Well, I certainly didn't mean to start a controversy, but I for one have
found this discussion quite interesting.
I am not competent to have much of an opinion about the technicalities
here. I can understand the explanation that identifying the format in
the file type makes it possible for other programs to make use of it.
But it also seems to me that there it's possible to make a distinction between
what I would call data-structure and what I (in my ignorance) think of as "file
type." Tab-delimited, for example, is a data structure, and yet the
tab-delimited files and comma-delimited files written by just about all programs
-- including Microsoft Excel 2001 -- are files of type "TEXT" on a Mac.
I will tell you how it looks from where I sit -- in a mere user's chair. It
looks like Entourage files are written to a file format that cannot be directly
read by any other programs. Whether this is because the other programs made a
mistake in the past by not having one of Microsoft's good ideas, or whether
Microsoft is throwing its weight around, I do not much care. What matters to me
is that it's too doggone hard for an ordinary user to get his data out of
Entourage.
What I would have suggested, had Microsoft asked me for advice, is that
Entourage itself provide the user with an option. THAT certainly seems to
conform to Macintosh practice.
Will
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P O L Y T R O P E * Houston, Texas
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