[All messages regarding "What is etext" concatenated.]

Number: 036
Newsgroups: alt.etext
From: jennings@halcyon.com (James Jennings)
Subject: What is etext?
Message-ID: <1993Mar1.051552.17395@nwnexus.WA.COM>
Organization: The 23:00 News and Mail Service
Date: Mon, 1 Mar 1993 05:15:52 GMT

This may sound like a silly question, but I'm genuinely confused.

My impression is that when people talk about etext they *sound* like
they are talking about an agreed upon standard. (Something like, 80
column lines and 7-bit ascii.) I have never seen what this standard is.
(If it exists.) It is possible that there is no standard, and that an
"etext" is any reasonably portable text file.

My question is, "Is there a standard, and if so what is it." 

Thanks.
James

Number: 039
Newsgroups: alt.etext
From: trier@slc6.ins.cwru.edu (Stephen C. Trier)
Subject: Re: What is etext?
Date: 1 Mar 1993 21:05:11 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland OH (USA)
Message-ID: <1mttq7INNokv@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu>
Lines: 30

In article <1993Mar1.051552.17395@nwnexus.WA.COM> jennings@halcyon.com (James Jennings) writes:
>My impression is that when people talk about etext they *sound* like
>they are talking about an agreed upon standard.

"Etext" means "Electronic text", nothing more.  I'd say that when people
discuss etexts, they mean works of more than passing social, artistic,
scientific, or historical value, in some sort of electronic text form.

Etexts come in all sorts of different formats.  The most popular etexts
are in plain ASCII, because it is widely portable, but you will find that
some efforts like the Online Book Initiative include texts in all sorts
of markup languages as well.

>It is possible that there is no standard, and that an "etext" is any
>reasonably portable text file.

That's a reasonable definition, but they do come in markup languages
as well.

I might say that an etext "a document in portable electronic form".

My definitions are based only on what sorts of things I have seen called
etext.  Perhaps there is an underlying philosophical view about etext that
would dictate a better definition.

-- 
Stephen Trier                      "They didn't seem to be acting out of
Network software type               malice, but they were, at best,
Case Western Reserve University     differently clued."
trier@ins.cwru.edu                        - John Perry Barlow

Number: 040
Newsgroups: alt.etext
From: trier@slc6.ins.cwru.edu (Stephen C. Trier)
Subject: Re: What is etext?
Date: 1 Mar 1993 21:12:23 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland OH (USA)
Message-ID: <1mtu7oINNoqn@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu>
Lines: 15

The Library of Congress _Workshop on Electronic Texts Proceedings_
defines an "Electronic Text" with the following paragraph:

     (1)  In this document, the phrase electronic text is used to mean
     any computerized reproduction or version of a document, book,
     article, or manuscript (including images), and not merely a machine-
     readable or machine-searchable text.

(from mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu:/etext/etext93/locet10.txt, lines 439-442)

-- 
Stephen Trier                      "They didn't seem to be acting out of
Network software type               malice, but they were, at best,
Case Western Reserve University     differently clued."
trier@ins.cwru.edu                        - John Perry Barlow
scientific, or historical value, in some sort of electronic text form.

Etexts come in all sorts of different formats.  The most popular etexts
are in plain ASCII, because it is widely portable, but you will find that
some efforts like the Online Book Initiative include texts in all sorts
of markup languages as well.

>It is possible that there is no standard, and that an "etext" is any
>reasonably portable text file.

That's a reasonable definition, but they do come in markup languages
as well.

I might say that an etext "a document in portable electronic form".

My definitions are based only on what sorts of things I have seen called
etext.  Perhaps there is an underlying philosophical view about etext that
would dictate a better definition.

-- 
Stephen Trier                      "They didn't seem to be acting out of
Network software type               malice, but they were, at best,
Case Western Reserve University     differently clued."
trier@ins.cwru.edu                        - John Perry Barlow