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Re: A call for arms - the future of Hebrew in the digital age



On Sun, 26 Apr 1998, Gilad Ben-Yossef wrote:

> entirely on M$ products (Explorer, Outlook etc.) and using M$
> proprietary protocols (e.g. It's "logical" hebrew).

Were there any other proprietary protocols mentioned ?

> The israeli government can, of course, choose whatever company it wishes
> to do business with, but whatever protocols are used they must be, so I
> believe, open standards and NOT proprietary software belonging to a big
> american company.

What the Israeli Governement cannot do, is commit public money to purchase
technology and software for a certain purpose without first organizing a
michraz. If there was no michraz on this, the govt., or whoever signed the
agreements is neck deep in hot water. I have not heard or seen mention of
such a michraz and you can be SURE that other players who were better
placed to fill this contract (and who just so happen to be UNIX
manufacturers/sellers) would have filled it. Perhaps even for $0, in view
of the potential market, and of the fact that they already have technology
that fills the bill (not the Bill - and we mean our trusted UNIX-based
Internet Standards etc.) and there are precedents abroad to this too.

As to open formats, if there is such an issue, then sooner or later there
will be pressure to make the manufacturer release a detailed description
of the standard, and he will comply or lose the contract. There are
precedents to this (for example IBM vs. the U.S. govt.). 

just my opinion,

Peter