Re: [Bug-gnupedia]Submissions in Word Format

[Christopher Mahan]

> From: Tom Chance <address@hidden>

> The only reason I can see for ever not allowing Word
> files, or any other files created by a company's
> software, is if they get on our backs about converting
> the file types, or charging us for using them. But
> until we get into trouble for doing it, we'll have to
> put philisophical dislikes of M$ aside to get as many
> articles into GNE and Nupedia as possible!

Microsoft cannot claim ownership of the textual content of a .doc file.

The only thing they would complain about would be the use of knowledge of 
their proprietory binary format, which the converter would certainly need if 
it was running on Linux, let's say.

But, if the converter was using a win 98 or win NT machine with MSWord on 
it, and decompose the document using the Word Document Object Model, 
programmatically, from VB, VBA, or VBScript, then the converter would in 
fact not know the details of the binary .doc file, but rather use MSWord's 
to do that with. And it's never been a problem to convert files from MSWord 
to something else (like ascii) using MSWord.

Now, depending on the type of files, this may be easy or hard, and possibly 
some formatting might go awry (MSWord formatting I think will never truly 
translate well to the web), but it could be used, either as-is if the author 
doesn't care, or it could be then edited online, from the xml (using TEI).


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