[austechwriter] Re: UK government gets bitten by Microsoft Word
- From: Peter Sanders <psanders@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 03 Jul 2003 14:42:15 +0800
Hi Michael
On Thu, 3 Jul 2003 15:47:51 +1000, Michael West <mbwest@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
>> The people that use word DO NOT know all the idiocyncrasies of MS Word.
>> They are the users that are referred to in many of our emails. Word is
>> one of those applications that BLOAT documents with all and sundry
>> information and much of the time Word does not have the intelligence to
>> remove none needed information.
>
> Fiddlesticks. The revision logs are there because some people need them,
> not because of an idiosyncrasy.
I stand by what I said in my earlier email. Yes, the revision logs are not
an idiosyncrasy, however Word DOES have idiosyncrasies, call them quirks if
you prefer. If this was not true then we would not have all the email on so
many of Word's problems. Bulleted lists amd numbering come to mind.
I did indicate within my previous email that ...
> Certainly there is a valid need for the facilties offered within Word,
> for use within authoring/editing.
Word documents DO retain "stuff" that they NO LONGER NEED. There is a
method that I have read about (that I do not recall) that will reduce some
of this BLOAT. I do not recall the exact details - something like opening
the doc and then saving it again, or under a different name to clear the
glut! No doubt you know of this "method" too.
> Word is powerful tool that many use without
> adequate training,
Yes of course, I have yet to meet someone that has attended anything other
than a simple nightschool course, eg "Beginners Guide to Word / Word
Processing" etc.
> and the result is stuff-ups like the one that hit the papers this
> morning.
Of course.
> It is a simple matter to strip out revision logs and other metadata
That may well be so, but to be brutally honest I have never done it nor had
the need to do it (AFAIK). If I ever did know how to strip out this data I
have long ago forgotten.
> -- but clerical people need to be told about it.
Yes but who is going to do it?
> That's our job.
I don't think so. Microsoft's information/help files/options should easily
and readily provide such options. Granted it must be there within the help
etc, but how could a user be expected to know what to look for when they
DON'T even KNOW they need to look for something??
> Too bad the highly-paid dolts running that government
> office didn't do their jobs properly as custodians of
> sensitive information by seeing to it that adequate
> documentation and training were provided (not to mention
> basic security precautions).
What else is new? :-)
> Blaming the tool for bureaucratic incompetence is asinine.
The tool is open to blame by being overly complex for relatively simple
needs of such publishing and yet NOT readily providing warnings / options
of disclosing such contents when publishing to the web etc.
Yes, there is also a need for "somebody" to oversee such data being
presented on the web et al. Governments being what they are will be forever
cost cutting and there will never be such a "proofreader". I behoves the
tool manufacturer to help wherever possible.
Gun manufacturers provide safety catches on their guns so people cannot
accidentally shoot themselves in the foot. Why can't Microsoft provide a
"safety catch" when publishing Word docs to the web etc.
There is no doubt that Microsoft cannot be held liable for others' (ir)
responsible publishing. In fact if you read M$ license agreements M$ are
not responsible / liable for anything :-)
Regards
Peter
--
Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/
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