A thought on non-paper books
James Nicoll
player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
If only there were some analogous material to put in an
non-Dead Tree format book. Problem is, it probably amounts to
a lot more work for the author and production team and where
movies have armies of people working on them with budgets
to match, books do not.
--
"Don't worry. It's just a bunch of crazies who believe in only one
god. They're just this far away from atheism."
Wayne & Schuster
Brenda W. Clough
James Nicoll wrote:
> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a DVD
> player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
> I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
>
> If only there were some analogous material to put in an
> non-Dead Tree format book. Problem is, it probably amounts to
> a lot more work for the author and production team and where
> movies have armies of people working on them with budgets
> to match, books do not.
That would have been an ideal format for all the appendices at the back of
LOTR. Or for those long research bibiliographies OTOH, these days, is it not
sufficient to put material like this up on the author's web page? Everyone
who really wants to find it can get it there.
Brenda
--
---------
Brenda W. Clough, author of DOORS OF DEATH AND LIFE
Reading on Wednesday December 19th at 7 pm
at KGB Bar, 85 east 4th St., New York City
http://www.sff.net/people/Brenda/
J.B. Moreno
> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a DVD
> player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
> I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
>
> If only there were some analogous material to put in an
> non-Dead Tree format book. Problem is, it probably amounts to
> a lot more work for the author and production team and where
> movies have armies of people working on them with budgets
> to match, books do not.
Other than extra for the appendix in milsf, I don't think there's much
they /could/ add --- maybe extra artwork?
--
JBM
"Your depression will be added to my own" -- Marvin of Borg
Nancy Lebovitz
Brenda W. Clough <clo...@erols.com> wrote:
>James Nicoll wrote:
>
>> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a DVD
>> player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
>> I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
>>
>> If only there were some analogous material to put in an
>> non-Dead Tree format book. Problem is, it probably amounts to
>> a lot more work for the author and production team and where
>> movies have armies of people working on them with budgets
>> to match, books do not.
>
>That would have been an ideal format for all the appendices at the back of
>LOTR. Or for those long research bibiliographies OTOH, these days, is it not
>sufficient to put material like this up on the author's web page? Everyone
>who really wants to find it can get it there.
Web pages are unreliable--they only stay up if someone is making sure
that they stay hosted. CDs aren't eternal either, but at least there
are more copies of them.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Michael S. Schiffer
<1f4tjok.109edufwjx8mhN%pl...@newsreaders.com>:
Just working from analogy with DVDs, there's deleted scenes, interviews
with the author and editor, background material (notes, timelines,
etc.), author commentary (a la the 1993 Hugo CD's annotations to _A Fire
Upon the Deep_), alternative edits if any were produced (I suspect that
there's a segment of the audience that would like to see Banks'
original, chronological _Use of Weapons_ to compare with the final
product), and translations into other languages (or the original
language in the case of a translation). For books with sufficient
stature, you could add in essays on the books by other people and a
biography of the author.
Mike
Wim Lewis
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a DVD
>player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
>I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
>
> If only there were some analogous material to put in an
Case in point, the much-desired, rarely-to-be-had annotated edition
of _A Fire Upon the Deep_. Some authors' supplementary material
would me more interesting than others', of course. C J Cherryh would
probably be able to supply a book's worth of interesting margin notes
and socialogical background. For other books, having that much explicit
information on the world of the story might spoil the effect.
--
Wim Lewis <wi...@hhhh.org>, Seattle, WA, USA. PGP keyID 27F772C1
My ambition is to have all [my] arguments seem annoyingly plausible -Joe Slater
Pardoz
> Other than extra for the appendix in milsf, I don't think there's much
> they /could/ add --- maybe extra artwork?
Depends on the author, I think. Ever read Howard Waldrop's "The
Annotated Jetboy", which weighs in at about 50% higher wordcount than the
original? (I'd *love* to see a fully-annotated compilation of Waldrop, since
for every reference I get I have the sneaking suspicion I'm missing two
more).
--
The Law of Raspberry Jam - The wider any culture is spread, the thinner it
gets. (Alvin Toffler)
Ron Bean
ms...@mail.com (Michael S. Schiffer) writes:
>Just working from analogy with DVDs, there's deleted scenes, interviews
>with the author and editor, background material (notes, timelines,
>etc.)
I'd love to see Neal Stephenson's research notes. He says "it's
just research", but he must do a lot of it.
IMHO he should write more non-fiction.
Evelyn C. Leeper
>
> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a DVD
> player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
> I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
Well, if that's SHREK, no one can figure out how they came up with
the "11 hours" figure.
--
Evelyn C. Leeper
http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
"A free society is one where it is safe to be unpopular."
--Adlai Stevenson
MJ Stoddard
<a02rvr$s...@netaxs.com>:
Most academic libraries still regard paper as the best archival medium.
I haven't seen any SF that presents a better medium other than group
memory.
Paper, in a well-protected archive, generally doesn't disapear.
The archive is not charged (a lot) every year for access to older
materials.
Paper is very difficult to change without leaving traces.
Paper is easy to read.
Acid-free paper lasts for at least 500 years, longer with good care.
Paper is easy to copy, either to more paper (camera, photocopier) or to
electronic format (digital camera, OCR scanning -- see numerous copies
of LOTR on web!).
The main disadvantages are: size, temperature and humidity
requirements, and local-access constraints.
Web pages disappear, or charge for access, or change the data to suit
current theories. Reading a web page without a 20th/21st century
computer is difficult; how many ASCII machines will be common in 2502?
While web archiving projects are underway, many publishers still refuse
to participate <http://www.publiclibraryofscience.org/>.
CDROM is an imperfect archival material: unproven durability, reading
requires a 20th/21st century CDROM player. Materials must be
transferred to other media after a century or so, or whenever the CDROM
becomes passe'. Think -- if you had a stack of 1000 CDROMs, from which
the pretty plastic graphics had long disappeared -- how would you sort
them for conservation/preservation? Just like the unreadable Greek
books in medieval monasteries, they'd be trashed.
Any electronic format is subject to the durability of its player and
the quality of its external labelling.
OBSF: Weber's _With the lightnings_ touches on this.
Robert A. Woodward
stod...@u.arizona.edu (MJ Stoddard) wrote:
<SNIP re: data archives and storage formats>
>
> Any electronic format is subject to the durability of its player and
> the quality of its external labelling.
>
> OBSF: Weber's _With the lightnings_ touches on this.
>
I assume that you mean David Drake's _With the Lightnings_.
--
robe...@drizzle.com http://www.drizzle.com/~robertaw/
rawoo...@aol.com
J.B. Moreno
> Most academic libraries still regard paper as the best archival medium.
> I haven't seen any SF that presents a better medium other than group
> memory.
-snip-
> Web pages disappear, or charge for access, or change the data to suit
> current theories. Reading a web page without a 20th/21st century
> computer is difficult; how many ASCII machines will be common in 2502?
Bah. It's requires a 20th century technology level as a minimum, higher
tech isn't a problem. As for ASCII in 2502? Wouldn't surprise me if
the answer was "all of them".
> CDROM is an imperfect archival material: unproven durability, reading
> requires a 20th/21st century CDROM player. Materials must be
> transferred to other media after a century or so, or whenever the CDROM
> becomes passe'.
-snip-
> Any electronic format is subject to the durability of its player and
> the quality of its external labelling.
The electronic format has the advantage of being able to be updated
automatically if set up that way -- it can happen without any human
intervention, which isn't something you can say for paper or any other
medium.
> OBSF: Weber's _With the lightnings_ touches on this.
Drake's.
Andrew Wheeler
>
> MJ Stoddard <stod...@u.arizona.edu> wrote:
>
> > Most academic libraries still regard paper as the best
> > archival medium. I haven't seen any SF that presents a
> > better medium other than group memory.
> -snip-
> > Web pages disappear, or charge for access, or change the
> > data to suit current theories. Reading a web page without
> > a 20th/21st century computer is difficult; how many ASCII
> > machines will be common in 2502?
>
> Bah. It's requires a 20th century technology level as a
> minimum, higher tech isn't a problem. As for ASCII in 2502?
> Wouldn't surprise me if the answer was "all of them".
Well, the old large-size floppies are essentially unreadable today
(aside from specialists), and there are a lot of orphaned operating
systems and formats. Sinclair, anyone? (Of course, by mentioning this,
I invoke the Usenet rule and will soon see posts by five people who
still use Sinclairs, including one poor soul who's posting using one)
This is all within twenty years; computer media from two decades ago
are difficult and time-consuming to read. Books from two *centuries*
ago are as readable as they ever were and books can last two
*millennia* with care.
I don't want to overstate the case -- as far as I know, nothing has
become unretrievable due to being only in a digital format. But
archivists want a stable medium that will be supported over the long
term (long being at least decades and preferably centuries). Computers
are still on the sharp side of the growth curve, which means their
strengths don't map very well onto archival uses.
>The electronic format has the advantage of being able to be
>updated automatically if set up that way -- it can happen
>without any human intervention, which isn't something you can
>say for paper or any other medium.
But this could also be a detriment -- imagine the Stalinist USSR able
to instantly "erase" all of those made non-persons, as soon as it
happened. Books are relatively tamper-resistant (or at least
tamper-evident) compared to digital formats. "Instantly able to be
changed" can be equivalent to "not to be trusted." (For another
possible use, closer to our supposed topic, this would make re-editing
novels to, say, delete all references to "newshens" or "slide rules"
quite easy -- and more intrusive edits would also be much easier.)
I'll also say that "able to be updated automatically" (even assuming
only updates for good purposes) is a long stretch of turnpike from
"will be" or even "in anyone's plans or dreams."
