On 12/05/2015 11:15 AM, Pedro Côrte-Real wrote: > It doesn't work like that. Assume a simple TIFF-based format like the > Sony one. Suppose you come across a 16bit value encoded as a standard > TIFF_SHORT that says 15346 (made up number). You don't know what that > number means so when you rewrite the Copyright tag you just leave it > alone. Well guess what that number may very well be the offset to a > TIFF IFD (a subsection with more values) you didn't previously know > about. When in the future we do understand what it means that link > will be broken on that edited file.
Once again you are thinking of the generic. In the specific there are cases where the linkage fields are defined and other fields such as the GPS/location fields (see my earlier example) are defined. You are talking about a Joe-Random edit. I'm not. There is no need for a complete understanding of every field in every possible file, only an adequate understanding of the ones I use. You argument about bugs is more valid. All software has bugs, we know that. The software in the cameras from the vendors has bugs. We know that too. This is a given. Its inescapable. But its not a deterrent. There argument about a complete understanding is a weak one. There are many fields, engineering, medicine, agriculture, geology/mining, chemistry, politics and more, where we've had an incomplete understanding and still do, but that has never discouraged us from doing our best effort to work with that and to experiment. The real advantage we have here over many of those fields is, as Patric points out, that we can make backups and roll-back our experimental mistakes. But if we're afraid to experiment then this becomes a set of religious practices, a hide-bound tradition obsessed with conservatism. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Go from Idea to Many App Stores Faster with Intel(R) XDK Give your users amazing mobile app experiences with Intel(R) XDK. Use one codebase in this all-in-one HTML5 development environment. Design, debug & build mobile apps & 2D/3D high-impact games for multiple OSs. http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=254741911&iu=/4140 _______________________________________________ Darktable-users mailing list Darktable-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/darktable-users
