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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.bhp.com.au!mel.dit.csiro.au!munnari.OZ.AU!spool.mu.edu!usenet.eel.ufl.edu!arclight.uoregon.edu!news.bc.net!felix.junction.net!not-for-mail From: michael@memra.com (Michael Dillon) 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 Subject: Re: Historic Opportunity facing Free Unix (was Re: The Lai/Baker paper, benchmarks, and the world of free UNIX) Date: 3 May 1996 23:33:21 -0700 Organization: Memra Software Inc. - Internet consulting - http://www.memra.com Lines: 58 Message-ID: <4metnh$dio@sidhe.memra.com> References: <4ki055$60l@Radon.Stanford.EDU> <4mb38b$680@solaria.cc.gatech.edu> <4mckp4$34m@rigel.tm.informatik.uni-frankfurt.de> <4md20d$c2@solaria.cc.gatech.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: sidhe.memra.com Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.development.system:22988 comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc:923 comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc:3657 comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc:3494 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:18695 comp.os.linux.advocacy:47981 In article <4md20d$c2@solaria.cc.gatech.edu>, Byron A Jeff <byron@cc.gatech.edu> wrote: >>> word 6 to do the conversion is self defeating. I don't have Windows nor >>> Word 6 but I get quite a few Word 6 attachments. What do I do then? >>If somebody sends you a Word 6 attachment, bounce it right back where >>it came from and ask them to save it as ASCII or RTF for you instead. Nah, just use save it to disk and use "less" to read it. Ignore the warning about a binary file. Guess what, you will see all the text that the person *INTENDED* you to see plus some other stuff they may not have intended like scraps of previous versions and previous filenames that the document had. I got an Non-Disclosure Agreement in Word 6 format to sign because I was being considered to do a project. In the file I saw 4 other filenames that all were similarily constructed with people's surnames and a few other letters. This let me know three of the other people being considered to do the project and helped me market my skills in the best light by comparing with what I knew of them. One disadvantage is that it may be unclear about whether a block of text is a deleted scrap or the current document. But since the same thing would be seen by a Word 2.0 user, I just emailled back for confirmation, said I was using Word 2.0 and pointed out that this was actually a security risk and they were better off cutting and pasting the document into Eudora. They thanked me. And I did win out over the competing analysts. >With the response "Well everyone else I know can read my Word 6 attachments >as is? Why can't you? I was thinking about using FreeBSD/Linux, but if >it can't even read a simple Word file, why should I?" Anybody who thinks a Word file is simple should stay far away from freeBSD and Linux. >I'm not discussing practical issues here. I'm talking about vision. To have >any hope of competing in the desktop market, there must be a bridge >between where they (being the users of Microsoft products) are and where >you want them to be. That bridge doesn't exist. And each and every time >you tell them to go back to Microsoft to do the most simple task, it slaps >them in the face with "Free Unixes can't do the job". There are lots of people who use 1% of the capability of their MS software. Very soon we will be able to put together a FreeUNIX system that can do the job they need quite well. >That should be enough of a problem to justify the creation of a Word 6 to >anything else converter that runs on a Free Unix platform. A converter, yes. A WP no. If someone starts work on a Word 6 to ASCII or Word 6 to HTML converter right now, people could modify it in the future to do Word 6 to MyWPformat or integrate it into MyWP. -- Michael Dillon Voice: +1-604-546-8022 Memra Software Inc. Fax: +1-604-546-3049 http://www.memra.com E-mail: michael@memra.com