Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
blog.miris.design
Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
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Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#2This was concocted at 5AM -- my apologies for any peculiar sentence structures or odd phrasing.
Will re-re-re-revise it again with fresh eyes after resting 'em!
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#3> but dismissing or abandoning media files is a much more guaranteed potential loss of information – information which plain text cannot capture due to its limitations.
Some examples are sorely needed. How is a Word/InDesign file more authentic than a plain text file? Or is the author talking about media? Is a ProTools session more authentic than Wav files?
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#4he said.. in courier, monospaced paragraphs format, morally as close to "plaintext" as you can be with a couple of diagrams which could have been ASCII art...
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#5> but dismissing or abandoning media files is a much more guaranteed potential loss of information – information which plain text cannot capture due to its limitations. Some examples are sorely needed. How is a Word/InDesign file more authentic than a plain text file? Or is the author talking about media? Is a ProTools session more authentic than Wav files?
I've read some docs with ASCII art diagrams far more complex than the medium really allowed.
I would have preferred PDF/A
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#6he said.. in courier, monospaced paragraphs format, morally as close to "plaintext" as you can be with a couple of diagrams which could have been ASCII art...
Exactly. The OP said what they needed to in plain text because it captures what they wanted to say in the simplest format.
If they had needed to convey an image or contextual information like some rich API spec, they would presumably have used something else.
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#7[deleted]
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#8That "some" proprietary formats from the 80's and 90's are still readable is already causing real problems: because not *all* are. So text, possibly with Markdown or similar hints regarding emphasis and structure, is still vastly better than any alternative I can think of.
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#9he said.. in courier, monospaced paragraphs format, morally as close to "plaintext" as you can be with a couple of diagrams which could have been ASCII art...
That is not a contradiction. The OP is just arguing that you should use the best medium + format for the job - and sometimes simple text is sufficient (as it says in the article).
Re: Don't write just in plain text (longevity vs. authenticity)
#10I think longevity is not just an issue of the data format but more so of its organization. It so happens that text files organized using the file system is the most easily producible, maintainable and queryable data organization tool.
But other media can have the same properties if they're organized using the file system rather than any complex tools. I have graphs and datasheets that have endured decades that I refer to often and are easily findable because they are well-named files in well-named folders, even though the formats are comparatively much more complex.