[plug] LaTeX -> Word converter?

[Bret Busby]

Mike wrote:
> 

<snip>

> mmm Word 6 has been around longer then HTML (I believe) and it could
> be (in the view of bearecrats) that an editor for Word 6 is more
> accesible across more platforms then HTML for greatest number of
> consistent user interfaces that is.
> 

Winword 6 has certainly been around a long time; from memory, it was in
about 1992, or 1993, that I was helping a third-year software
engineering project group, with one of their manuals, and, at 100 pages,
with screen dump images included, it was more than Winword 6 could
handle. At that stage, from memory, the Internet was still Arpanet, and,
the Australian node was AARNET, and it was all academic in Australia,
and, non-commercial.

Now, the problem with this, is that Winword 6 is now quite out of date,
to the same extent that using WordPerfect 5.1 as the standard, would be
equally inappropriate (apart from the far greater stability of
WordPerfect 5.1, and, the lack of WYSIWYG in WordPerfect 5.1). So, not
many p[eople would still have copies of WinWord 6, let alone working
copies of it.

And, given that appeal books, whilst not incorporating the graphics of
software engineering maunals, can still go to a hundred or so pages, or,
more, depending on the case complexity, I would be wary about using
WinWord 6, for such valuable material, especially from my experience.

> ie. I beleive there are still some WFWG systems and these don't run
> the latest HTML - WYSIWYG editors...

I am not sure - what is WFWG?

> 
> There also seems to be more confusion about what is the most appropriate
> version of HTML whereas Word 6 is a seemingly precise 'standard'.

But, Winword 6 is so out of date, as to be unrealistic, as a standard
()apart from being used as a standard by bureaucrats...); yet, HTML 3.2
is reasonably accessible by most web browsers in common use today (I
make a point, when using HTML, of sticking to the 3.2 standard, for
accessibility), and, it is platform-independent, and, requires much less
skill, I believe, than using other typesetting applications, such as Tex
or groff, etc (though Christian may disagree, being more familiar, now,
with Tex).

> 
> As for PDF - could have been considered but I beleive the cost of
> a PDF editor for lower end systems doesn't justify their installation
> in comparison with Word 6 that is,
> 

Ah, yes, but, given that the application is court documents, including
appeal books, generally the nature of the people involved in preparing
such things, and, given the research involved, using, no doubt, such
things as the Scales (I think it is named) online database of legal
precedents, etc, lower end systems would not be a consideration. QC's
and such, and, the upper market lawyers, who would be dealing with
appeal books, at however many thousand dollars an hour, would likely
have super-dooper, chrome-plated, talking computers in neural networks,
with nitrogen cooling, and videoconferencing and ISDN links, and
permanent Internet connections, and all kinds of gizmo's, that send them
SMS messages in the courtrooms, etc, so that they don't need to worry
about the common things, like whether they have the resources to load
more than twelve applications at once, or, whether their word-processing
application can handle a thousand page document, with twelve levels of
indexing.

However, apart from Jeremy, they are probably unlikely to be using
Linux, so, their primary concern, with their computers that they use,
will likely be whether the super dooper palmtop computer that they take
into court, with all their notes and precedents, will crash at an
inopportune time, so that, when the full court of the appeal court asks
them for a response to their learned friends' motion, their response
will end up being, to the full court, "Oh, *&^%$!", causing them to lose
the appeal, with costs, and, end up being thrown in the cells, for
contempt of the court, and, referred to the bar association, with a
recommendation for disbarring, from the full court, for conduct
unbecoming of the profession.

No, Winword 6 is far too much out of date, and, it wasn't very stable,
anyway, and, personally, I believe that HTML 3.2 is a safer, and, more
universally accessible format, to be adopted as a document standard.

-- 

Bret Busby

......................................
"So once you do know what the question actually is, you'll know what the
answer means."
 - Deep Thought, Chapter 28 of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
 - Douglas Adams, 1988 
......................................