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List:       koffice
Subject:    Re: file formats [Re: Question about your KPresenter's review]
From:       Catherine Olanich Raymond <cathy () thyrsus ! com>
Date:       2002-03-13 4:38:36
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On Monday 11 March 2002 03:47 am, Vadim Plessky wrote:
> On Monday 11 March 2002 01:18, Catherine Olanich Raymond wrote:
> |   On Friday 08 March 2002 05:40 am, Vadim Plessky wrote:
> |   [text cut here]
>
> It depends how you count :-)
> mp3 [sorry for off-topic here] is not just "let's rip our own disks"
> ideology. Without significant compression (appx. 1:10), you were not able
> to distribute music to wide audience, even with modern broadband (ADSL,
> xDSL, cable, T1) connection.
> So, on top of "being digital and small in size", it has opened new audience
> and new markets.
> One of those markets is "listening to the mp3 music in your car"
> I know it's still emerging, but it's coming.
>
> And... the same is valid for KWord/XML.
> Can you imagine viewing MS Word document in your car, say, on built-in or
> optional TFT LCD display (GPRS, DVD, etc.)?
> I can't.
> And you *can* view KWord docs on such embedded devices, due to XML
> flexibility. You just need to right correct CSS stylesheets, that's it.
> "XHTML Basic" suits exactly such applications, and was designed, by the
> way, with "mobile phones in mind".
>
> Therefor, you can use KWord fo normal wordprocessing tasks for now, and
> later use it for Digital Publishing - on different medias.
> (from mobile phones to PDAs to multimedia kiosks to computers)

Rob Landley had some comments about this analogy, Vadim, which I'm still 
thinking about.  I'll take this on in another posting.




> |   Eric, Rob and I are thinking about a follow-up presentation to Drag.net
> | (for a future LinuxWorld?) that would have a "Blues Brothers" theme and
> | talk about our (especially mine) testing of various different apps for
> | the basic functions I need.  Maybe the "windows and macintosh" /Country
> | and Western" analogy will fit into it.  :-)
>
> In my opinion, Windows is very close to "Bad Boys Blue" music.
> Have you visoted Microsoft site recently? It's completely in Blue color,
> changing variations from time to time.

Yes.  Actually, I think of MS as being a lot closer to Muzak--bland, slick, 
like the interior of a moderately priced hotel room.


> |   > One of the key questions is how powerfull the Content Owner.
> |   > Imagine for a minute: "Lord of The Rings" is available only in KWord
> |   > format (say, for on-line sales or downloading)
> |   > What will happen in this case?
> |   > I guess most people who want to read this book, will buy some Linux
> |   > distribution, install KOffice - just in order to get / read famous
> |   > book. (I do not discuss copy protection here)
> |
> |   I understand the analogy.  But, of course, that is not the world we
> | live in. Here, KWord is a minority format at this point.
>
> Ah, The World is getting more and more strange every day. And more
> dangerous...
> I am not sure anymore what exactly world we are living at. :-)
>
> Anyway, children are growing, and they are visiting schools.
> If we can manage to get KDE into schools - than in 5-7 years we can have
> KOffice in offices.
>

Perhaps.  But first we have to *get it there.* 



> |   > Problem with Star Office that it can't support Cyrillic correctly.
> |   > People who tried it here suggested that a whole StarOffice is a joke,
> |   > nothing more. Hope Sun will fix it for upcoming StarOffice6 - but my
> |   > impression that Sun's goal is to ditch Microsoft, not to bring out
> |   > "perfect product".
> |
> |   Probably true.  If more people used Cyrillic, though, it would be a
> | different story. :-)
>
> Yes, I know - 250 mln. is not a lot. :-)
> But I am not sure in Chineese support in StarOffice, either. (and that's
> over 1 billion of people)

True.  But Chinese support raises issues that don't come up with regard to 
English or Cyrillic.  And it's my understanding that the Chinese are working 
on their own software to handle the support problem.  They aren't likely to 
influence whether a Linux application or an MS application will handle the 
format problems of the rest of the world.


> I heard that SO6 will have Asian languages support, but don't know to what
> extent (and wether it will be able to print in those languages, or just
> display on screen?)

I wouldn't bet on it's being very extensive, if it truly provides any kind of 
support for Chinese....



> |   I gather Open Office doesn't support Cyrillic either...?
>
> I need to check. Don't know yet...
> I tried to download StarOffice6 beta from Sun site couple of months ago,
> but download process was always stopping in the middle (after 50MB). And
> server was rejecting to restore download.

Sun's people told me at LinuxWorld that 6.0 wouldn't be out till May.  And I 
read a news article recently saying that it would only be available for free 
to people who have Solaris systems; Linux and Windows users will have to pay 
a license fee.  

So you're not likely to get to try it out for free, not anymore...




>   Probably, reason for this is HUGE size of that RPM - 69MB.
> One more argument in favour of KOffice :-)

KOffice has a lot to recommend it.  Now if it only allowed me to edit Word 
documents... :-)


-- 
Cathy Raymond <cathy@thyrsus.com>

"The meeting of personalities is like the contact of chemical substances; 
if there is any reaction, both are transformed."  Carl Jung
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