
Please stop sending me your shitty Word documents – Coding 2 Learn - MarcScott
http://www.coding2learn.org/blog/2014/04/14/please-stop-sending-me-your-shitty-word-documents/
======
georgespencer
> Just spare a thought for those of us that choose not to use Microsoft Word,
> and respect our right not to do so.

The price you pay for inconveniencing me into sending you a document type
which might alarm or confuse a non-technical person or necessitate additional
software being installed is that when I send you a .doc file you have to email
me back to specifically ask that I send it in a non-.doc format. I won't judge
you, but you're asking people to optimise a standard behaviour (assumption
that Word is ubiquitous) for a marginal gain (catering to the tiny fraction of
nerds who get so agitated by this assumption that they lecture people on the
internet).

~~~
Turing_Machine
"necessitate additional software being installed"

Every computer on the market that can read Microsoft Word documents can also
read plain text without anything being installed.

"you're asking people to optimise a standard behaviour"

"Standard" according to whom? Some rough numbers from Googling from a couple
of minutes:

Number of personal computers in the world: 1 billion Number of copies of
Microsoft Word sold: 100 million

So, no, having Microsoft Word (or at least a legal copy of it) is not
standard.

"for a marginal gain"

Again, according to whom? What is the relationship here? If he is your
teacher, boss, prospective boss, or customer, the gains might be anything but
marginal. It looks like he is a computing teacher, actually. I've had plenty
of teachers who required work to be formatted in a specific way from which you
deviated at your peril.

The assumption that everyone has Microsoft Office running on a Windows machine
was never true, but in today's mobile world it's not true with a vengeance.

~~~
MetaCosm
.doc(x) != word. For example, I really like
[http://www.abisource.com/](http://www.abisource.com/) on desktops.

Having the ability to open .doc(x) files IS standard, Microsoft Word is not.
Lucky we got OpenOffice, LibreOffice, AbiSource and tons of other open source,
freeware, shareware, commercial off the shelf software to open .doc(x) on
every imaginable platform.

EDIT: I prefer text, because I am a vimmer, but accept opening (and often
sending) .docx is a part of the requirements that I can't control.

------
_Simon
How utterly ridiculous. Please stop posting your own shitty, over-entitled
rants. That you clearly think that you are still "1337" by being so
dissmissive of a commonly used tool is arrogant and ridiculous. Also, your
list of installed apps is missing TextEdit, which reads doc and docx files
perfectly well. Unless of course you remove all of the other apps that come
with OS X and literally only use those you list, which would be absurd.

------
atoponce
I used to think this way. In fact, when applying for a job, I would only
submit my resume in PDF. I've stopped this.

I know you think you're doing good to the world by telling people to shove it,
by adhering to your standards. But what you're really doing is exactly what
you claim they are doing to you. The world works in Microsoft Office. 9 out of
10 computers have Microsoft Windows installed. Gartner has estimated that 9
out of 10 Microsoft Windows installations have some version of Microsoft
Office installed.

With the advent of online document, spreadsheet, and presentation software
popularity, and the fact the Microsoft Office documents are natively
supported, it's a losing battle. There are good strong technical arguments why
proprietary formats should not be used, even including open binary formats.
You won't win that argument.

It doesn't help your cause either, when the reply back to your refusal to open
a .docx is "Well then, install it, or don't read it." By you trying to force
work on others, you will simply just be missing out on what the content of the
document is. Unless, of course, you install LibreOffice/OpenOffice.org.

If you want to send open standard document formats to your contacts, go for
it. But by demanding that the sender do extra work curtailing to your needs,
so you don't have to do extra work installing office software, is
hypocritical.

Get over yourself. No one cares.

~~~
dragonwriter
> 9 out of 10 computers have Microsoft Windows installed.

Nine out of 10 traditional desktop/laptop PCs, maybe, but that's a smaller and
smaller share of the computers people use every day.

> 9 out of 10 computers have Microsoft Windows installed.

That's probably true; unless things have changed recently, nearly all consumer
PCs shipped with Windows for several years (and Windows/Office versions) have
shipped with whatever the current "Home" version of Office is installed,
though the license may have been a time-limited trial. So, yeah, if you are
looking at _installed_ , you'll get a pretty high number.

------
chriswait
Sorry buddy, you're vastly outnumbered and your expectations are unrealistic.

~~~
Turing_Machine
The last time I looked, mobile devices were outselling desktops and notebooks
by a comfortable margin.

So, no, he's not outnumbered.

~~~
collyw
I use a desktop (or laptop) for doing work. The most I will do on my phone is
send a short email reply, as the interface is so inferior for getting any
"real" work done.

~~~
Turing_Machine
You're not everybody. When you send email to someone else, your preferred mode
of working doesn't really enter into it.

