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List:       koffice
Subject:    M$ Word filter? And more standard formats
From:       "Schmidt, Frank-Andreas" <Frank-Andreas.Schmidt () sig ! siemens ! de>
Date:       1999-11-26 8:12:46
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> A very well put reply. This has always been a traditional problem, that
> of having no standard. Come to think of it , even KDE's image viewer doesnot
> read gimp's .xcf file. So kword's file format will be another one among many.
> While kword will read and write to a few other file formats , this still doesnt
> solve the problem.
> 
I agree. And what is more: Does KSpread have a standardized format on saving data ?
And what about KPresenter ?

I mean itīs time to think about a new way to store data.
As "dep" mentioned 500k docs are easy to store and forward with the means of today.

So why not take XML into account ?
In my opinion Microsoft is slowly moving toward this format to store data. The last \
version of their PowerPoint converts presentations automatically into html-files and \
gifs. Next step would be to have -sort of- XML, see Office2000.

So what about the following:
Choose XML.
Letīs handle text and graphics separately. Means that text has links to graphics and \
so on. At save time grab all the files of the document and sent them through the \
tar/gz or bz2 algorithm to store all data into one file. At load time process vice \
versa. For the user it will be easy to handle the document:
Itīs size is small, so he can sent it via mail.
One can untar the doc-file and use the files separetly.
The docs can easily put to the web
Data can be processed with other programs, too. 
Choose XML because it will be a standard to the industry in less than 3 ys.

Well, there have to be import/export filters, too. But these are mainly to support \
users that want to switch their docs to the new format. They will take into account \
that the import fails or is incomplete in some cases, but they will use the programs \
native format for the future because it has advantages. 

Seeing forward to the answers of the community,

	Frank


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