Plain text ASCII. Boston City Hall.

Plain text ASCII. Boston City Hall.

[Don Saklad]

a. How might I set up a free public service with the public notices of
   Boston City Council Committees Public Hearings that the council
   distributes merely by email in microsoft word format ?...

   Ironically, the council has been unwilling to see how to distribute
   public notices in plain text ascii

b. Would there be something like a list server that would
   automatically convert forwarded public notices in microsoft word
   format and make them readable on the web?...

   I get the microsoft word formatted notices in rmail in emacs and
   could forward them regularly, if necessary. It is the converting
   to plain text ascii that is the difficulty.

c. Or would there be another way for me to forward the microsoft word
   formatted notices to a web link where anyone would be able to check
   the current and archived notices?...

I could get an email address submitted on the email list that would
effect forwarding of the microsoft word public notices automatically.

The council public notices full text are not available on the web. A
screwy calendar of public hearings dates is available but its
difficult to navigate and does not include the full text of the
notice, only time, location and minimal descriptor keywords.
http://cityofboston.gov/citycouncil

If any of you kind folks out there would, please ask for the emailings
of public notices of city council committee hearings, take a look at
the microsoft word formatting and let me know any ideas, hints, tips
or pointers for setting up plain text ascii formatting on a web link
or how to set up a listserver type thing and its archives.

To subscribe or or unsubscribe
email: ann.hess at cityofboston.gov
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Re: Plain text ASCII. Boston City Hall.

[Tim McNamara]

Don Saklad <dsaklad@nestle.csail.mit.edu> writes:

> a. How might I set up a free public service with the public notices
> of
>    Boston City Council Committees Public Hearings that the council
>    distributes merely by email in microsoft word format ?...
>
>    Ironically, the council has been unwilling to see how to
>    distribute public notices in plain text ascii

The simplest solutions- e.g., saving the documents as ASCII text
files or .rft files- is often the most difficult to see.  If they
really want to preserve a specific formatting, they should publish
them as PDF files.

> b. Would there be something like a list server that would
>    automatically convert forwarded public notices in microsoft word
>    format and make them readable on the web?...
>
>    I get the microsoft word formatted notices in rmail in emacs and
>    could forward them regularly, if necessary. It is the converting
>    to plain text ascii that is the difficulty.

Easy if you're running a Unix compatible OS.  There are several
small, compact applications that will convert between formats
(usually called something like "word2text" "word2rft" "word2pdf"
etc.  These are usually freeware and very robust.  Mac OS X will run
these, as well, from the command line (there are some drag-and-drop
versions for OS X).  If you're running Windows, I have *no* idea.  I
don't understand Windows, having been a Mac/Mac OS X/NetBSD user.

> c. Or would there be another way for me to forward the microsoft
>    word formatted notices to a web link where anyone would be able to
>    check the current and archived notices?...

You could certainly just archive the Word documents on a Web site and
people could download them at will.