On 20 Sep 2007 at 4:42, Dennis W. Manasco wrote: > At 9:05 AM -0400 9/17/07, David W. Fenton wrote: > > >But a journal accepting submissings for publication has to be more > >versatile in what it can accept, > > But, if they have acceptance standards, why can they not enforce them?
A red herring. I'm not even beginning to suggest that they have no rights to set their own format standards. I'm only questioning the logic behind accepting DOC but not DOCX. > To put it in very Victorian terms: If their standards say that they > accept only typewritten copy, should they accept hand-written script > on a pack of envelopes? No. But there are good, logical justifications in that example for accepting one and rejecting the other. I don't see any such justifications in the case of DOC vs. DOCX. > >since many times the end users of Microsoft products are not > >actually aware of the document format > >issues involved. > > I think somebody could feel insulted by that. Look, I make my living as a computer consultant, supporting all kinds of users. I know that many people are completely oblivious to the underpinnings of their software and most can't accomplish anything with the SAVE AS TYPE dropdown. Most don't even know it's there. Indeed, I have clients who have Word documents named document1.doc, document2.doc and so forth. These are *very* smart people in realms outside computer software, but they just don't pay attention to these kinds of things, and I'm not sure they should have to. > It's probably just "end users of Microsoft products" who are not > "actually aware," so I guess it's not something I should worry about. Er, we're talking about a "problem" that is specific to Microsoft products, i.e., the new file format, so I don't think it's odd to restrict the comments about making those users do something special to the users of MS products. > >why shouldn't they also accept the new MS Word format? > > Because it impairs their workflow and they find the new format unnecessary? It oughtn't do the former, and the fact is that the latter is irrelevant, as by choosing to accept MS document formats, they put themselves under MS's control in regard to changes MS makes in those formats. > >>To allow .docx would require them to change their workflow. That's > >>an expensive choice when the option is to merely disallow .docx. > > > >It doesn't necessarily change their workflow. > > Their workflow does not incorporate .docx. Oh, come on -- they buy a copy of Office 2007 or install the converters in whatever version of Word they have and convert to whatever format is needed by their publishing software. > To incorporate .docx in their workflow would change their workflow by > adding translators and/or other programs. It could add a whole 2 minutes to the process!!!!! > How does the inclusion of .docx not "necessarily change their workflow?" How does it change it in any significant way? Once you're accepting a proprietary format, you've ceded control to the company that owns that format. Accepting DOC means MS controls what you're going to get, and when MS introduces DOCX that means you should adapt. My bet is that 3 years from now, all these organizations rejecting DOCX will reverse themselves. > >>Without a _full_ description it _cannot_ become an international standard. > > > >I haven't followed the details, but I thought the objectsion were > >not to the documentation but to the capabilities of it (or maybe the > >implementation details). > > Microsoft has posited .docx as an international standard. Yes. So what? > To be accepted as an international standard any submission must be > entirely transparent: It's documentation must totally, fully and > completely describe it. > > The .docx submission did not pass this test. And all of this is completely irrelevant to the discussion, as DOC is not an ISO standard. > IMHO that seems totally imbecilic on Microsoft's part. ISO > recognition and recommendation is too important to flub. > > The only conclusion I can draw is that Microsoft doesn't fully > understand the format themselves. > > (Or that they are playing a typical Microsoft game and trying to > sneak through a "standard" that others won't be able to fully > replicate, so that they can use some obscure hooks in it with the > next generation of their OS and programs.) While interesting, and debatable, all of this seems completely orthogonal to the discussion I was involved in. > >Huh. I have assisted with two different academic music journals and > >neither of them was automated at all. > > You might want to check out JOSA (a/b), JAMA, APS (Phys. Rev. A..E, > etc.), Nature, Science, Physics Today, etc. > > They are extremely automated in their journal production. Even Grove was not automated back in 2000 when I submitted my two articles and assisted in creating the works list for the article on Franz Liszt. > >>Normal human beings don't need to deal with extraneous hassles for > >>which they see no benefit. > > > >Which is exactly why the journals should accept docx, so that those > >submitting articles don't need to worry about it. > > Thus the supplicant should be exempted from the rules of the master? If you're accepting submissions you're the point of control -- you're the one with the knowledge of the formats. It's your area of specialization. It makes more sense to use the expertise at the choke point than at all the end points where the content originates. My bet is that they're going to get DOCX submissions anyway, and then spend an inordinate amount of time rejecting those submissions, and, in the case of articles they want to publish, they'll be helping the people convert to DOC, or they'll be converting it themselves. Seems to me like they are making an awful lot of extra work for themselves for not good reason whatsoever (given how easy it is to get Word 2007 or install the converters; and I remind my readers that I excepted math journals, since that's a special case). > >>>>>The *.docx format serves a completely different purpose than PDF > >>>> > >>>>That is not my interpretation of Microsoft's repeated assertions. > >>> > >>>MS has a completely different portable document format whose name I forget. > >> > >>I'd appreciate knowing it. > >> > >>To the best of my knowledge .docx was the format that would knock > >>Adobe off it's pedestal and conquer the world as the Great New > >>Document Language... > > > >It's called XPS (i.e., XML Paper Specification). See: > > > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML_Paper_Specification > > I had never heard of it before. > > I do like the header notation from Wikipedia: > > <quote> > > This article or section is written like an advertisement. > Please help rewrite this article from a neutral point of view. > Mark blatant advertising for speedy deletion, using {{db-spam}}. > > </quote> > > Regardless, what I have repeatedly read in the trade press is that > Microsoft was positioning .docx as the undoing of PDF. I would say that those articles were written by the usual suspects, the computer press writers who are completely clueless about what they are writing about. > Since .docx is XML and XPS is an "XML Paper Specification" and .docx > is a "paper specification" it looks to me like this is just a new PR > wrapper around .docx to rename it XPS. Do you really not understand the difference between a page description format and a data storage format? > >And, as I said, it serves a completely different purpose than docx > >and all the other Office file formats -- it's a page description > >format for portability, not a data storage format specific to > >specific applications. > > That is contrary to what I've read in the press: > > Microsoft was promoting .docx as a self-contained and portable > alternative to PDF. Now it is (apparently, though not vociferously) > promoting XPS, but I see no difference other than the name. This is simply wrong. It is *not* what MS has been doing, and anyone who had been paying attention over the last 3 years would know this. > >And all that said, PDF is not an open format, either. It was easy to > >reverse engineer, precisely because PostScript is a plain-text > >page-description language, but it is no more an ISO standard than > >docx. > > PDF has been fully described.. Because it is a text format. > Adobe first published the complete PDF specification for use without > restriction in 1993 > > See: <http://www.adobe.com/pdf/release_pdf_faq.html> > > Is it an ISO standard? > > Yes. > > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDF/A> > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDF/X> I didn't know that. PostScript still has to be licensed, though, so you can't really produce a PDF without using a proprietary format. And, of course, Adobe is working on a successor to PDF, anyway. -- David W. Fenton http://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
