PmWiki | Main / SoftwareTheMissingLinkInTheChurchsLanguage

(:nl:)'''EDITORIAL - Software: the missing link in the Church's language?'''

Purgamentum init, exit purgamentum

Since ''Inter Mirifica'' at the time of Vatican II, and notably of course during the period of John Paul II's reign as Pope, more Church documentation has appeared on communications, including the new technologies, than ever before in the Church's history. No surprise there. Ethics and Social Communication, Ethics in Internet, Church and the Internet, 30 or so World Communication Days with messages for each, the very last letter written by JPII, Rapid Development... What is a surprise, however, is that when you run a search with the word 'software' in it on all those documents, nary a mention! It is as if this is such a minor element in communications, internet, ethics, dare I say Church, that it doesn't rate a discussion. Sets you thinking, really.

What is software? The question may have several answers, beginning with the technical - that it is a set of programming instructions sent to a machine which then carries out the commands it receives. Historians can trace such a phenomenon back to at least 1804 when a Frenchman, Jaquard, discovered how to make a loom work faster with only one person feeding in a punched card. But to leave software just to the technicians would be reductionist, to say the least. It is a cultural artifact with a history, sociology and a culture. If we talk of a media culture today, and not lightly, meaning that our modern culture is significantly different because of it, then we are also talking about its driving force - software.

Software as a cultural artifact of significance, is just the beginning of our reflection. Consider the dominant role in today's global society of software comapnies, software movements proprietary or free, software development. Consider the social assumptions that might be coded into everyday programs - is 'Word' a neutral thing? Most programs, at least those that interest the end-user, have interfaces: the interface is really the meeting point between machine and human, to the point where there are studies of CHI (sometimes represented by the Greek letter, yes, but meaning Computer-Human Interface). Software is so malleable and complex - probably why it got the name 'soft' attached to it - that it tends to embody a culture's methods, knowledge and philosophies. We have 'intelligent software', 'social software'. It has been a largely western thing, but no longer, so we could expect that software produced by other cultures with ancient traditions would embody more than just new technology.

So, back to religious reflection, it does seem odd indeed to me that there is quite a missing link, with all the nuances of that term in this context; a failure to connect the Church's deeply principled pronouncements with the need for equally principled action in the area of software, or even just to reflect on the issues involved. And there are important areas of action and important issues for reflection at every turn. The Church is a vital agent of education, to take just one - discussion of software in this context has to be more than that of finding clipart for catechists. Software becomes inseparable from catechesis in today's world, since the task (so John Paul II, the Pontifical Council on SC, Episcopal Conferences...told us) is "to integrate the Christian message with the media culture". And that's fair comment. St. Augustine applied the principles of classic rhetoric to communication of the faith (De catechizandis rudibus), Gregory the Great told preachers to apply human communication techniques to their pastoral efforts (Regula pastoralis)...we could hardly, today, ignore the history, sociology, philosophy, ethics, of software. We need something for today; maybe Purgamentum init, exit purgamentum (Garbage in, garbage out) could be a good start for today's catechist or homilist! Or, more seriously, and more classically, Cui bono. Usefulness on the one hand, self-interest on the other The 'missing link' this time is no fossil, but an unexplored hypertext to Christian faith.

Julian sdb

FOSS IN PRACTICE

LyX

Pronounce it as you wish - most would say 'licks'. I think its pedigree though probably means it should be 'Lik' or even ''Lich' with a Scottish 'ch'! But it's a free software item built for the Linux OS and more recently ported to Windows. It is well worth consideration for a number of reasons - firstly because it is very easy to use, and secondly it is a good bridge to a way of thinking and working that is, in fact, a revolution for most of us ordinary types who spend too many hours with a word processor.

Lyx is actually a front-end for a well established technique in publishing - typesetting, which has been around for centuries but is no longer a 'hot metal' process. Computers do it, and if you send off something to your local printer, the first thing they do is move it into Quark Express or some similar high-end software in order to give your text that professional typeset look. Lyx will do that for you - for nothing. It is a front-end for a computer typesetting program called LaTeX ('laytech' not 'latex' as in rubber, hence the pedigree I spoke of earlier). LaTeX is well known and appreciated in the printing industry.

LyX does all this behind the scenes for you. Is it, then a word processor? Not really. The substantial difference is that when you work with your text (either from scratch or you drop it in as a plain text file) you don't worry at all about formating. Not at all. You simply determine whether the line or paragraph is of a particular structural category - is it a title, subtitle, heading, plain paragraph, image (figure, they call it), address line etc. This means you are really concentrating on what matters in a text - its contents and their structure. In that sense it is a revolution. As you start (or even afterwards) you tell LyX whether you are writing an article or a book or a report or a letter or a range of other categories, and it picks the formatting for you. Clever. You are free to vary that if you want to or need to, but in 99% of cases why would you? Let the experts worry about formatting and you concentrate on a better text!

If you are interested, Google it up under LyX for Windows and find the full/complete Windows installer (there is a choice of less; take the lot, if you have the room) and install it - that's not a difficult process. It is all automatic. Just say yes to everything. Working with LyX requires little or no learning curve. It is not WYSIWYG but instead WYSIWYM (what you mean instead of what you get). And if you have any questions, ask me. It helps to read the User Guide and Tutorial, but once you've done that just start. You will find it hard to go back to word processors after using it - they don't make as much sense as you have been fooled to believe they do! . FOSS PRINCIPLES

The 'X' in today's software

Last week we dispensed with the notion that 'F' has any other meaning in contemporary software contexts than FREE/LIBRE. 'X' is another letter of the alphabet that has been besmirched in our day and age - nobody wants to deal with anything rated 'X'! But rejoice, for today's software is giving 'X' a new and decent lease of life.

We are accustomed to FX, which is just a play on words, really (effects). But that is not what 'X' is all about in software today. MAC has OS X, there's X-Windows, and an X Org Foundation, a program version number could be 1.3.x, there's XML, XHTML.....

Basically, the 'X' stands for something that has been eXtended, improved, something with newer possibilities.

We need to give thought to both XML and XHTML in future editions of this newsletter. Most would not recognise XML, but would readily recognise the HTML in XHMTL. The web was built on HTML. The new web (they call it Web 2.0) is being built on XHTML.

In very simple terms it means that HTML came to a grinding halt. It was carrying too big a burden. XHTML gave it new life, allowing it to be extended almost ad infinitum. This is not only interesting, but very important to understand. If you or your school, parish, youth centre, are building or fixing up a website at the moment, and it is NOT written in XHTML, then you should really go back to those who are doing it for you and ask why. It is that important. Something written with the 'X' in it will still be around in five years time. Those written without the X won't. Browsers will cease to support them. A person with sight disabilities already struggles to deal with something in HTML - but in XHTML he or she has the possibility of bringing Braille to the rescue. A person with low and almost no bandwidth goes online as little as possible and can't see much of many websites because of the images and a range of other things - but the XHTML site is likely to look fine without images, presented neatly as text only and visible even on a PDA or cellphone screen. More on this at another time. (:nl:)