From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,666bab5bfbdf30c2 X-Google-NewGroupId: yes X-Google-Attributes: gida07f3367d7,domainid0,public,usenet X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news2.google.com!news1.google.com!npeer03.iad.highwinds-media.com!news.highwinds-media.com!feed-me.highwinds-media.com!post01.iad.highwinds-media.com!news.flashnewsgroups.com-b7.4zTQh5tI3A!not-for-mail From: Stephen Leake Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Generating PDFs with Ada References: <4d2908c7$0$22120$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net> <9f23e50a-2c2c-4ccc-bd56-f6ffdc6c7ee7@37g2000prx.googlegroups.com> <82aaj73jsr.fsf@stephe-leake.org> <9600f7e1-496b-4232-a5b8-50bc97d8dd7a@g26g2000vbi.googlegroups.com> <87tyhfgu5y.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org> <87lj2rgkaz.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org> Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2011 04:42:17 -0500 Message-ID: <82mxn61mrq.fsf@stephe-leake.org> User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.2 (windows-nt) Cancel-Lock: sha1:V4jSmm7HtFz0ol7IMdO+wJrTsng= MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Complaints-To: abuse@flashnewsgroups.com Organization: FlashNewsgroups.com X-Trace: 27d774d2d7769e029e66100426 Xref: g2news2.google.com comp.lang.ada:17360 Date: 2011-01-12T04:42:17-05:00 List-Id: Ludovic Brenta writes: > > This is only half true. Their interest is to make their software > backward compatible (to ease migration to newer versions of their > software) but forward incompatible (to *force* migration to newer > versions of their software, aka planned obsolescence, and break > competitors' tools, aka total dominance). The only reason why they have > published some specifications (the "Microsoft Open Specification > Promise") is because "open" has become a buzzword and they want to be > "buzzword compliant" and combat the rise of actual open standards. > Remember: standards exist to protect customers against greedy vendors, > not the opposite. Me, I'll choose a Standard over a Promise every time. +10 > Like Stephe, I too hope that nobody writes a library that helps generate > .doc files. My reason reason is that such a tool would endorse the > proprietary format and help continue the dominance of evil proprietary > formats against standard ones. The same tool could be just as useful > writing PDF, DocBook, OpenDocument or even Plain Text instead of any > version of .doc. Software engineers should promote standards whenever > possible, whatever language they use. +10 -- -- Stephe