--
Andrew Wheeler
Editor, SF Book Club (USA) -- speaking only for myself
No Ideas But In Things!
Terry Austin
>This is all within twenty years; computer media from two decades ago
>are difficult and time-consuming to read. Books from two *centuries*
>ago are as readable as they ever were and books can last two
>*millennia* with care.
99.9999999999999% of the books from two centuries ago no longer exist.
Digital data can be copied infinitely with perfection.
Which do you think will be easier (and more successful): Copying old digital
data to a new hard drive (routine among those who replace such thing) or
keeping a book being printed on today's shit paper from crumbling to dust
within a century?
>
>I don't want to overstate the case -- as far as I know, nothing has
>become unretrievable due to being only in a digital format.
In fact, some has. The data from the first Mars lander comes to mind, in
fact, because the only guy who knew the format died.
>But
>archivists want a stable medium that will be supported over the long
>term (long being at least decades and preferably centuries). Computers
>are still on the sharp side of the growth curve, which means their
>strengths don't map very well onto archival uses.
With a little thought about format - ASCII is a good choice - in a network
environment, digital storage actually takes deliberate thought to *not*
preserve.
>
>>The electronic format has the advantage of being able to be
>>updated automatically if set up that way -- it can happen
>>without any human intervention, which isn't something you can
>>say for paper or any other medium.
>
>But this could also be a detriment -- imagine the Stalinist USSR able
>to instantly "erase" all of those made non-persons, as soon as it
>happened. Books are relatively tamper-resistant (or at least
>tamper-evident) compared to digital formats.
Not if you burn them. And digital data is several orders of magnitude easier
to replicate and distribute. Try to shove a book through a phone line to a
couple dozen foreign friends.
>"Instantly able to be
>changed" can be equivalent to "not to be trusted." (For another
>possible use, closer to our supposed topic, this would make re-editing
>novels to, say, delete all references to "newshens" or "slide rules"
>quite easy -- and more intrusive edits would also be much easier.)
In other words, there are advantages and disadvantages to both, and they are
not the *same* advantages and disadvantages.
>
>I'll also say that "able to be updated automatically" (even assuming
>only updates for good purposes) is a long stretch of turnpike from
>"will be" or even "in anyone's plans or dreams."
And? "Able to be" is superior to "unable to be." If it doesn't happen, that
is the not fault of the medium, and people who do not update electronic data
as needed will not keep books cool and dry. Stupidity is stupidity in any
medium.
--
Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com>
http://www.hyperbooks.com/
Metacreator character software now available
Alan Barclay
Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>Well, the old large-size floppies are essentially unreadable today
>(aside from specialists), and there are a lot of orphaned operating
>systems and formats. Sinclair, anyone? (Of course, by mentioning this,
Physical formats are becoming less and less relevent. With
networking, both local & wide area, it's easy for data to be
transfered across operating systems and physical formats.
However file formats are definatly relevent. A file format such
as Word is essentially impossible to decipher. This means
either the original program, or a massive amount of work.
This is one of the reasons why I recommend simple text based
formats whenever possible. I forsee a movement from ISO-8859-1
to UTF-8, but the 7 bits of ASCII will remain constant forever.
J.B. Moreno
> "J.B. Moreno" wrote:
> >
> > MJ Stoddard <stod...@u.arizona.edu> wrote:
> >
> > > Most academic libraries still regard paper as the best
> > > archival medium. I haven't seen any SF that presents a
> > > better medium other than group memory.
> > -snip-
> > > Web pages disappear, or charge for access, or change the
> > > data to suit current theories. Reading a web page without
> > > a 20th/21st century computer is difficult; how many ASCII
> > > machines will be common in 2502?
> >
> > Bah. It's requires a 20th century technology level as a
> > minimum, higher tech isn't a problem. As for ASCII in 2502?
> > Wouldn't surprise me if the answer was "all of them".
>
> Well, the old large-size floppies are essentially unreadable today
> (aside from specialists), and there are a lot of orphaned operating
> systems and formats.
Well, I haven't used an 8" disk in a while, but Apple 5 1/4" are used
constantly. I do admit to having occasional problems with this, I ned
to buy another drive sometime soon and see if I can't get some more
disks.
-snip-
> This is all within twenty years; computer media from two decades ago are
> difficult and time-consuming to read. Books from two *centuries* ago are
> as readable as they ever were and books can last two *millennia* with
> care.
Computers are a brand new technology -- if you want to compare it to
writing, everything before the 20meg hardrive became standard on PC was
stone tablet time; we're constantly improving our data storage
capabilities. And that means something...
-snip-
> Computers are still on the sharp side of the growth curve, which means
> their strengths don't map very well onto archival uses.
No. You've completely missed what is happening -- the growth curve is a
/good/ thing; each new generation of storage medium not only holds more
than the last, it holds a /lot/ more than the last. This means that
when switch hardware, /all/ of the data is copied and not just what is
considered important. You plug in the new device, tell it (or let it
automatically gather) all of the info on the old device and then the old
device is removed and is no longer relevant.
If you want to worry about something, don't worry about storage of the
info -- worry about how the information is arranged.
Elsewhere people are talking about the SF stories where it's pointed out
that technological civilizations come with their own built-in Rosetta
stones; this is true (to an extent, if from their point it was black
writing on a black background, don't expect them to decode it quickly),
but in the case of electronic storage of that information it's
irrelevant.
What's important is not preserving bits, that's relatively simple and
we're constantly working on making it better, what those bits means is
another matter. If you want your information to be understandable in
10,000 years, don't use Word, use NotePad.
(So, if our electronic info is to be decoded by people with no
connection to us, then we'll need the electronic equivalent of the
Rosetta Stone, which people will have to deliberately create. But
that's not really relevant to our own archival needs).
Eric Walker
[...]
>99.9999999999999% of the books from two centuries ago no longer
>exist.
That implies that for _each_ currently extant book two hundred
or more years old, there were originally, um, 10,000,000,000,000
books originally in existence? (I may be off by a place or two
there, but I guess we get the idea.)
Hmmm. . . .
--
Cordially,
Eric Walker, webmaster
Great Science-Fiction & Fantasy Works
http://owlcroft.com/sfandf
Terry Austin
>On Mon, 24 Dec 2001 20:48:51 -0800, Terry Austin wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>>99.9999999999999% of the books from two centuries ago no longer
>>exist.
>
>That implies that for _each_ currently extant book two hundred
>or more years old, there were originally, um, 10,000,000,000,000
>books originally in existence? (I may be off by a place or two
>there, but I guess we get the idea.)
>
>Hmmm. . . .
You can quibble with the numbers, or what constitutes a "book", all you
want, the point remains: Books are *not*, on average, any more durable than
digital data, especially when you realize that digital data is not tied to
the medium it is currently stored in.
Andrew Wheeler
>
> Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>
> >This is all within twenty years; computer media from two
> >decades ago are difficult and time-consuming to read. Books
> >from two *centuries* ago are as readable as they ever were
> >and books can last two *millennia* with care.
>
> 99.9999999999999% of the books from two centuries ago no
> longer exist.
Of all of the physical copies of those books? (I agree with that.) Or
of all of the different books? (This is demonstrably untrue.)
Hell, 99%+ of all of the *AOL CD-ROMs* ever created have probably been
destroyed or rendered unusable at this point, so your point is a non sequitur.
What has been lost from the past has been lost either a) in disasters
(such as destruction of libraries and effectual destructions of entire
civilizations) or b) by simply not being widely disseminated. The
latter problem has basically been cured; the former would effect
digital media much worse than books to begin with.
>Digital data can be copied infinitely with perfection.
Yes, and my car *can* travel at 100 miles per hour. Can is a nice
word; it covers a lot.
> Which do you think will be easier (and more successful):
> Copying old digital data to a new hard drive (routine among
> those who replace such thing) or keeping a book being printed
> on today's shit paper from crumbling to dust within a
> century?
I suggest you read Nicholson Baker's _Double Fold_ on the subject of
the destruction of old paper. He's mostly talking about newspapers,
which have always been printed on the cheapest stock available.
Hundred-plus year old papers are still quite readable. There's no
reason to believe today's books are substantially more brittle than
the newspapers of a hundred years ago -- they're actually more durable.
The question is also *how often* you need to replace the digital data
-- once every five years? once a decade? -- and how costly that is.
Paper might need to be "rescued" once a century, if that often, and is
accessible -- no matter what technological changes have taken place --
for that entire period.
The previous poster was mostly talking about the web and CD-ROMs, both
of which are not stable formats. You mention ASCII elsewhere, which
would be a better solution. But hard drives still hit their effective
lives, and someone will have to go through them and copy the files to
something else (I'm not going to count the cost of the storage, since
that's cheap now and heading lower).
> >I don't want to overstate the case -- as far as I know,
> >nothing has become unretrievable due to being only in a
> >digital format.
>
> In fact, some has. The data from the first Mars lander comes
> to mind, in fact, because the only guy who knew the format
> died.
Thanks for making my point for me.
> >But archivists want a stable medium that will be supported
> >over the long term (long being at least decades and
> >preferably centuries). Computers are still on the sharp side
> >of the growth curve, which means their strengths don't map
> >very well onto archival uses.
>
> With a little thought about format - ASCII is a good choice -
> in a network environment, digital storage actually takes
> deliberate thought to *not* preserve.
