*BSD News Article 66629


Return to BSD News archive

Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.development.system,comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,comp.os.linux.advocacy
Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.rmit.EDU.AU!news.unimelb.EDU.AU!munnari.OZ.AU!news.ecn.uoknor.edu!paladin.american.edu!news.jhu.edu!aplcenmp!night.primate.wisc.edu!sdd.hp.com!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!news.inap.net!news1!not-for-mail
From: root@dyson.iquest.net (John S. Dyson)
Subject: Re: Historic Opportunity facing Free Unix (was Re: The Lai/Baker paper, benchmarks, and the world of free UNIX)
X-Nntp-Posting-Host: dyson.iquest.net
Message-ID: <4l6tto$5mg@dyson.iquest.net>
Sender: news@iquest.net (News Admin)
Organization: John S. Dyson's Machine
References: <4ki055$60l@Radon.Stanford.EDU> <4l2u61$fdg@solaria.cc.gatech.edu> <4l4crd$nus@miso.cs.uq.edu.au> <31769650.284D5C90@lambert.org>
Date: Fri, 19 Apr 1996 02:31:20 GMT
Lines: 22
Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.development.system:22010 comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc:769 comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc:3414 comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc:3263 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:17885 comp.os.linux.advocacy:46676

In article <31769650.284D5C90@lambert.org>,
Terry Lambert  <terry@lambert.org> wrote:
>Warwick Allison wrote:
>] 
>] Too short sighted.  Did Netscape go and write a Word6 compatible
>] WWW browser?  No.  Applications *don't* live forever (Word6
>] cannot load Word3 documents, for example).
>
>For what it's worth, "The File Formats Handbook" by Born states
>that Word6 format is not documented because it is proprietary
>and only available under non-disclosure.
>
>So you would have a hell of a time legally writing a clone that
>could read the file formats in any event.
>
One FreeBSD contributor friend of my wrote a Word6 to Nroff approximate
converter -- he DID have to get the file format under non-disclosure.  From
what I hear it is complex and insecure.  However technically terrible it is,
it is probably the predominant Windows word processing file format.  Lots
of .DOC files lying around out there!!!

John