Subject: Re: Word Exporter Project
From: Paul Rohr (paul@abisource.com)
Date: Thu Mar 02 2000 - 12:20:36 CST
Sam,
This is an interesting proposal. There seem to be at least two potential
approaches to Word compatibility in play here:
1. Export to older (binary) versions of the Word format
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This way, users can edit and exchange documents with folks who have *any*
version of Word, including older ones. This would also allow
interoperability with existing users of any other products which support
that format. Plus which, it makes for a great testbed for ensuring that
we've achieved internal round-trip fidelity with the matching importer.
2. Export to the latest (hacked HTML mess) version of the Word format
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This way, users can edit and exchange documents with ... who? Just people
who've paid the big bucks to upgrade to the very latest version of Word?
Ick.
bottom line
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Obviously, we can't solve every problem for everyone, but I think that
option #1 would solve the needs of a *lot* more people, whereas option #2
helps MSFT sell copies of Office 2000.
In short, I'd prefer to see us focus our exporter efforts on increasing our
compatibility with document formats that are already in widespread use.
After all, the XML-style document format we want everyone to start using is
*ours*, not MSFT's hacked-up mess, right?
Paul
PS: If you're still interested in going ahead with this project, please
reread my manifesto on importers and exporters:
http://www.abisource.com/mailinglists/abiword-dev/00/January/0486.html
Did you mean to suggest that this particular Word format should be
write-only? If so, why?
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