Borland 2004/2005 Talks

Main Talks

The outlines for all of my talks appear in HTML, and when possible, as XHTML, that is, as XML. There are several reasons for doing this:

HTML and XML are non-proprietary, cross platform standards. This has two advantages:
- The reader can pick their platform and tools. HTML and XML are supported on all platforms.
- The writer, in this case me, can also pick my platform and tools.
HTML and XML are simple, easy to understand formats. Twenty years from now, no one may be able to read Microsoft Word or PowerPoint documents. The odds are that XML as a standard will still exist, but if it does not, it is so simple that it can be easily converted into some other format. In short, these are the formats most likely to preserve the value of this text for as long as possible.
You can block copy directly from the text. PDF makes it difficult or impossible for you to highlight text in general, and code listings in particular, and paste them into another document. That is great if you want to hide knowledge, but my goal is to disseminate it.

The only big disadvantage to HTML that I know about is that it does not print easily. I can live with this for two reasons:

I am interested in ecology, and want to encourage people to read online.
Tools for converting to PDF are much more common than they once were.
Printing HTML is not impossible, it just is not always as convenient as one might want. In particular, it is hard to use both sides of a sheet of paper when printing HTML.