From: "Kristoffer Lundén" Date: 2007-03-30T22:35:38+09:00 Subject: Re: Just for fun... On 3/30/07, Trans wrote:> Yet, this is practical only in the short-run, and because too many> people follow this kind of tenant, the long-run never gets here. In> other words, by not collectively working together to adopt better> technologies we are ultimately being less practical.> Like I said, not ideal. And I have nothing against going forward, andwould applaud any *open standard* (free to implement by anyone)becoming widespread across all platforms. Meanwhile, however, compression becomes steadily less and less of anyreal value for the average desktop user, for almost any scenario -today, archiving is mainly done to group files, and any compression ismostly a nice side effect. A certain group of people who believe indoing things as efficiently and correct as possible (they call usnerds ;-)) will not agree, but it's true nonetheless and easy toobserve in almost any computer user - it's when a directory, or evenmore than 2-3 files is to be mailed that the archivers are used,almost never because of size issues. Talking general computer usehere. Of course, if I release some code only meant to be used on Linux, Iusually tar.gz or .bz2 it, and Mac users probably still sit things ingeneral? The point is, by defaulting to zip, you may hold back the revolution abit, but it also ensures that your mom, your boss, your customers, andjust about everyone except Perrin ;-) can open it. This is convenientand pragmatic, but it's also important: there's a lot of busy peopleout there who will not even bother to reply wit a complaint if theycan't open the files directly, they will just junk the message andmove on. A *lot* of people out the aren't interested in installinganything, no matter how good it is. A lot of these people may pay yoursalary or sponsor your next project. I have about 40 students I work with, computer literate and in theages 18-30, and I am writing this because this has shown to be a realproblem, before I got them all to only send stuff in formats asstandard as possible - this includes not sending MS files unlessrequested. Students have, in a very real sense, lost internshipopportunities, and maybe even job offers (who knows?) because of this,and it has only a long time after shown that it was only because itwas a RAR archive or funnily, an Open Document, or something likethat. Some will say it's a matter of education, to which I wish you the bestof luck. It hasn't worked so far, because most people are notinterested. However, I sincerely support any movements to getting say7zip built in in the next Windows service pack... that's what it isgonna take at this moment. -- Kristoffer -- Kristoffer Lundén✉ kristoffer.lunden@gmail.com✉ kristoffer.lunden@gamemaker.nuhttp://www.gamemaker.nu/☎ 0704 48 98 77