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Why we have situated software (Re: A sad farewell)

Carsten Bormann <cabo@tzi.org> Fri, 06 November 2020 19:31 UTC

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Subject: Why we have situated software (Re: A sad farewell)
From: Carsten Bormann <cabo@tzi.org>
In-Reply-To: <CE764E62-AC69-4339-B4ED-A0D0044E995E@strayalpha.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Nov 2020 20:31:48 +0100
Cc: Larry Masinter <LMM@acm.org>, IETF <ietf@ietf.org>, Pete Resnick <resnick@episteme.net>
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References: <b0ca070f-dd1f-1b8d-940c-7e4c57ea8393@cisco.com> <5fa3ffbe.1c69fb81.a621e.78ba@mx.google.com> <MN2PR15MB3103C6573396210E2CA7274D97EE0@MN2PR15MB3103.namprd15.prod.outlook.com> <E971F6B0-EFF1-4E1D-8CCB-80FA7FEB722D@gmail.com> <20201105174127.GF1750809@mit.edu> <6f1fcd3a-c3cf-a9a7-7aaf-af327d337f43@mnt.se> <CAKq15vcBBGhwAd76LEQDhEa+e1XcTr2HGnmJw9J9y9znbjFMAw@mail.gmail.com> <174AC0A1-77B5-4B6B-AD9D-7C9FB6023BC1@episteme.net> <CAKq15vc947QrG0KgTdP2kiLpE_8YXbEWMZfyFqaGRdJ4me-Mxg@mail.gmail.com> <CE739672-72C4-44B7-821A-99AE400F574C@akamai.com> <CAKq15vdEVfk4ST+WEk06hdgVxMtUU=GKwZwTjtoUSxvEouHRfg@mail.gmail.com> <6FCC5D7B-2EDC-4191-AA0F-BE91211B9B07@akamai.com> <CAKq15vcRAu8VrDmZ-44z3vy8r=1Rx-AA0Xwsg84JFRjpX+=Ypg@mail.gmail.com> <CE764E62-AC69-4339-B4ED-A0D0044E995E@strayalpha.com>
To: Joseph Touch <touch@strayalpha.com>
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On 2020-11-06, at 02:47, Joseph Touch <touch@strayalpha.com> wrote:
> 
> I don’t think Git can itself track Word diffs, e.g. If requiring Git manage edits is a criteria, you’ve walled the solution in (and it’s standing in 1970).

Whoa.  It’s Word that is trying to live that 1970’s dream, WYSIWYG.

It has taken a long time for the community to realize that this approach is not productive for collaboration on technical documents.  
That’s why today we use git (which now is the gold standard for collaborative development) and markdown (or some other humane markup language).

(I usually collaborate on slides with Keynote.  
I fully understand the pull that this kind of tools exerts [in particular if done right], and they are great for one-off stuff like slides.  
But that is a kind of tool that is less central to the core business of the IETF.)

[Why do I react so strongly here?
I have edited one RFC using Word, RFC 3095, with a herd of 15 co-authors. 
Never, never, never again.]

Grüße, Carsten

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