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Re: Alternative proposal


I fully agree with Jim Pflugrath comment.

- 1 - It is obvious that if the information is in two files one will be often missing.

- 2 - The pointer on the binary file included in the ASCII file will rapidly be incorrect: just move the binary file in another directory and the ASCII file becomes useless.

Thus from the archive point of view, i.e. to store data for a long time this is just the best suggestion to make the information unsafe and rapidly incorrect.

- 3 - It is correct that binary information might become difficult to read in the future if the format for numbers change. But why to believe that ASCII will remain forever? Is is more safe in the future than IEEE formats. Nobody can answer to this point and we should strongly recommand o use IEEE formats.

Moreover as Jim suggests, a very simple tool allows to extract the ASCII information from the file.

To conclude: if we follow Syd Hall and Nick Spadini recommendation, just forget this new format. Nobody will use it. All images and binary files formats available on the market store the information in ONE file.

With best regards,
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