As long as the entity maintaining that computer system continues to
exist. There's a similar problem with books in libraries, of course,
but books tend to be more widely distributed at the moment. A really
long-term, robust 'Net could be the digital equivalent, if files are
widely enough distributed. But I doubt that this would happen
regularly enough to keep whole categories of files from disappearing
with their originators/keepers. (How far back do the archives of this
group go? How widely distributed are they? Our discussion here is part
of a text that is itself partially missing.)
> >>The electronic format has the advantage of being able to be
> >>updated automatically if set up that way -- it can happen
> >>without any human intervention, which isn't something you
> >>can say for paper or any other medium.
> >
> >But this could also be a detriment -- imagine the Stalinist
> >USSR able to instantly "erase" all of those made non-
> >persons, as soon as it happened. Books are relatively
> >tamper-resistant (or at least tamper-evident) compared to
> >digital formats.
>
> Not if you burn them. And digital data is several orders of
> magnitude easier to replicate and distribute. Try to shove a
> book through a phone line to a couple dozen foreign friends.
Well, if a book is burned, the tampering was evident, wasn't it? (That
was part of my point.)
The original poster I was responding to (you've stripped out his
attribution, but I think it was J.B. Moreno) seemed to be talking
about instantly updatable network-linked copies, which would be
subject to the abuses I mentioned. Off-line copies, of course,
wouldn't. Perhaps whatever control was put on them to effect the
changes would be hackable (by someone, somehow, at some time), perhaps
not. We're being very hypothetical here.
If copies were not linked (and thus weren't instantly updateable as
the previous poster suggested), then they could be sent out to show
the changes made by <insert evil person> to the new versions of File
X. If they *were* instantly updatable, then that updating would have
to be hacked (to save particular older, unchanged copies from being
altered), or the old copies kept off the network. (And the latter
leads to similar problems as paper copies, though it's arguable which
is more easily copied with current/projected technology.)
> >"Instantly able to be changed" can be equivalent to "not to
> >be trusted." (For another possible use, closer to our
> >supposed topic, this would make re-editing novels to, say,
> >delete all references to "newshens" or "slide rules"
> >quite easy -- and more intrusive edits would also be much
> >easier.)
>
> In other words, there are advantages and disadvantages to
> both, and they are not the *same* advantages and
> disadvantages.
I'll agree to that. Digital media are very good for particular
applications. I just don't think really long-term storage is one of
them, at this point.
> >I'll also say that "able to be updated automatically" (even
> >assuming only updates for good purposes) is a long stretch
> >of turnpike from "will be" or even "in anyone's plans or
> >dreams."
>
> And? "Able to be" is superior to "unable to be." If it
> doesn't happen, that is the not fault of the medium, and
> people who do not update electronic data as needed will not
> keep books cool and dry. Stupidity is stupidity in any
> medium.
Well, something that's possible but never happens (flying cars,
anyone?) is not terribly useful to those of us who happen to live in
*this* universe.
Of course, we can't now say what will or won't happen in the future.
My point was that this one mere possibility of a possible advantage,
in some situations (which could also be a great detriment in other
situations) can't outweigh digital media's disadvantages in other areas.
J.B. Moreno
> As long as the entity maintaining that computer system continues to exist.
> There's a similar problem with books in libraries, of course, but books
> tend to be more widely distributed at the moment. A really long-term,
> robust 'Net could be the digital equivalent, if files are widely enough
> distributed. But I doubt that this would happen regularly enough to keep
> whole categories of files from disappearing with their
> originators/keepers. (How far back do the archives of this group go? How
> widely distributed are they? Our discussion here is part of a text that is
> itself partially missing.)
Give or take a lost article or two, and posters that deliberately didn't
want to be archived -- the archives for this group go back to 1981.
Basically as long as it has existed, and through various forms (the name
has changed several times).
Take a look at:
<http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=bnews.watmath.4013&output=gplain>
(An article posted by Brad Templeton back in 1982, Brad still
occasionally post to rafsw).
Terry Austin
>Terry Austin wrote:
>>
>> Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>>
>> >This is all within twenty years; computer media from two
>> >decades ago are difficult and time-consuming to read. Books
>> >from two *centuries* ago are as readable as they ever were
>> >and books can last two *millennia* with care.
>>
>> 99.9999999999999% of the books from two centuries ago no
>> longer exist.
>
>Of all of the physical copies of those books? (I agree with that.) Or
>of all of the different books? (This is demonstrably untrue.)
>
>Hell, 99%+ of all of the *AOL CD-ROMs* ever created have probably been
>destroyed or rendered unusable at this point, so your point is a non sequitur.
To exactly the same degree that the point I am responding to is a non
sequitur. A physical book is, by and large, irrelevant, historically
speaking. Only the information contained in it really matters. And that
information is a *lot* easier to preserve in a digital format.
>
>What has been lost from the past has been lost either a) in disasters
>(such as destruction of libraries and effectual destructions of entire
>civilizations) or b) by simply not being widely disseminated. The
>latter problem has basically been cured; the former would effect
>digital media much worse than books to begin with.
Depends on how narrowly you define "digital media." It would take, quite
literally, the end of the world, to destroy the *content* of any digital
media on the 'net, for instance.
>
>>Digital data can be copied infinitely with perfection.
>
>Yes, and my car *can* travel at 100 miles per hour. Can is a nice
>word; it covers a lot.
So you claim that it is better to not be *able* to do something desirable
than to be *able* to do it? Of do you even have a point?
>
>> Which do you think will be easier (and more successful):
>> Copying old digital data to a new hard drive (routine among
>> those who replace such thing) or keeping a book being printed
>> on today's shit paper from crumbling to dust within a
>> century?
>
>I suggest you read Nicholson Baker's _Double Fold_ on the subject of
>the destruction of old paper. He's mostly talking about newspapers,
>which have always been printed on the cheapest stock available.
>Hundred-plus year old papers are still quite readable. There's no
>reason to believe today's books are substantially more brittle than
>the newspapers of a hundred years ago -- they're actually more durable.
You didn't answer my question. And I've had 20 year old paperbacks
disintegrate. Literally.
>
>The question is also *how often* you need to replace the digital data
>-- once every five years? once a decade? -- and how costly that is.
>Paper might need to be "rescued" once a century, if that often, and is
>accessible -- no matter what technological changes have taken place --
>for that entire period.
Digital backups can be, and in cases where it is important, *are*,
automated. It is a *lot* easier to duplicate digital media. End of story.
If it weren't, we wouldn't have a copyright fight brewing right now. That is
the *entire* point of DMCA, in fact.
>
>The previous poster was mostly talking about the web and CD-ROMs, both
>of which are not stable formats.
Neither of which represents the entirety of digital media.
>You mention ASCII elsewhere, which
>would be a better solution. But hard drives still hit their effective
>lives, and someone will have to go through them and copy the files to
>something else (I'm not going to count the cost of the storage, since
>that's cheap now and heading lower).
Rather the point. People *do* copy entire old hard drives. And that's people
who are dealing with the equivalent of newspapers, with absolutely no effort
at archiving them.
>
>> >I don't want to overstate the case -- as far as I know,
>> >nothing has become unretrievable due to being only in a
>> >digital format.
>>
>> In fact, some has. The data from the first Mars lander comes
>> to mind, in fact, because the only guy who knew the format
>> died.
>
>Thanks for making my point for me.
And yet, the tape itself is still readable with a little effort.
The counterpoint is that you can't read a book that was lost or destroyed
either.
>
>> >But archivists want a stable medium that will be supported
>> >over the long term (long being at least decades and
>> >preferably centuries). Computers are still on the sharp side
>> >of the growth curve, which means their strengths don't map
>> >very well onto archival uses.
>>
>> With a little thought about format - ASCII is a good choice -
>> in a network environment, digital storage actually takes
>> deliberate thought to *not* preserve.
>
>As long as the entity maintaining that computer system continues to
>exist.
What happens to libraries that cease to exist? Historically, quite often,
they cease to exist because they are burned.
>There's a similar problem with books in libraries, of course,
>but books tend to be more widely distributed at the moment.
If so, and I would take some convincing, that is not likely to continue to
be true for much longer.
>A really
>long-term, robust 'Net could be the digital equivalent, if files are
>widely enough distributed.
Any deliberate effort to archive digital data is far cheaper and easier than
the same for book. *I* could preserve more data on my own hard drive than
the largest library in the world, for the cost of bandwidth to download it.
>But I doubt that this would happen
>regularly enough to keep whole categories of files from disappearing
>with their originators/keepers. (How far back do the archives of this
>group go?
1981, or its creation, whichever is later.
>How widely distributed are they?
Worldwide, for the price of access (which is free in most of the western
world, if you look).
>Our discussion here is part
>of a text that is itself partially missing.)
It's far more complete than any printed discussion of similar nature,
despite being orders of magnitude larger.
And, in fact, Google opening up a free, worldwide available archive of
Usenet going back 20 years is a pretty good example of just exactly how
superior digital media are to paper. It is difficult to imagine how a public
discussion forum as extensive as Usenet was - even in 1981 - would have been
*possible* in 1981 in a paper medium, much less reconstructing such a
complete archive after so long.
>
>> >>The electronic format has the advantage of being able to be
>> >>updated automatically if set up that way -- it can happen
>> >>without any human intervention, which isn't something you
>> >>can say for paper or any other medium.
>> >
>> >But this could also be a detriment -- imagine the Stalinist
>> >USSR able to instantly "erase" all of those made non-
>> >persons, as soon as it happened. Books are relatively
>> >tamper-resistant (or at least tamper-evident) compared to
>> >digital formats.
>>
>> Not if you burn them. And digital data is several orders of
>> magnitude easier to replicate and distribute. Try to shove a
>> book through a phone line to a couple dozen foreign friends.
