On 4-9-2012 5:58, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Mon, 03 Sep 2012 23:52:19 +0200, andrel wrote:
>
>> On 3-9-2012 22:43, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> On Mon, 03 Sep 2012 22:15:10 +0200, andrel wrote:
>>>
>>>> Why on earth would you want to do that? The thing is meant for a
>>>> paperless society.
>>>
>>> Paperless society is a myth,
>>
>> like flat screens won't happen. Oh sorry we do have them now. They were
>> a myth for a large number of years and then suddenly within a few years
>> they replaced all CRTs.
>
> I don't see a paperless society in place.  Do you?

partly, I am printing things about once a week or less. I used to print 
3-4 documents a day. I do most of my revisions on screen.


> I tried to order a transcript of my college grades about a year ago.  I
> signed the paperwork using my Wacom tablet and e-mailed it back. The
> signature was rejected - I had to print out the stupid form, sign it *in
> pen*, scan it back into the computer, and e-mail it to them.
>
> Until legal requirements are changed in society so that an electronic
> signature is considered legal and binding - *uniformly* - we won't have a
> paperless society, and we're no where close to that.

I do know these issues. As a matter of fact I often do receive faxes 
with ECG's on the fax in my room. That it happens does not mean that 
this scanning of paper versions is the common thing to do. By far most 
of my communication is digitally. So I am not paperless, but paper is 
only about 25% of my world now and that number is reducing fast.

>>> but being able to scan existing documents could help get closer to
>>> paperless, no?
>>
>> No. Almost everything I read, and I assume you as well, was digital
>> before it was painted on a dead tree. In stead of scanning and OCRing
>> just give me that file.
>
> Once upon a time, I had a set of books written by the author Honoré de
> Balzac that were printed in the early 20th century.  I can assure you
> those were not digital before being printed on dead tree.
>
> I also have in my possession copies of the Sherlock Holmes stories and
> the works of H. G. Wells, printed before digital writing systems were in
> common use.  In fact, I've got a fair selection of books that were
> printed well before digital systems were in common use in publishing -
> and the vast majority (if not all of them) of those books are not
> actually considered "rare".

I was not talking about what you have, but about what you normally read. 
I also have many books printed before digital, just to show my age, but 
I don't read them as often as I do read things printed later.
Also I don't see you wanting to scan any of those books. The point of 
having these is having these, not the reading. In 5 years time you will 
be reading them digitally if you want to read them again.

> Can you read files in Envoy format?  I've got some materials in that
> format as well - good luck finding a system that can read them. ;)

But do you also have the dead tree version of those?
Do you want it as it was printed at the time or just the content?

-- 
Women are the canaries of science. When they are underrepresented
it is a strong indication that non-scientific factors play a role
and the concentration of incorruptible scientists is also too low

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