Re: Apparently Email Forwarding's Usefulness has Sort of Ended

[Chuck Hastings <cwh2@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Framers:  See Bill Hall's definitive comments below
of how M$ email programs read forwarded messages
as attachments, so that they get nuked.   Plus, I let
myself vent a few words on the same subject in
response to his comments.

I hope this helps.      CH




Hello Bill Hall,

Thanks for your tip.

I did as a matter of fact already do what you're
suggesting, the second time that I sent my message.

I didn't suspect the full problem right away, because in
my personal email program  (Netscape Messenger 4.79)
attachments don't look anything whatever like forwarded
messages.  And the combination of Netscape Messenger
and Norton AntiVirus scans all incoming and also
all outgoing email messages on my machine, so no
Framer actually got any viruses from me.

I've used a few versions of Outlook at contract jobs,
and even there they haven't LOOKED exactly the same.
Attachments had little logos  (FrameMaker, MSWord,
Visio, or whatever), whereas forwarded messages had
sort of a plain box thing.  So I can't account why your
version of Outlook called a forwarded message an
attachment.  Good old Microsoft quality, I guess.

Outlook driving Messenger out of the marketplace
is one more example of Gresham's Law of Software.

I think I did make one mistake the first time that I sent
that message, which was forgetting to nuke the HTML
transmission option;  Netscape Messenger gives you a
dialog box wherein you can do that.  I'm VERY sorry that
my negligence in that respect may have distracted some
Framers from what was turning into a very spirited and
serious debate on the future  (if any)  of the for-profit
packaged-software industry, including Adobe and
FrameMaker.


Chuck Hastings      cwh2@earthlink.net

Vintage Silicon Logic         San José and Seattle


============================================


HALL Bill wrote:

> Chuck,
>
> Outlook showed that the mail had an attachment. Given the number of
spam and virus messages I simply delete any mail with an attachment
unless I know exactly who it is from and have a good idea what the
attachment is.
>
> For this reason, if you are forwarding to people running M$ mail
products (e.g., outlook, outlook express) you are much better off
embedding the forwarded document rather than sending it as an attached
.eml or whatever format your system uses.
>
> Regards,
>
> Bill Hall
>
> Documentation Systems Analyst
> Head Office, Engineering
> Tenix Defense
> Williamstown, Vic. 3016
> Phone: 03 9244 4820
> Email:bill.hall@tenix.com
> URL: http://www.tenix.com
>
> Honorary Research Fellow
> Knowledge Management Lab
> School of Information Management & Systems
> Monash University
> Caulfield East, Vic. 3145
> Phone: 03 9903 1883
> Email: william.hall@infotech.monash.edu.au
> URL: http://www.sims.monash.edu.au/research/km/
>
>
> | -----Original Message-----
> | From: Chuck Hastings [mailto:cwh2@earthlink.net]
> | Sent: Monday, 8 December 2003 1:52 PM
> | To: framers@omsys.com
> | Cc: Richard Combs; Bill Briggs
> | Subject: Re: PROFOUND AND SCARY OBSERVATIONS [Fwd: Framemaker
> | isperfect,
> | therefor it's dead]
> |
> |
> | OK, Framers, I'll try this another way.
> |
> | I did NOT send an ATTACHMENT.  I FORWARDED
> | a message.  And it went out through my daily-updated
> | Norton AntiVirus.  Not to worry.
> |
> | Apparently Richard Comb's' software defenses are
> | unable to distinguish a forwarded message from an
> | attachment.  Bill Briggs seems to have something
> | different in place, in his system.
> |
> | I was unaware that FORWARDING emails to the
> | Free Framers list was also an illegal operation.  Is it,
> | really?
> |
> | This time around I just EMBEDDED my son's message,
> | instead of forwarding it.  I hope that any of you who
> | received it OK the first time will forgive the repetition.
> |
> | Richard, you're obviously quite free to  <snip>  this
> | message also, if you're moved to do so.
> |
> |
> | Chuck Hastings      cwh2@earthlink.net
> |
> | Vintage Silicon Logic         San José and Seattle
> |
> |
> |
> | ============================================
> |
> |
> | Richard Combs wrote:
> |
> | Chuck Hastings wrote something that arrived with an attachment:
> |
> | <snipped all; deleted message and attachment>
> |
> | This list permits attachments? Now, that's profoundly scary.
> |
> | ;-)
> |
> | Richard
> |
> |
> | ============================================
> |
> |
> | Hello Framers,
> |
> | My son Steve has expertise in software and IT far
> | beyond mine.  He was an MSWord developer at
> | Microsoft for six years, and in the half decade or so
> | since he left he has converted all computers  (many)
> | that he and his wife own and use to Linux.  That
> | may just indicate something . . .
> |
> | I think his observations are potentially quite useful
> | to the FrameMaker community, and so I'm forwarding
> | them as he suggested.  He didn't see my wisecrack
> | about how there may soon be an opportunity for an
> | open-source Linux-based program to be called
> | FlameMaker, but quite a few of you reacted to my
> | jibe in various ways.
> |
> |
> | Chuck Hastings      cwh2@earthlink.net
> |
> | Vintage Silicon Logic         San José and Seattle
> |
> |
> | ============================================
> |
> |
> | "Steve R. Hastings" wrote:
> |
> | > Dad: if you think your FrameMaker discussion mailing list would be

