Riding the open standards wave to lower costs

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No?: People might choose to use Word because they are familiar with the interface conventions, or they have applications written that plug in to office (though if you had apps that plug into an Oracle database, you'd be stuck just as much with Oracle), but it has NOTHING to do with the fact that they have to to maintain compatiblity with the Office-oriented world.

Interesting passage. Several important errors.

First, you proceed list several precise areas where people need to maintain compatability with the Office-oriented world; then you go on to say that those Office-compatability issues (like UI conventions, application plugins, etc.) have "nothing to do" with Office compatability.

Perhaps you're constraining "compatability" to mean "file compatability." If you are, you should say so. It'd kind of a silly thing to do -- it requires willful blindness to the way that applications are actually used by people to do work -- but you could do it, of course.

Second, you make a quick but telling jab: "...though if you had apps that plug into an Oracle database, you'd be stuck just as much with Oracle...."

That's a really, really curious thing to say. I wonder why you'd say it. Because, of course, it's pretty clearly wrong. Unless, of course, by "plugs in" you mean "requires Oracle-specific connector software that is not available for Office applicaitons like Excel or Access." (Which would be an interestingly restrictive definition, in view of the fact that your definition of "compatible with Office" is something like "files can be imported with 80% formatting preservation."); Posted by: escoles@... Posted on: 10/17/03 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use