I'd rather not have bloated Word files sucking up my data plan.

~~~
_Simon
And neither are you or the OP. In fact, I'd hazard a guess that you are in
actual fact a minority. Before you assert higher mobile sales again, think on
how many people use their device for anything more than the very basics;
photos, messaging and social networking etc.

~~~
Turing_Machine
You are missing the point completely.

No one is trying to tell you you can't use Word to your heart's content on
your own machine. When you send email to another person, though, you can't
assume that they're going to have it. Especially not now.

"In fact, I'd hazard a guess that you are in actual fact a minority."

Smartphones that do have email and don't have Microsoft Word are a minority?

How do you figure that? Neither iOS nor Android comes with the ability to view
Word documents.

~~~
_Simon
>" _Smartphones that do have email and don 't have Microsoft Word are a
minority?_"

You, as already stated, are missing the point. It has been explained and you
continue to miss, or obtuesly ignore the point.

> _" Neither iOS nor Android comes with the ability to view Word documents."_

Bullshit. iOS can read doc files natively.

------
htk
There is a side of HN that loves whining.

~~~
guyprovost
You said it pal... Kinda sad!

------
pithon
I notice that this post has bold-faced section headings, opens with an
italicized pair of sentences, has a bulleted list, and quotes that are
indicated with a gray vertical bar. The best part is the section title "Plain
text should be plain" which is bolded.

The author must think they are a pretty good designer to not use plain text
(their conclusion, not mine).

~~~
Turing_Machine
Web pages aren't email.

~~~
tzs
I used to think email should be plain text. I ranted at technical people that
sent rich text or HTML email.

Then I realized I was being an idiot, and they were right.

Here's how I came to that realization. Imagine an alternate reality where
computing developed almost the same as it did in ours, except for one key
difference. They did not develop email--it just never occurred to anyone. They
have Internet. They have FTP. They have the web. They have instant messaging.
They have Facebook. They just don't have email. They still do their
correspondence on paper, sent through the post office.

They, of course, use computers to write their mail. They then print it, and
mail the printout. They think nothing of including inline photos, bold
headings, embedding charts, and so on. If they need to send a lot of data with
a mail, they drop a thumb drive or a memory card into the envelope.

When the recipient receives the mail, there is a good chance they scan it, OCR
it, and store it in their computer, as that is more convenient than dealing
with physical sheets of paper.

Now someone has the bright idea of skipping the "print/mail/scan" and instead
using the Internet to transport the content. Does anyone think they are going
to toss in a requirement that their new "email" system only can handle plain
text? Of course not. They are going to try to make it as capable as the
regular "print/mail/scan" mail system, and so are going to support inline
graphics and photos, multiple typefaces and fonts, bold, underling, strikeout,
color, and all that jazz.

The difference between that alternate reality and ours is that the people that
got the bright idea for email in our reality got it at a time when most
computer terminals couldn't handle more than simple plain text. The recipient
was going to be reading on a teletype or, if lucky, on a video terminal that
was effectively a glass teletype.

Those technical limitations have been long gone. There is simply no reason to
keep email less functional than paper mail now that we are not forced to do
so.

~~~
Turing_Machine
That would be a good argument if the OP were about HTML email, but it it
isn't. It's about sending Microsoft Word attachments.

------
Robadob
I've found through my time at University that the standard document format for
anything that doesn't require the recipient to edit/add to the document is
pdf. Most word processors will now export to it, and readers are pretty
prevalent to.

Is this truly different in business?

------
robinhoodexe
For reading only - PDF and nothing else.

For when I need to be able to edit the document - .doc please.

------
zokier
This topic was already ranted to death what ... 20 years ago? This post brings
absolutely nothing fresh to the discussion, just reiterates the same old tired
points, continuing to preach the choir.

~~~
Turing_Machine
Not to put too fine a point on it, but this is not 20 years ago.

~~~
zokier
So what has changed then that invalidates the old rants and justifies a new
one?

~~~
Turing_Machine
More mobile devices sold than desktops and notebooks.

~~~
zokier
And none of the arguments in presented TFA referenced mobile devices at all.
Even the section which would be relevant ("I don’t have Word installed") does
not even mention mobile. And it doesn't even touch the real problems with
.docs on mobile, eg their "non-responsive" layouts.

~~~
Turing_Machine
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here. There are plenty of other
things that aren't the same now as 20 years ago. More people on Macs. More
people on Linux. More free or low cost alternatives to Word. Stuff tends to be
web-centric rather than 8.5x11" paper-centric.

A book could be written about all the things that have changed since then.

Just because an argument was had 20 years ago doesn't mean it isn't worth
having again. Otherwise we'd still be using stone tools.