> | > interested in this, please forward it to them.
> | >
> | > Cas Tuyn noted that FrameMaker is essentially perfect, and it's so

> | > difficult for Adobe to sell upgrades that Adobe may simply
> | stop selling
> | > FrameMaker.
> | >
> | > The top reason I now prefer free, open source software to
> | proprietary
> | > software is: no one can ever take it away from you.  The
> | people working
> | > on a piece of free software aren't trying to make money.  They
don't
> | > make decisions based on how much money people will pay.
> | They just want
> | > the software to be good.
> | >
> | > With free software, you don't have to be a software
> | engineer to be able
> | > to get features added; the development team will probably
> | add a feature
> | > if you request it and it's a good idea.  And, if your business
> | > absolutely requires a particular feature, you can always
> | hire a software
> | > engineer to add that feature, if no one else will.  (And if
> | anyone in
> | > the world adds a new feature, the rest of the world gets it
> | for free!)
> | >
> | > So, in the free software world, as long as there are people who
care
> | > about the program--care enough either to write code, or to
> | hire someone
> | > to write code--that program isn't dead.  That's why I would
> | sooner run a
> | > business using free software, than using proprietary software.
> | >
> | > It used to be true that you had to be a software geek to
> | understand and
> | > use free software, but it's no longer true.  The best of the free
> | > software is about as good as the best of the proprietary
> | software, at
> | > least for the most common purposes.
> | >
> | > Getting down to specifics, is there any free software that
> | can fill the
> | > shoes of FrameMaker?  I am handicapped here because I don't
> | know much
> | > about FrameMaker, but here are the ones I think might be of
> | interest.
> | >
> | > OpenOffice.org Writer: This is usually viewed as a replacement for

> | > Microsoft Word, not as a replacement for FrameMaker, but I read an

> | > article that claims that it is more like FrameMaker than it is
like
> | > Word.  Here's the article, so you can read it yourself:
> | >
> | >
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=7120&mode=thread&order=0
> | >
> | > OpenOffice.org software is available for Windows, Linux, and even
> | > Mac OS X (but it's tricky to install for Mac).  You can get
> | > OpenOffice.org software from the OpenOffice.org web site:
> | >
> | > http://www.openoffice.org/
> | >
> | > KWord: the KDE project's word processor, KWord, is advertised as a

> | > FrameMaker-like word processor.  It's frame-based.  You need to be

> | > running KDE to use it, so it is limited to platforms (such as
Linux)
> | > that support KDE.  In other words, no Windows version is
available.
> | > (Yet, anyway.)
> | >
> | > http://www.koffice.org/kword/
> | >
> | > LyX: a friendly, graphical front-end for TeX, a system for
> | typesetting.
> | > LyX is supposed to make it easy to write highly structured
> | documents,
> | > and the styles control how everything looks.  So you would
> | make sure all
> | > the sections are tagged correctly (title page, headings, body
text,
> | > whatever) and it will all look very consistent when printed.
> | >
> | > http://www.lyx.org/
> | >
> | > Vex: an XML editor, intended to be word processor-like and
> | intended to
> | > be used with DocBook for authoring documents.  There are other XML

> | > editors out there as well; I haven't really tested any of them, so
I
> | > just picked this one as an example.
> | >
> | > http://vex.sourceforge.net/
> | >
> | > In case you are not familiar with DocBook:
> | >
> | > http://www.docbook.org/
> | >
> | > http://xml.oreilly.com/news/dontlearn_0701.html
> | >
> | > In closing, I'll also note that even if Adobe kills off
> | FrameMaker, you
> | > don't have to stop using it.  Lots of old software is still
> | around in
> | > common use.
> | > --
> | > Steve R. Hastings    "Vita est"
> | > steve@hastings.org   http://www.blarg.net/~steveha
> |
> |
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> |






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