>
>Well, if a book is burned, the tampering was evident, wasn't it? (That
>was part of my point.)
If the digital data is widely distributed, the tampering is evident as well.
>
>The original poster I was responding to (you've stripped out his
>attribution, but I think it was J.B. Moreno) seemed to be talking
>about instantly updatable network-linked copies, which would be
>subject to the abuses I mentioned.
As opposed to the far easier abuses of simply restricting access to paper
records.
>Off-line copies, of course,
>wouldn't. Perhaps whatever control was put on them to effect the
>changes would be hackable (by someone, somehow, at some time), perhaps
>not. We're being very hypothetical here.
Digital media lends itself well to customized solutions to individual
problems.
>
>If copies were not linked (and thus weren't instantly updateable as
>the previous poster suggested), then they could be sent out to show
>the changes made by <insert evil person> to the new versions of File
>X. If they *were* instantly updatable, then that updating would have
>to be hacked (to save particular older, unchanged copies from being
>altered), or the old copies kept off the network. (And the latter
>leads to similar problems as paper copies, though it's arguable which
>is more easily copied with current/projected technology.)
It's arguable which is more easily copied? Between paper and digital data on
a network? Only an *idiot* would find that arguable.
You seem to be thinking in terms of a single copy of something being
archived in a digital environment. Why would anyone limit themselves so
much? What would it accomplish? The mere fact that someone *does* limit
themselves such is evidence of their information not being credible. The
nature of the very medium provides the tools to fight such abuse. The same
is not true of books.
>
>> >"Instantly able to be changed" can be equivalent to "not to
>> >be trusted." (For another possible use, closer to our
>> >supposed topic, this would make re-editing novels to, say,
>> >delete all references to "newshens" or "slide rules"
>> >quite easy -- and more intrusive edits would also be much
>> >easier.)
>>
>> In other words, there are advantages and disadvantages to
>> both, and they are not the *same* advantages and
>> disadvantages.
>
>I'll agree to that. Digital media are very good for particular
>applications. I just don't think really long-term storage is one of
>them, at this point.
Then you don't understand the technology. Imagine the Library of Congress
being xeroxed every night at midnight, in a few minutes, or even a few
hours, and the copies stored in a different state. For pennies. Every night.
For years.
>
>> >I'll also say that "able to be updated automatically" (even
>> >assuming only updates for good purposes) is a long stretch
>> >of turnpike from "will be" or even "in anyone's plans or
>> >dreams."
>>
>> And? "Able to be" is superior to "unable to be." If it
>> doesn't happen, that is the not fault of the medium, and
>> people who do not update electronic data as needed will not
>> keep books cool and dry. Stupidity is stupidity in any
>> medium.
>
>Well, something that's possible but never happens (flying cars,
>anyone?) is not terribly useful to those of us who happen to live in
>*this* universe.
You didn't answer my question. Something that's possible but never happens
is a deliberate choice when the possibility is obvious and self evident.
Certainly far more useful than something that's *not* possible.
>
>Of course, we can't now say what will or won't happen in the future.
>My point was that this one mere possibility of a possible advantage,
>in some situations (which could also be a great detriment in other
>situations) can't outweigh digital media's disadvantages in other areas.
I've yet to see any disadvantages that do not amount to a matter of personal
preference.
Andrew Wheeler
>
> Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>
> >Terry Austin wrote:
> >>
> >> Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> >This is all within twenty years; computer media from two
> >> >decades ago are difficult and time-consuming to read.
> >> >Books from two *centuries* ago are as readable as they
> >> >ever were and books can last two *millennia* with care.
> >>
> >> 99.9999999999999% of the books from two centuries ago no
> >> longer exist.
> >
> >Of all of the physical copies of those books? (I agree with
> >that.) Or of all of the different books? (This is
> >demonstrably untrue.)
> >
> >Hell, 99%+ of all of the *AOL CD-ROMs* ever created have
> >probably been destroyed or rendered unusable at this point,
> >so your point is a non sequitur.
>
> To exactly the same degree that the point I am responding to
> is a non sequitur. A physical book is, by and large,
> irrelevant, historically speaking. Only the information
> contained in it really matters. And that information is a
> *lot* easier to preserve in a digital format.
You're arguing against your last post, now. Then, you said that most
of the books in existence two hundred years ago are now gone. (Which
is untrue.) Now, you're saying that doesn't matter, as long as the
"information" exists. If it doesn't matter what form the information
is in, why spend the time and money to convert it?
Certain kinds of information (specifically text in ASCII format) may
be able to be kept in a digital form that is comparable in lifetime to
a physical book. Anything more complicated (any kind of illustration,
or typography, for example), leads one into the thicket of file
formats, which change and die over time.
> >What has been lost from the past has been lost either a) in
> >disasters (such as destruction of libraries and effectual
> >destructions of entire civilizations) or b) by simply not
> >being widely disseminated. The latter problem has basically
> >been cured; the former would effect digital media much worse
> >than books to begin with.
>
> Depends on how narrowly you define "digital media." It would
> take, quite literally, the end of the world, to destroy the
> *content* of any digital media on the 'net, for instance.
Unplugging and trashing the particular server would do quite well, for
any file in only one location. (And I very much doubt the majority of
files are widely distributed.) An EMP would fry large sections of the
'net and turn the hardware it runs on to junk. Power outages can make
an electronic file inaccessible, even if it still exists. There's lots
of ways to destroy digital media; they rely on a highly developed
technological society.
> >>Digital data can be copied infinitely with perfection.
> >
> >Yes, and my car *can* travel at 100 miles per hour. Can is a
> >nice word; it covers a lot.
>
> So you claim that it is better to not be *able* to do
> something desirable than to be *able* to do it? Of do you
> even have a point?
Let me say it again, in words simple enough for even you to
understand: if something *is not* happening, the fact that it is
*possible* is irrelevant.
> >> Which do you think will be easier (and more successful):
> >> Copying old digital data to a new hard drive (routine
> >> among those who replace such thing) or keeping a book
> >> being printed on today's shit paper from crumbling to dust
> >> within a century?
> >
> >I suggest you read Nicholson Baker's _Double Fold_ on the
> >subject of the destruction of old paper. He's mostly talking
> >about newspapers, which have always been printed on the
> >cheapest stock available. Hundred-plus year old papers are
> >still quite readable. There's no reason to believe today's
> >books are substantially more brittle than the newspapers of
> >a hundred years ago -- they're actually more durable.
>
> You didn't answer my question. And I've had 20 year old
> paperbacks disintegrate. Literally.
What did you do to them? That is the important question. If you treat
a medium badly, it will degrade. (There are similar things you can do
to digital media, especially those, like CD-ROMs, in tangible form).
The fact that you *can* destroy a paperback doesn't mean that
paperbacks inevitably are destroyed on their own.
I didn't answer your question because it was based on a wrong premise:
that "today's shit paper" will inevitably crumble. This is untrue.
> >The question is also *how often* you need to replace the
> >digital data -- once every five years? once a decade? -- and
> >how costly that is. Paper might need to be "rescued" once a
> >century, if that often, and is accessible -- no matter what
> >technological changes have taken place -- for that entire
> >period.
>
> Digital backups can be, and in cases where it is important,
> *are*, automated. It is a *lot* easier to duplicate digital
> media. End of story.
So only "important" files will be duplicated? Who decides what is
"important?" Will it also be "important" that those few saved files be
accessible to anybody except those who saved them?
You're saying that some digital files will be replicated indefinitely
into the future. This is true, but it's not actually what we're
talking about. What you're *not* saying is that the vast majority of
files will be stuck in their original format, and be essentially
unreadable within a generation (even they even exist at all, in any
form accessible to the general public).
> If it weren't, we wouldn't have a copyright fight brewing
> right now. That is the *entire* point of DMCA, in fact.
Yes, it is. But that's not what we're talking about. I very much doubt
that MP3s and DVD encoding will be the standard file formats for music
and video in a century, which is closer to what we *are* talking about.
We're talking, I remind you, about the respective durability over
centuries of digital and printed formats.
> >The previous poster was mostly talking about the web and CD-
> >ROMs, both of which are not stable formats.
>
> Neither of which represents the entirety of digital media.
Thank you, Captain Obvious.
> >You mention ASCII elsewhere, which would be a better
> >solution. But hard drives still hit their effective lives,
> >and someone will have to go through them and copy the files
> >to something else (I'm not going to count the cost of the
> >storage, since that's cheap now and heading lower).
>
> Rather the point. People *do* copy entire old hard drives.
> And that's people who are dealing with the equivalent of
> newspapers, with absolutely no effort at archiving them.
Will they continue to do this for centuries? ("Nancy, it's time to
re-backup the family archives again!") Will documents written under
Windows 3.1 (choose a random OS or application here) be readable in
thirty years?
This is not a system that will make documents available to the general
public over long stretches of time. At best, it's a pure packrat
mentality, and documents will likely die with their creators/hoarders.
> >> >I don't want to overstate the case -- as far as I know,
> >> >nothing has become unretrievable due to being only in a
> >> >digital format.
> >>
> >> In fact, some has. The data from the first Mars lander
> >> comes to mind, in fact, because the only guy who knew the
> >> format died.
> >
> >Thanks for making my point for me.
>
> And yet, the tape itself is still readable with a little
> effort.
>
> The counterpoint is that you can't read a book that was lost
> or destroyed either.
Name a single published book from the last century that is now
destroyed or lost. Compare that to all of the gigabytes of files that
have been lost in digital formats (I'm probably underestimating), for
various reasons. I lost about 10 megs of e-mail at work just a few
months ago myself -- these things happen.
