Chad Smith wrote:
On 10/28/05, M. Fioretti <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
In any case, please just ignore your (or my) own files. Nobody else
cares about them. This is about millions of public and corporate
documents which is essential to keep COMPLETELY legible in fifty years
time. WHATEVER they contain. Be it macros (**), complex tables and
equations, formulas....
Hmm...
50 years....
Do you think anyone could read a computer file from 50 years ago today?
Not without some *very* specialized tools - IE hardware *and* software.
There is one format - I'm not sure if its an international standard or not,
but I'm pretty sure its an open format - that existed 50 years ago that is
still in use today - actually much moreso than it was then. It doesn't take
any special equipment, or software, or hardware to read. Although it does
take a little bit of training.
It's called *PAPER*.
If something is important enough to be needed 50 years from now, I sure as
heck hope *SOMEONE* has the forethought to print it out!
In 50 years, I doubt anyone will own a desktop computer. In 50 years, I
doubt many people's computers (in whatever form they exist then) will be
equipped to read CD-ROMs or IDE hard drives. They'll probably look and act
*very* different than they do today.
In the year 2055, when people access the GoogleNet through their free
nano-implants, I severally doubt it will matter what file format the
government saved my electronic birth certificate in. You really think this
propriatary DRM RIAA MPAA stuff is going to hold up technologically to 50
years of hackers, crackers, white hats, and black hats? You think it's going
to hold up legally when the Napster generation is in control of the
government?
And, as far as Andrew's statement being "absurd", OOo *DOES* open MSO stuff
- and so do hundreds of other non-MS programs. If every piece of MSO
Software on earth disappeared, through some sort of mega-virus, or
"miracle", the *DATA* of the files said in their ultra-secret, evil, litttle
propriatary software will be completely intact.
You don't save data in macros. Macros manipulate data - not store it. You
don't save Data in formating. And besides, formatting remains intact a large
amount of the time on a large amount of non-MS software.
You are afraid of nothing. The boogieman isn't going to steal your driver's
liscence out of your pocket, or your savings out of your online bank
account. These records exist, today, in a readable format that will remain a
readable format as long as people have computers. Not just MSO and OOo, but
virutally *EVERY* piece of office suite/business pak/productivity/word
processing software *IN THE WORLD* can open, edit, read, and save MSO
formats. You *will not* lose your identity because the wicked government
saved your social security number in a evil MS format.
-Chad Smith
Chad,
You miss one point on this. Paper is a financial pain to go through.
Read some old books on hacking in the banking industry. You will
find that court cases against inside hackers never proceeded because
the paper trail was just to complicated to go through.
The issue is how to put todays data into a format that can be read in
50 or 100 years. Heck, we have problems reading digital data from 10
years ago due to proprietary technology. We are looking at Open file
formats for "all" of our data. Much of it is not documentation.
Heck, we want to find a format that will allow us to just mix the
different forms of data in one application.
This is where XML is coming into play. There are XML formats that
will work with 95% of our data. Archiving the data on paper is not an
option anymore. It is impossible to even go through the amount of
data we generate in one hour if it was printed. Heck, I work with
multi-gig files.
Don't focus on the past but on the future. Look at the mistakes from
the past and don't repeat them or leave todays data in a format that
won't work in even two years.
I moved to open formats after receiving a CD full of data that was
created in CorelDraw and other programs that needed to be converted.
No version of CorelDraw that I had access to would open the files. I
had to find a copy of CorelDraw that would. After a few months, I
succeeded. I copied all the files into standard formats such as PDF
or OOo 1.1 formats. I also burned a copy of OOo on the DVD. I will
convert all the files to ODF now that 2.0 is out. Now I know that
files will be able to be opened in the future.
-
Robin Laing
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