Re: [sword-devel] Food for thought regarding OSIS and some of its alternatives...

[Kahunapule Michael Johnson]

David Blue (Mailing List Addy) wrote: On Friday 10 March 2006 23:29, Kahunapule Michael Johnson wrote: I am not a religious follower of open source and ISO standards. Actually, I care little about ISO endorsement of any standard unless the standard is both relevant to the task at hand and a better solution than reasonable alternatives. This isn't a game for me... it is what I do: translate, proclaim, publish, and live the Word of God, and help others who do those things. This isn't a game for most of us either. It is what we do. Now let me explain the importance if standards, especially standards endorsed and maintained by standards organizations such as the *International* *Standards* Organization. And, what's more I can do it in one word, Compatibility I'm sold on the need for compatibility already. It turns out that this is an excellent argument for the use of a proprietary standard published and supported by the International market leader in word processing software. The need for standards is one of the forces that leads towards a sort of monopoly for those standards. If a corporation can ride that need and profit from that, it is pretty smart, isn't it? Microsoft has done many good things! <big grin -- just don't shoot me... I'm out of range, anyway> The project wherein I produce Microsoft WordML text starts with something that I call open and standard (USFM and Unicode). This meets a very practical need for typesetting Scriptures in minority languages right now. Think of the real output as bound, printed paper-- very standard, but not electronic. The use of proprietary software in the process doesn't bother me at all. Later, that same open standard text can be used to produce the same sort of output using open source software. Open standard in, open standard out, and stuff in the middle that may or may not last long, but fills an urgent and current need is what I am talking about. Don't get me wrong. I like open standards and open source (as I define them), and if I could do the same thing all "open" with no (or little) extra cost, I would. The real value of the standard is to allow interchange in both space and time of data (or whatever), not to straight-jacket the whole process. The Sword Process uses proprietary formats and nonstandard extensions, but can still import and import texts that conform to various standards. That is OK. It would not be OK to say that is not OK. Just because something is a standard does not ensure compatibility. Take an lesson from history books-- RS-232 serial interface. Just because two things were RS-232 doesn't mean they could communicate. Lots of parameters had to be set (flow control method, speed, parity, number of data bits, connector types, etc.) to communicate successfully. Later standards, like USB and IEEE 1394 are better, in that respect. Just plug it in. Another observation from these standards-- they don't last forever, but there are converters to bridge the time and technology gap. I have a device that converts from USB to RS-232 and back that I use to keep an ancient Palm Pilot in operation, for example. The wonderful thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from, and so many variants. :-) Even in your example, you list more than one wireless LAN standard. Keep smiling! Michael http://kahunapule.org

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