> >> >But archivists want a stable medium that will be
> >> >supported over the long term (long being at least decades
> >> >and preferably centuries). Computers are still on the
> >> >sharp side of the growth curve, which means their
> >> >strengths don't map very well onto archival uses.
> >>
> >> With a little thought about format - ASCII is a good
> >> choice - in a network environment, digital storage
> >> actually takes deliberate thought to *not* preserve.
> >
> >As long as the entity maintaining that computer system
> >continues to exist.
>
> What happens to libraries that cease to exist? Historically,
> quite often, they cease to exist because they are burned.
Quickly, name three libraries other than Alexandria that were burned.
Also, name some books that only exist in a single copy, so that one
library burning would destroy them.
Can you name a library in the Western world that was burned this
century, even?
This is a silly point. If the horse nomads from central Asia are
overrunning civilization, digital media don't have an advantage over
books. Books can be read without technological aid, and the mythical
horse nomads hate technology more complicated than their bows.
> >There's a similar problem with books in libraries, of
> >course, but books tend to be more widely distributed at the
> >moment.
>
> If so, and I would take some convincing, that is not likely
> to continue to be true for much longer.
You really think most computer files are distributed more widely and
durably (in ASCII or other easily-readable format) than books?
Find me _Goodnight, Moon_ on the 'net, in any form that will be
readable in a century.
> >A really long-term, robust 'Net could be the digital
> >equivalent, if files are widely enough distributed.
>
> Any deliberate effort to archive digital data is far cheaper
> and easier than the same for book. *I* could preserve more
> data on my own hard drive than the largest library in the
> world, for the cost of bandwidth to download it.
And if your hard drive crashes, what then? (Maybe you have off-site
storage -- you probably do.) What happens to it when you die? Will
your heirs do anything with whatever computer system you have then, or
just wipe it clean and put in whatever they want?
You're not showing a long-term solution.
If everything (all the files on everyone's hard drives, all over the
world) were in ASCII, and widely distributed, then your solution might
be feasible for as long as our current civilization exists. (And
neither you nor I can say how long that will be.)
But your solution depends on lots of technology being continuously
available, which may not be the case. And it also only works for pure
text, which does not describe most of the objects sitting in
libraries. It's, at best, a Procrustean bed.
Terry Austin
"Andrew Wheeler" <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote in message
news:3C29F720...@optonline.com...
You're the one mixing physical instances of a digital data set and
the information itself. Make up your mind, and stick with one
subject.
>
> Certain kinds of information (specifically text in ASCII format) may
> be able to be kept in a digital form that is comparable in lifetime to
> a physical book. Anything more complicated (any kind of illustration,
> or typography, for example), leads one into the thicket of file
> formats, which change and die over time.
Not really, no. BMPs from Win3.1 are still readable by WinXP.
JPEG isn't going anywhere any time soon. And the file specs
on both are public record, and close to impossible to destroy
since both specs are widely distributed. So long as we have
digital computers, they will be fairly trivial to recreate, if necessary.
>
> > >What has been lost from the past has been lost either a) in
> > >disasters (such as destruction of libraries and effectual
> > >destructions of entire civilizations) or b) by simply not
> > >being widely disseminated. The latter problem has basically
> > >been cured; the former would effect digital media much worse
> > >than books to begin with.
> >
> > Depends on how narrowly you define "digital media." It would
> > take, quite literally, the end of the world, to destroy the
> > *content* of any digital media on the 'net, for instance.
>
> Unplugging and trashing the particular server would do quite well, for
> any file in only one location.
And a can of lighter fluid an a match will do quite well for
a book in only one location. So? Again, digital has the advantage,
being trivial to duplicate.
>(And I very much doubt the majority of
> files are widely distributed.)
The majority of printed matter isn't, either. Again, you are confusing
two different things. Digital material _that is comparable to books_
*will*, by definition, be well distributed. You can't complain that
books are hard to preserve because internal reports printed for
employee use are thrown away after they are used.
>An EMP would fry large sections of the
> 'net
Bullshit.
>and turn the hardware it runs on to junk.
Bullshit.
EMPs are far more localized than that, and CDs are quite
immune to them. And shielding isn't as hard as a lot of people
seem to think.
>Power outages can make
> an electronic file inaccessible, even if it still exists.
Power outages can make *books* inaccessible, unless you
can read by moonlight.
>There's lots
> of ways to destroy digital media; they rely on a highly developed
> technological society.
Indeed. There's fewer ways to destroy books, but they are
*universally* available, regardless of technology levels. So?
>
> > >>Digital data can be copied infinitely with perfection.
> > >
> > >Yes, and my car *can* travel at 100 miles per hour. Can is a
> > >nice word; it covers a lot.
> >
> > So you claim that it is better to not be *able* to do
> > something desirable than to be *able* to do it? Of do you
> > even have a point?
>
> Let me say it again, in words simple enough for even you to
> understand: if something *is not* happening, the fact that it is
> *possible* is irrelevant.
LKet me say this again, even though you will, again, refuse to
address it because you know you can't without conceding the
point: If something is *possible*, and it is well known that it is
possible, if it's not happening, it's a _deliberate choice_. If you
are bitching that we aren't doing something because we don't
*want* to, you're a moron.
>
> > >> Which do you think will be easier (and more successful):
> > >> Copying old digital data to a new hard drive (routine
> > >> among those who replace such thing) or keeping a book
> > >> being printed on today's shit paper from crumbling to dust
> > >> within a century?
> > >
> > >I suggest you read Nicholson Baker's _Double Fold_ on the
> > >subject of the destruction of old paper. He's mostly talking
> > >about newspapers, which have always been printed on the
> > >cheapest stock available. Hundred-plus year old papers are
> > >still quite readable. There's no reason to believe today's
> > >books are substantially more brittle than the newspapers of
> > >a hundred years ago -- they're actually more durable.
> >
> > You didn't answer my question. And I've had 20 year old
> > paperbacks disintegrate. Literally.
>
> What did you do to them?
Treated them the way most book owners treat paperbacks. Read
them, and threw them in a box.
>That is the important question. If you treat
> a medium badly, it will degrade.
The vast majority of book, owned by the vast majority of book
readers, are treated badly. Digital media is more resistant to this.
>(There are similar things you can do
> to digital media, especially those, like CD-ROMs, in tangible form).
> The fact that you *can* destroy a paperback doesn't mean that
> paperbacks inevitably are destroyed on their own.
The fact that you *can* fail to backup digital media doesn't mean that
digital media inevitably will be failed to be backed up. You argue against
your own point. Again.
>
> I didn't answer your question because it was based on a wrong premise:
> that "today's shit paper" will inevitably crumble. This is untrue.
You argue that it is inevitable that digital media will not be backed up.
You're full of shit.
>
> > >The question is also *how often* you need to replace the
> > >digital data -- once every five years? once a decade? -- and
> > >how costly that is. Paper might need to be "rescued" once a
> > >century, if that often, and is accessible -- no matter what
> > >technological changes have taken place -- for that entire
> > >period.
> >
> > Digital backups can be, and in cases where it is important,
> > *are*, automated. It is a *lot* easier to duplicate digital
> > media. End of story.
>
> So only "important" files will be duplicated? Who decides what is
> "important?"
Whoever owns the file. Duh. Who decides what books are important?
Do you honestly think that every report, every piece of paper, every
Post-It note ever generated in the average company is preserved
forever?
>Will it also be "important" that those few saved files be
> accessible to anybody except those who saved them?
Is it important that every internal report generating in a given company
be accessible to anybody except those who printed them?
>
> You're saying that some digital files will be replicated indefinitely
> into the future.
No, you're the one claiming that it must *only* be one way or the
other.
>This is true, but it's not actually what we're
> talking about.
I have no idea what you're talking about, because you keep
changing the subject.
I suspect you don't really know either.
>What you're *not* saying is that the vast majority of
> files will be stuck in their original format, and be essentially
> unreadable within a generation (even they even exist at all, in any
> form accessible to the general public).
And the same is true of the vast majority of printed matter.
What is *intended* to be archived, what is *desired* to be
archived, *will* be, and it will be a *lot* easier to do so with
digital material than with paper.
You are bitching that what nobody *wants* to archive won't
be, and that is a sign of low intelligence and sloppy thinking.
>
> > If it weren't, we wouldn't have a copyright fight brewing
> > right now. That is the *entire* point of DMCA, in fact.
>
> Yes, it is. But that's not what we're talking about.
It is exactly what we're talking about, until you change the subject
*again*. You keep arguing that digital media is more difficult to
preserve than paper. You are full of shit.
>I very much doubt
> that MP3s and DVD encoding will be the standard file formats for music
> and video in a century, which is closer to what we *are* talking about.
The protocols are widely published, widely distributed, and public record.
If no decoders are available, they will be trivial to recreate.
>
> We're talking, I remind you, about the respective durability over
> centuries of digital and printed formats.
And digital is orders of magnitude easier to make durable, and, in fact,
requires deliberate choice to even make it difficult.
>
> > >The previous poster was mostly talking about the web and CD-
> > >ROMs, both of which are not stable formats.
> >
> > Neither of which represents the entirety of digital media.
>
> Thank you, Captain Obvious.
You - obviously - need the obvious pointed out to you. You've
missed a number of rather obvious points (the inconvenient ones,
for your arguments).
>
> > >You mention ASCII elsewhere, which would be a better
> > >solution. But hard drives still hit their effective lives,
> > >and someone will have to go through them and copy the files
> > >to something else (I'm not going to count the cost of the
> > >storage, since that's cheap now and heading lower).
