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MA Senator Decries OpenDocument Decision
An anonymous reader writes to mention a ZDNet article on Massachusetts senator Marc Pacheco's OpenDocument study. The report blasts the decision to switch to the OSS-friendly document format, saying the state's IT division didn't have the authority to make that decision and has disregarded the needs of disabled citizens. From the article: "'The process, quite frankly, was driven by one individual in a very powerful position (Kriss) issuing a memo to an individual in a less powerful position (Quinn). Then he was told to get it done and forget about any obstacles,' Pacheco said. Although OpenDocument is not yet widely used, other government entities, including Belgium, have expressed interest in OpenDocument as a standard as well."
OpenDocument is a standard format for documents that anyone can use. It doesn't have anything to do with voice synthesizing or special screen readers. That's the editor/viewing application's responsibility or capability.
No, your just wrong. Obviously all IT decisions like these should be left to senators.
That's because even then, he was concerned about the rights of the disabled to ride dirt bikes.
It's kind of ironic. I must be part of the audience for which this senator is attempted to advocate. I was working on a Word document for a coworker that was a glorifed form. She couldn't get it to not bullet her paragraphs as individual list items. After struggling with it for a while, I was able to overcome this amazing "feature" by randomly deleting text until it stopped auto-formatting the paragraph (I achieved this by pasting the text into Notepad, removing some funny characters, clearing out the form field, and re-pasting the text back in).
If it weren't for Microsoft's helpfulness and amazing features, a task like that would have only taken a minute, and I would have been able to get back to my own tasks much more quickly. This is something that Open Source Software doesn't understand about government contracts - one of the purposes of government employment is to create jobs. If you start making software more efficient & easy to use, instead of bloated & intimidating, things like certification, overtime, & over-employment become relics of the past.
OSS needs to take a page from Microsoft's book - they've been doing this for a long time...they know what they're doing. Heck, Microsoft has gotten so good at getting money from large, wealthy entities that Warren Buffett felt left out of the action, and decided to go ahead and give Bill Gates all his money too.
Kindness is not to be found in anything but that it adds to its beauty...
Oh, please. You can't expect politicians to have any comprehension of the issues that they make world-changing decisions about.
I think it's a shame that you criticize Mass.
After all, it has some of the most affordable
legislators in the whole nation.
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zoom for readability
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reading layout view
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keyboard shortcuts
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and don't forget scroll with your mouse
I'd like to see Open Office add those features!Really, it's a lot. I mean, now he can afford to
buy a copy of Microsoft Windows *and* Microsoft Office!
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
The point is, does OpenOffice or whatever apps are currently available that use the OpenDoc format has the same level of help for people with disabilities as Office? Obviously it's (mostly) the app not the format that addresses this, but it's a valid bitch: Does OpenOffice or any of the other semi-mature non-Microsoft applications have support for disabilities at or better than MS Office? Most people who are not completely blinded by ideology will say honestly, "not yet".
MS won't ever support a standard that directs interest away from themselves unless someone holds their feet to the fire. It's not suprising at all, or even particularly "evil". Like any dumb beast, they just need a kick in the nuts every now and then to point them in the right direction.
Oh, if you're a person w/ disabilities... why the hell are you not using a Mac? Don't make us suffer because of your masochistic tendencies, ok?
Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
He's a Republican so he would retort that those without money should be ignored and not heard anyway.
If that's your response to a 7 second delay, I'd hate to carpool with you ;)
I kid, I kid...