Re: Affecting Institutional Change (Yeah Right)
> > Douglas Allan Tutty <dtutty@porchlight.ca> wrote:
> > > On Tue, May 08, 2007 at 03:49:54PM -0400, Amy Templeton wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Can anybody recommend a *really, really convincing* source of
> > > > information I can give people/my college that will aid in deterring
> > > > them from trying to force people to use MS-Office files (by sending
> > > > them via email and posting them on official college sites)? The
> > > > ones I've been using
> > > Change colleges?
If I were the type to write "lol," I'd have written it instead of
this filler sentence. Fortunately, it's not quite that bad despite
my dramatic description, and I <3 my college other than that.
> > > Talk directly to the people creating the files. Explain the
> > > problem and ask them what they would need to effect change. I've
> > > never used an MS office product so I don't know what's involved,
> > > also I don't know the content of the files or how they are
> > > generating them.
Fair enough. I guess I'm just getting frustrated because I feel
like I'm the only one on campus who *doesn't* use MS and MS-for-Mac
products exclusively (or at all), despite there apparently being a
GNU/Linux group on campus (I haven't contacted them at all, but the
impression I get from their website is that they're more into
prettifying things with Compiz and such than my particular
minimalist-when-it-comes-to-computers aesthetic will allow for, and
definitely more into that stuff than into encouraging good
practices. So basically I kind of wish there were some magic
solution that would save me from having to nag at professors and
administrators constantly (or at least when printed copies of the
documents aren't available) about this.
> > > Perhaps they can provide an easy pointy-clicky-gimmik that
> > > transforms their doc files to something useful. It may be as
> > > simple as adding a button to a tool bar, right beside the "save
> > > as doc file", a "save as something useful" button. The author may
> > > not have the skill or permission to change the toolbar directly.
Hmm...that would be an interesting trick. I'll google around on
that; if I could find something about that it'd be pretty useful.
Thanks!
M. Fioretti <mfioretti@mclink.it> wrote:
> yes, that language isn't the same spoken by non programmers.
I dunno...the first article
(http://goldmark.org/netrants/no-word/attach.html) at least seems
to be directed at Word users in general...but good point. Also, I'm
not actually a programmer /per se/. I get around fine in Emacs and
can hack together some basic elisp, BASH script a bit, and use
LaTeX, but beyond that I am by no means a programmer by any stretch
of the imagination.
> 1) as far as official college sites go, it depends on where the
> college is and whether it is a public one or not. Some countries
> and states *have* laws that mandate that public electronic
> documents must be published at least in non proprietary formats.
> In the USA, Pam Jones of Groklaw.net may be able to help you to
> find this out. IF this is your situation, threatening a lawsuit
> or at least communicating to any news outlet in a 500 miles
> radius may move something.
It's a private college, and have no desire to make this anywhere
near that insane, but thank you nonetheless. I'm basically
wishfully hoping for a quiet solution.
> 3) Another angle may be to point out that several states are
> moving to open formats:
> http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/02/06/HNtexasminnodf_1.html
> and explain why Universities should be the first ones to follow
> this example
Interesting...I will keep this in mind.
> 4) I haven't actually opened it yet, but the database here:
> http://digifreedom.net/node/55 is meant just to list good and bad
> (from this point of view) schools and Universities worldwide,
> both to help all of them to get the kind of coverage they
> deserve, and to help students to find out in advance and avoid
> the wrong places. You and everybody else is encouraged to send me
> off list any relevant material. Obviously, you are also
> encouraged to pass around this request as much as you can.
I appreciate this kind offer, but I would prefer to try to resolve
this first. I really love my school in most other dimensions, just
not when it comes to their computery stuff. That's why I haven't
mentioned the name as of yet. Also, it's not actually a *policy*,
just a tacit acceptance and a failure to educate their staff about
this.
> Hope these comments are useful.
Yes, thank you.
> Joe Hart <j.hart@orange.nl> wrote:
> > You *could* refuse to deal with people that send you documents
> > that you cannot read, but reality says you must at least on
> > occasion do so.
Yeah, unfortunately most of the culprits are my professors and
other staff members at the college. Not really anybody I can refuse
to deal with, since they're in the position of power here.
> > Its just that too many people think that MS Office is the only
> > software that exists to create documents. Even telling them
> > about alternatives does not let them see the light.
Agreed. I always try to let people know that this isn't the case,
but it just isn't enough. They're always like, "Well, what do *you*
use?" and then I have to try to explain LaTeX and Emacs (they're
like "Wait, you use a TEXT EDITOR for everything? Like NOTEPAD???
Why would you do such a thing???"...*sigh*) without sounding (a)
incredibly nerdy :-) and (b) completely incomprehensible. For the
record, I also try to mention OpenOffice/Abiword/etc. when they
don't specifically ask about my setup.
> > The best you can do is hope a virus will wipe their hard drive
> > and then being the Good Samaritan, offer to install a reliable
> > OS on their machine so the problem will not recur
Haha...yes, one can only hope. However, I doubt this will happen at
the college since their oh-so-practical ban on IRC and use of
"industry standards" like Novell and M$ should keep them *totally
safe* from viruses. And I actually did make that offer at a friend
of mine recently (I occasionally do try to increase the ranks of
women GNU/Linux users in particular, since I'm the only one I know
in real life), but her parents bought her a Mac pretty much as soon
as they heard her old Windows computer died. Oh well.
Anyway, thanks for your responses. I guess I just needed to
complain and actually be *heard* for a change.
Amy
--
Try to get all of your posthumous medals in advance.
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