> >
> > Rather the point. People *do* copy entire old hard drives.
> > And that's people who are dealing with the equivalent of
> > newspapers, with absolutely no effort at archiving them.
>
> Will they continue to do this for centuries?
They will certainly be *able* to. Again, you are bitching that
what nobody *wants* to preserve won't be preserved. That is
a *stupid* argument.
>("Nancy, it's time to
> re-backup the family archives again!") Will documents written under
> Windows 3.1 (choose a random OS or application here) be readable in
> thirty years?
They're readable now, and nobody is even proposing that ASCII not
be a standard forever.
>
> This is not a system that will make documents available to the general
> public over long stretches of time. At best, it's a pure packrat
> mentality, and documents will likely die with their creators/hoarders.
Same is true of the vast majority of printed documents that aren't
deliberately thrown away. Again, you are comparing purely personal
electronic documents to published books. If my books go to the
trash heap when I die, those books will not be gone forever, since
they were *published*, and widely distributed. You compare stuff
that people do *not* publish and widely distribute to what *is*
widely distributed.
It's a bullshit comparison.
>
> > >> >I don't want to overstate the case -- as far as I know,
> > >> >nothing has become unretrievable due to being only in a
> > >> >digital format.
> > >>
> > >> In fact, some has. The data from the first Mars lander
> > >> comes to mind, in fact, because the only guy who knew the
> > >> format died.
> > >
> > >Thanks for making my point for me.
> >
> > And yet, the tape itself is still readable with a little
> > effort.
> >
> > The counterpoint is that you can't read a book that was lost
> > or destroyed either.
>
> Name a single published book from the last century that is now
> destroyed or lost.
Cite? Didn't think so.
>Compare that to all of the gigabytes of files that
> have been lost in digital formats (I'm probably underestimating), for
> various reasons.
Try - just once is your stupid, miserable life - to compare comparable
things. Try comparing those digital files to every Post-It note you've
ever written, for instance. That's comparable.
>I lost about 10 megs of e-mail at work just a few
> months ago myself -- these things happen.
Do you have every single letter and memo your ever received
at work archived? Do you think you *could* have every single
memo and letter archived? Do you think your employer could
*afford* to archive every paper document that passes through
their hands? Try comparing comparable things. How many
*published books* do you think the average publisher has lost?
Electronic or paper. Which do you think is *easier* to lose the
last copy of?
>
> > >> >But archivists want a stable medium that will be
> > >> >supported over the long term (long being at least decades
> > >> >and preferably centuries). Computers are still on the
> > >> >sharp side of the growth curve, which means their
> > >> >strengths don't map very well onto archival uses.
> > >>
> > >> With a little thought about format - ASCII is a good
> > >> choice - in a network environment, digital storage
> > >> actually takes deliberate thought to *not* preserve.
> > >
> > >As long as the entity maintaining that computer system
> > >continues to exist.
> >
> > What happens to libraries that cease to exist? Historically,
> > quite often, they cease to exist because they are burned.
>
> Quickly, name three libraries other than Alexandria that were burned.
Quickly, name three libraries that have ceased to exist in any other
way, and tell us what happened to the books therein.
>
> Also, name some books that only exist in a single copy, so that one
> library burning would destroy them.
Name a single electronic file that cannot be copied in a trivial fashion,
both in terms of the effort required and the cost.
>
> Can you name a library in the Western world that was burned this
> century, even?
Books get burned all the time. I grew up in rural Missouri, where
such things still happen, even today.
And, again, you are mixing different things. You include personal
files on a home PC in digital, but don't include home libraries.
Homes burn every single day, and many have libraries. If you
want to exclude those libraries, exclude home PCs as well.
How many published e-books have been totally lost, ever?
>
> This is a silly point.
Then why do you keep making it?
> If the horse nomads from central Asia are
> overrunning civilization, digital media don't have an advantage over
> books. Books can be read without technological aid, and the mythical
> horse nomads hate technology more complicated than their bows.
Digital is trivial to replicate and distribute. Paper books are not. End
of story.
>
> > >There's a similar problem with books in libraries, of
> > >course, but books tend to be more widely distributed at the
> > >moment.
> >
> > If so, and I would take some convincing, that is not likely
> > to continue to be true for much longer.
>
> You really think most computer files are distributed more widely and
> durably (in ASCII or other easily-readable format) than books?
You really tink most computer files are *desired* to be distributed
more widely and durably than books? Those that someone *wants*
to distribute widely *are* distributed widely. Refer to the endless
threads about digitally pirated books, and the utter impossibility of
stopping such activity, for more details.
>
> Find me _Goodnight, Moon_ on the 'net, in any form that will be
> readable in a century.
>
Ask in alt.binaries.e-books. Or are you claiming that digital
piracy of books doesn't happen, and all the lawsuits over
it are imaginary?
> > >A really long-term, robust 'Net could be the digital
> > >equivalent, if files are widely enough distributed.
> >
> > Any deliberate effort to archive digital data is far cheaper
> > and easier than the same for book. *I* could preserve more
> > data on my own hard drive than the largest library in the
> > world, for the cost of bandwidth to download it.
>
> And if your hard drive crashes, what then? (Maybe you have off-site
> storage -- you probably do.)
If I don't, it's a deliberate choice. What happens when my house burns
down? The books are all destroyed.
>What happens to it when you die?
What happens to my paper books with I die?
>Will
> your heirs do anything with whatever computer system you have then, or
> just wipe it clean and put in whatever they want?
>
> You're not showing a long-term solution.
You're not showing a long term problem.
>
> If everything (all the files on everyone's hard drives, all over the
> world) were in ASCII, and widely distributed, then your solution might
> be feasible for as long as our current civilization exists. (And
> neither you nor I can say how long that will be.)
Indeed. And if they're not in ASCII and widely distributed, then
they are the equivalent of Post-It notes, memos and letters. What
happens to them when I die? Do my heirs preseve them for all
eternity? If I'm famous, perhaps, but in the vast majority of
cases, they are thrown away.
>
> But your solution depends on lots of technology being continuously
> available, which may not be the case.
If the technology ceases to exist, our civilization will have gone with
it, and we'll have much larger problems than whether or not Aunt Bee's
diary is still readable.
>And it also only works for pure
> text, which does not describe most of the objects sitting in
> libraries. It's, at best, a Procrustean bed.
>
Graphic formats are public domain, for the most part (there are
certainly several major formats that are), and widely published.
And it's trivial to recreate viewers. Same with video formats.
Your argument boils down to bitching that what people don't
*want* to preserve won't be preserved, while ignoring that
the exact same thing is true of paper documents.
You are an idiot.
Terry Austin
Michael S. Schiffer
>Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>> As long as the entity maintaining that computer system continues
>> to exist. There's a similar problem with books in libraries, of
>> course, but books tend to be more widely distributed at the
>> moment. A really long-term, robust 'Net could be the digital
>> equivalent, if files are widely enough distributed. But I doubt
>> that this would happen regularly enough to keep whole categories
>> of files from disappearing with their originators/keepers. (How
>> far back do the archives of this group go? How widely distributed
>> are they? Our discussion here is part of a text that is itself
>> partially missing.)
>Give or take a lost article or two, and posters that deliberately
>didn't want to be archived -- the archives for this group go back to
>1981. Basically as long as it has existed, and through various forms
>(the name has changed several times).
It's more than one or two. I was active on the group from 1987 or so,
but none of my posts prior to about 1990 show up. I believe some
fraction of what I posted in the early 90's is missing as well, though
it's hard to be sure how much. Google has done a great job of gathering
up the archives that were available, but there are a lot of holes. (I
saw a post from one of the major contributors noting that he might not
have weeded out so many of the non-technical groups from his archives if
he'd known they'd wind up the only copy.) This does tend to reinforce
Andrew's point.
On the other hand, I don't have *any* printouts of articles from that
time, and likely very few printed copies of posts from the 80's survive
at all. Paper is probably still the best medium for information of
general enough interest that people will be willing to devote the space
to it, since that's pretty much all it absolutely requires. (It
requires a lot more to actually be useful, like cataloging and
organization, but you can always hope that someone will do that work
later on.) But no one was ever going to devote a warehouse to storing a
printed copy of twenty years worth of Usenet. Depending on paper alone,
it would have been entirely lost, because storage space isn't free. (If
it's close enough to be useful to the people who might want to look at
the archive, it often isn't even especially cheap.)
For items that combine a lot of data with limited interest, electronic
storage is probably your best bet, because (unless there's an archive
interested in your subject) the paper will probably get dumped for
something of more current interest eventually. For more compact items
that you know someone will want in a century but that you're not sure
people will want in the intervening decades, paper is probably your best
bet.
(If there's enough interest in long-term storage, microform has the
stability of paper while requiring a lot less storage space. But you
need enough demand to get the microform made in the first place. And no
one ever runs across Dad's old microfilm of a work previously thought
lost while looking around the attic.)
Mike
--
Michael S. Schiffer, LHN, FCS
ms...@mail.com
msch...@condor.depaul.edu
Andrew Wheeler
>
> "Andrew Wheeler" <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote in message
> news:3C29F720...@optonline.com...
> >Power outages can make an electronic file inaccessible, even
> >if it still exists.
>
> Power outages can make *books* inaccessible, unless you
> can read by moonlight.
Since you've now devolved to your usual frothing at the mouth, I'll
restrict myself to answering this one stupid point of yours and
ignoring the others. (Since I've already talked about all of them.)
You ignore points deliberately, try to shift the basis of an argument,
and engage in personal attacks just to justify your own bloated ego.
