jon said:
>   Anyone can build "tools", but there's a gazillion
>   "tools" out there gathering dust on shelves

there are?  can you point us to a half-dozen of these gazillion?


>   Anyone can build "tools", but there's a gazillion
>   "tools" out there gathering dust on shelves
>   because the authors did not do their homework properly
>   and try to understand the truly important requirements
>   leading to widescale embracement.

well, have you written reviews on these tools to
inform the authors about "the proper homework"
and "the truly important requirements"?  if so,
i'd like to see the reviews and get this head-start.

let's examine an actual example that i gave in this thread.
tk3, from nightkitchen.com, has good annotation features.
these include dogearing, highlighting (in 4 different colors),
stickies (in those same 4 colors), and a notebook capability,
which allows the user to include text, graphics, and movies
from the e-book in their notes.  annotations can be shared.
how does that stack up to your gazillion other tools, jon?


>   No need to build "tools" to provide this perspective.
>   That's silly. The tools can be built, whether based on
>   XML or plain text, when there is a need and a decision
>   to go ahead *after* fully understanding the requirements.

except you will _not_ fully comprehend the situation _until_
you build the tools.  it's an iterative process.  and the fact that
you don't know that is one of our main points of contention...

i encourage you to get some programming experience, jon.
it'll make you a lot smarter...

-bowerbird