Quote:
Originally Posted by MarchHare
Once again, I'll use an example that people defending the use of sending files in MS Office format have conveniently ignored:
Do you send images in Photoshop's .psd format? No, of course you don't. That format is used for editing image files, but when it comes time to distribute the completed work, you'll save it as a JPEG or PNG or whatever. Sending MS Office documents that you don't intend for the recipeient to edit is the exact same thing. If you want to distribute a completed document, send it as a PDF.
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i think thats a bit of an apples and oranges comparison. psd's are pretty rare. i can take a picture with my digital camera, put it on my computer and crop it and edit it and resize it without ever using photoshop or its psd format. i would say most users never need a program like photoshop to manage their image files.
on the other hand, microsoft has managed to make its office suite pretty much standard operating practice at all colleges and businesses i have been involved with. generally, everyone is expected to at least have a basic operating knowledge of office products like word, excel, and outlook. however, outside of graphic designers and such, not many people need photoshop skills for their job.
though i must say, i do agree with the concept of having completed documents be pdf's. on our website i do regularly ask people if the files they want added need to be edited by end users; if they don't i will convert to pdf. personally, i have no problem using pdf's for finished documents. there was just a terrible amount of microsoft/office hate in this thread.
while doc files are not quite as universally used as exe or jpg, they are still a very common file type that just about everyone can open up. so its the initial criticism that no one should use doc files for anything that i think got this all going.