You also failed to give one specific instance, in the five or six
places I asked for them. It's now time for you to crawl back into your
hole and die.
Ever heard of *daylight*?
Phil Fraering
>Give or take a lost article or two, and posters that deliberately didn't
>want to be archived -- the archives for this group go back to 1981.
>Basically as long as it has existed, and through various forms (the name
>has changed several times).
I'm thinking of "pressing the button" and registering to become
an Official Goggle Unperson, but I haven't totally made up my
mind yet.
Phil
--
Phil Fraering
p...@globalreach.net
Terry Austin
>Terry Austin wrote:
>>
>> "Andrew Wheeler" <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote in message
>> news:3C29F720...@optonline.com...
>> >Power outages can make an electronic file inaccessible, even
>> >if it still exists.
>>
>> Power outages can make *books* inaccessible, unless you
>> can read by moonlight.
>
>Since you've now devolved to your usual frothing at the mouth,
It's inevitable when you keep repeating the same unsupported and obviously
incorrect assertions over and over. As inevitable, in fact, as you
retreating behind such things rather than actually address a single point
about which you know you are wrong.
> I'll
>restrict myself to answering this one stupid point of yours and
>ignoring the others.
That'd be the ones where complain about some aspect of digital media when,
in fact, paper is worse on that particular point? The points you - obviously
- know you cannot answer?
>(Since I've already talked about all of them.)
Indeed. But not actually answered a single one.
>You ignore points deliberately, try to shift the basis of an argument,
Yes, you do.
>and engage in personal attacks just to justify your own bloated ego.
As opposed to you being simply stupid?
>You also failed to give one specific instance, in the five or six
>places I asked for them.
Liar.
>It's now time for you to crawl back into your
>hole and die.
It's now time for you to (continue to) pretend there weren't any points you
refused to address because you can't.
>
>Ever heard of *daylight*?
Ever heard of "moron"?
J.B. Moreno
If you don't mind my asking...why? I think looking back and finding out
that the question as to why Piers Anthony was such a sexist pig goes all
the way back to 1982 is a good thing, who knows what little jems you
might let drop all inadvertently?
Marduk
> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a DVD
> player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS tapes. One DVD
> I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
>
> non-Dead Tree format book. Problem is, it probably amounts to
> a lot more work for the author and production team and where
> movies have armies of people working on them with budgets
> to match, books do not.
I think 2 additions to the original text would be apropriate:
Additional artwork - pictures, images. Sometimes the writer tries to
describe something which in fact is very difficult to describe in
words. An image would help immensly. Of course there will be ppl who
will point out, that its the reader's imagination, that should create
the image, but sometimes its simply impossible, or in other cases,
your imagination's product is just too poor, you realize it, but can
do nothing about it.
Take for example the LOTR poster which depicts Anduin and the 2
statues of kings on its shores. I bet, there were very few people,
whose imagination could draw something that spectacular.
Second addition, is authors suggestion of what music, in his opinion,
would be apropriate for the reader to hear, to create the right
atmosphere.
Marduk
Peter Bruells
> Take for example the LOTR poster which depicts Anduin and the 2
> statues of kings on its shores. I bet, there were very few people,
> whose imagination could draw something that spectacular.
> Second addition, is authors suggestion of what music, in his
> opinion, would be apropriate for the reader to hear, to create the
> right atmosphere.
Both would be more or less useless to me. I enjoy reading the Lord of
the Rings right now, but I do not feel the need to visualize
anything. And music is a distraction to reading.
Nancy Lebovitz
would be nice, background world-building, and perhaps some rough drafts.
If the book's been around for a while, then there might be both scholarly
and non-scholarly articles about it.
This could still be a non-trivial amount of work to put together, but
some authors would probably have a part of it written up already.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Robert Carnegie
And my headers declare that I'm a Google Person, so how would that
action affect our relationship? Semi-serious question.
J.B. Moreno
> Phil Fraering <p...@globalreach.net> wrote in message
> > pl...@newsreaders.com (J.B. Moreno) writes:
> >
> > >Give or take a lost article or two, and posters that deliberately
> > >didn't want to be archived [...]
> >
> > I'm thinking of "pressing the button" and registering to become an
> > Official Goggle Unperson, but I haven't totally made up my mind yet.
>
> And my headers declare that I'm a Google Person, so how would that
> action affect our relationship? Semi-serious question.
From your point of view, it would end it except through an intermediary;
he would appear to ignore any post by you, and you would appear to
ignore any post by him.
Andrew Wheeler
>
> Ever heard of "moron"?
Yes, I've been arguing with one. But I'm stopping now.
Matt Ruff
>
> You know what is making me think seriously about getting a
> DVD player? The extra stuff on DVDs which is not on VHS
> tapes. One DVD I saw had 11 hours worth of extra material.
My wife and I just got a DVD player for Christmas, and we're still in
the novelty stage where everything about it seems kinda cool, but in the
long run I think the three primary advantages of DVD over VHS will turn
out to be: (1) everything is in widescreen; (2) clearer picture (we can
read even small subtitles without squinting now); and (3) DVDs take up
less storage space than videotapes.
As for the "extras," in most cases I'm underwhelmed. I mean, it's kind
of cute to be able watch something in a foreign language (episodes of
"The Sopranos" dubbed in Spanish or French are funny, for the first two
minutes anyway), and there is the occasional "making of" documentary
that's kind of cool, but much of the stuff is dispensible fluff that I
doubt I'd miss.
> If only there were some analogous material to put in an
> non-Dead Tree format book.
I'd say the fact that you have to go looking for such material suggests
that this is a solution in search of a problem. Dead Tree format ain't
broke, in this aspect at least.
-- M. Ruff
Mark Atwood
>
> My wife and I just got a DVD player for Christmas, and we're still in
> the novelty stage where everything about it seems kinda cool, but in the
> long run I think the three primary advantages of DVD over VHS will turn
> out to be: (1) everything is in widescreen; (2) clearer picture (we can
> read even small subtitles without squinting now); and (3) DVDs take up
> less storage space than videotapes.
You forget the joy of watching Jacky Chan in super-slow-motion. And of
watching a movie frame by frame by frame with a nit-picker's guide in
hand.
--
Mark Atwood | Well done is better than well said.
m...@pobox.com |
http://www.pobox.com/~mra
Jorj Strumolo
> I think the three primary advantages of DVD over VHS will turn
> out to be: (1) everything is in widescreen; (2) clearer picture
> (we can read even small subtitles without squinting now); and
> (3) DVDs take up less storage space than videotapes.
Having been downloading stuff from newsgroups and making VCDs,
I think another nice thing is random access. If you know that
something's mentioned near the end of a show, you can just jump
there instantly, instead of having to "fast" forward slowly to
it on a tape.
I think another nice addition would be searchability. They have
a bit of this on some DVDs, where you can jump to a scene if
there's a list of them in the box text for reference. But what
about being able to search for text in subtitles? Having a
subtitle track that's descriptive, like they sometime have as
an audio channel on TV shows (can't recall the name for that),
but it's searchable. Even more so.
ObWritten: well, none. Though I might mention that today in
alt.binaries.multimedia "Brave New Worlds", a "What is science
fiction?" documentary is being posted. Haven't looked at it
yet, since it's still being posted.
Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes
Mark Atwood <m...@pobox.com> spake:
> Matt Ruff <Storyt...@worldnet.att.net> writes:
>> My wife and I just got a DVD player for Christmas, and we're still in
>> the novelty stage where everything about it seems kinda cool, but in the
>> long run I think the three primary advantages of DVD over VHS will turn
>> out to be: (1) everything is in widescreen; (2) clearer picture (we can
>> read even small subtitles without squinting now); and (3) DVDs take up
>> less storage space than videotapes.
> You forget the joy of watching Jacky Chan in super-slow-motion. And of
> watching a movie frame by frame by frame with a nit-picker's guide in
> hand.
And always being able to watch subtitled versions of non-English
films[0]. *I WILL NEVER HAVE TO WATCH A FUCKING DUB AGAIN!!!*
And turning on subtitles briefly if you didn't understand what someone
said in an English film.
And director's commentary, if you're into that kind of thing, which I
am. Used to be that "making of" specials were rare and hard to come by.
Now a great many DVDs have them. If I was to go for the biggest gain to
history and the art of cinema from DVDs, that would probably be it -
getting to sit for 90 minutes with the director and others talking about
the movie as it's playing.
[0] There are a few exceptions, but they're easily avoided by reading
the back cover.
--
<a href="http://kuoi.asui.uidaho.edu/~kamikaze/"> Mark Hughes </a>
"No one is safe. We will print no letters to the editor. We will give no
space to opposing points of view. They are wrong. The Underground Grammarian
is at war and will give the enemy nothing but battle." -TUG, v1n1
James Nicoll
Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes <kami...@kuoi.asui.uidaho.edu> wrote:
>
> And turning on subtitles briefly if you didn't understand what someone
>said in an English film.
_Snatch_ has a special set of subtitles just for the "gypsy"
characters.
--
"Don't worry. It's just a bunch of crazies who believe in only one
god. They're just this far away from atheism."
Wayne & Schuster
Frank Ney
kami...@kuoi.asui.uidaho.edu (Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes) to write in
rec.arts.sf.written :
> And director's commentary, if you're into that kind of thing, which I
>am.
And in the case of _Apollo 13_, commentary from the commander and his wife
about what they actually went through during the time in question.
Frank Ney N4ZHG WV/EMT-B LPWV NRA(L) ProvNRA GOA CCRKBA JPFO
--
"I believe a self-righteous liberal Democrat with a cause is
more dangerous than a Hell's Angel with an attitude."
-- Ted Nugent
Just Say No to Gestapo Tactics http://reduce.to/justsayno/
Abuses by the BATF http://www.hamnet.net/~n4zhg/batfabus.html
Terry Austin
>In <2i4l2ukb2nk7v2oqm...@4ax.com>, Terry Austin
>Now what we have here, class, is a quintessential Usenet post.
"A"? Try a dozen or more.
Terry Austin
>Terry Austin wrote:
>>
>> Ever heard of "moron"?
>
>Yes, I've been arguing with one.
I know you are, but what am I?
>But I'm stopping now.
We haven't been arguing since you refused to address the fact that some of
the attributes of digital media you are whining about are far worse for
paper.
That you were too stupid to realize this is a clue.
Terry Austin
>In <ailn2u428r3ei6k4n...@4ax.com>, Terry Austin
><tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>
>>r...@sff.net (Robert Rogoff) wrote:
>>
>>>In <2i4l2ukb2nk7v2oqm...@4ax.com>, Terry Austin
>>><tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Terry Austin wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "Andrew Wheeler" <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote in message
>>>>>> news:3C29F720...@optonline.com...
>>>>Liar.
>>>>
>>>>>It's now time for you to crawl back into your
>>>>>hole and die.
>>>>
>>>>It's now time for you to (continue to) pretend there weren't any points you
>>>>refused to address because you can't.
>>>>>
>>>>>Ever heard of *daylight*?
>>>>
>>>>Ever heard of "moron"?
>>>
>>>Now what we have here, class, is a quintessential Usenet post.
>>
>>"A"? Try a dozen or more.
>
>Yes, yes, Terry, you're right, and so is Andrew.
Heh. We're both idiots. The only real difference is that I know it.
>
>I was confused at first, thinking that this argument was actually a
>parody of the Monty Python argument clinic.
Heh.
>
>Now I see that I've actually stepped into a pile of fresh argument.
>
>Feel free to carry on...
No doubt.
Robert Carnegie
> I think 2 additions to the original text would be apropriate:
> Additional artwork - pictures, images. Sometimes the writer tries to
> describe something which in fact is very difficult to describe in
> words. An image would help immensly. Of course there will be ppl who
> will point out, that its the reader's imagination, that should create
> the image, but sometimes its simply impossible, or in other cases,
> your imagination's product is just too poor, you realize it, but can
> do nothing about it.
> Take for example the LOTR poster which depicts Anduin and the 2
> statues of kings on its shores. I bet, there were very few people,
> whose imagination could draw something that spectacular.
You can _see_ spectacular huge statues in Egypt. I imagine that
they're on Web pages for archaeological or tourist interest, but
please excuse me not checking.
(Somehow I feel that Mount Rushmore _fails_ to be spectacular,
but I'm not sure exactly what's wrong with it.)
And, of course, artwork can be included in dead tree productions -
and given the standard of comicbooks nowadays, I don't think that
cost can be the grounds for not including colour plates with our
modern fantastic fiction prose packages. Hardcover books for
children (in Britain) used often to have several colour plates,
plus monochrome drawings. I'm not sure what you get now, except
that I only see picture plates in movie tie-in books these days.
But then, perhaps the cellulose equivalent of DVD-with-features is
the "Art of Shannara" graphic coffee-table book at eye-watering price.
Be careful what you wish for :-)
As you hint, "The Music of..." is another well-known money-spinner...
but then, the text could be included on the CD as well: full circle.
Plug for BBC's _Lord of the Rings_ audio dramatisation from a while
back which I hope will be webcast as well as broadcast from
www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/ - starting early in the new year, I think.
Phil Fraering
>If you don't mind my asking...why? I think looking back and finding out
>that the question as to why Piers Anthony was such a sexist pig goes all
>the way back to 1982 is a good thing, who knows what little jems you
>might let drop all inadvertently?
Because I wrote a great deal of stuff just off the cuff back when
this was still a bulletin board instead of The Great Archive.
Alternate explanation: "If you meet the Buddha on the net, put him
in your kill file." Anyone taking usenet *that* seriously would probably
be better served to look elsewhere.
Alternate explanation 3: I was reading an old post on rec.arts.sf.* earlier
this week, and ran across one I didn't recognize was mine until I got to the
.signature.
And I thought the .signature was something obnoxious a real jerk must
have come up with.
I'm still thinking. I'm not fishing for compliments or anything, really,
in case anyone's wondering.
Phil Fraering
>And my headers declare that I'm a Google Person, so how would that
>action affect our relationship? Semi-serious question.
Basically, you can apply to have all your past posts erased. Once.
I think.
Alan Gore
>I was confused at first, thinking that this argument was actually a
>parody of the Monty Python argument clinic.
Speaking of which, you have now encountered the Mr. Creosote of Usenet
argument.
ag...@qwest.net | "Giving money and power to the government
Alan Gore | is like giving whiskey and car keys
Software For PC's, Inc. | to teenaged boys" - P. J. O'Rourke
http://www.alangore.com
Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes
Robert Carnegie <rja.ca...@excite.com> spake:
> You can _see_ spectacular huge statues in Egypt. I imagine that
> they're on Web pages for archaeological or tourist interest, but
> please excuse me not checking.
> (Somehow I feel that Mount Rushmore _fails_ to be spectacular,
> but I'm not sure exactly what's wrong with it.)
I would call it "solemn" or "dignified", not "spectacular". The one
thing that might affect perceptions of it is that we don't deify our
presidents. We might respect them, or might not, but they're still just
normal joes.
> And, of course, artwork can be included in dead tree productions -
> and given the standard of comicbooks nowadays, I don't think that
> cost can be the grounds for not including colour plates with our
> modern fantastic fiction prose packages. Hardcover books for
> children (in Britain) used often to have several colour plates,
> plus monochrome drawings. I'm not sure what you get now, except
> that I only see picture plates in movie tie-in books these days.
_The Last Hero_, by Terry Pratchett, illustrated by Paul Kidby. It's
a beautiful book, and the art is an integral part of the story.
As I've noted before, I would be perfectly happy to see illustrations
in adult literature, too. Speculative fiction often has scenes that are
extremely difficult to describe in prose, but a single image could help
with. An occasional place or being illustration (even just sketches)
wouldn't go amiss. _Gormenghast_'s illustrations are exactly the kind
of thing I have in mind.
Evelyn C. Leeper
>
> Terry Austin wrote:
> >
> > "Andrew Wheeler" <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote in message
> > news:3C29F720...@optonline.com...
> > >Power outages can make an electronic file inaccessible, even
> > >if it still exists.
> >
> > Power outages can make *books* inaccessible, unless you
> > can read by moonlight.
>
> Since you've now devolved to your usual frothing at the mouth, I'll
> restrict myself to answering this one stupid point of yours and
> ignoring the others. (Since I've already talked about all of them.)
> You ignore points deliberately, try to shift the basis of an argument,
> and engage in personal attacks just to justify your own bloated ego.
> You also failed to give one specific instance, in the five or six
> places I asked for them. It's now time for you to crawl back into your
> hole and die.
>
> Ever heard of *daylight*?
Or candles?
--
Evelyn C. Leeper
http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
"A free society is one where it is safe to be unpopular."
--Adlai Stevenson
James Angove
> Physical formats are becoming less and less relevent. With
> networking, both local & wide area, it's easy for data to be
> transfered across operating systems and physical formats.
>
This is more an article of faith among the *NIX literate than an
actual fact. Certainly it has some truth, but your finacial
institution
is still very much married to large scale IBM infrastructures of a
somewhat
ancient vintage. The largest consumer bank in the US certainly still
is. (Although I broke down and used a Wells ATM the other day, and
either than have alot of horse power in on-site unit, or they ripped
out all their old infrastucture. Be interesting to find out.
I will probably die before people stop useing some variant on the
concept of
a FEP; which fact gives me cold sweats.
> However file formats are definatly relevent. A file format such
> as Word is essentially impossible to decipher. This means
> either the original program, or a massive amount of work.
> This is one of the reasons why I recommend simple text based
> formats whenever possible. I forsee a movement from ISO-8859-1
> to UTF-8, but the 7 bits of ASCII will remain constant forever.
Maybe. But they aren't the only game in town, and for lots of really
interesting markets they don't even have a local francise (Hey! My
sports metaphor actually works -I don't think I've ever done that
before). The aboved mentioned large finacials use something really
horrid, cause they kind of have to:
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/EBCDIC.html
Thats right: EBCDIC. It lives even still.
James
Alan Barclay
James Angove <ja...@ospf.net> wrote:
>gor...@elaine.furryape.com (Alan Barclay) wrote in message
>news:<10092580...@elaine.furryape.com>...
>
>> Physical formats are becoming less and less relevent. With
>> networking, both local & wide area, it's easy for data to be
>> transfered across operating systems and physical formats.
>>
>
>This is more an article of faith among the *NIX literate than an
>actual fact. Certainly it has some truth, but your finacial
>institution
>is still very much married to large scale IBM infrastructures of a
>somewhat
As I said, it's becoming less and less relevent. A modern 390
or Z/Series can run gigabit ethernet, and be both source and
destination for ftp. If I'm going from an the 390 to a non-EBCDIC
system, then I have to remember to put the ascii mode into the
JCL, but even when going from mainframe to mainframe it's quite
common to transfer the files in ASCII.
When using telnet, the telnet daemon translates between EBCDIC
and ASCII, as telnet is defined to always use ASCII.
This is not theoretical, a major part of my job is in helping
make these sort of transfers happen.