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LHC Fully Documented Online 239

Physicser writes "Want to read every single technical detail of the design and construction of the Large Hadron Collider and its six detectors? The whole shebang — seven reports totaling 1600 pages, 115 MB, with contributions from 8000 scientists and engineers — has been published electronically by the Journal of Instrumentation, free to read without a subscription."
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LHC Fully Documented Online

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  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 25, 2008 @11:55PM (#24747081)

    Not particularly.

  • PR0N! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Brain_Recall ( 868040 ) <brain_recall@yaho[ ]om ['o.c' in gap]> on Monday August 25, 2008 @11:58PM (#24747091)
    Nerd porn at its finest.

    This is something to download, store away, and reminisce some 30 years later.

  • I would but.... (Score:5, Informative)

    by east coast ( 590680 ) on Monday August 25, 2008 @11:59PM (#24747101)
    It would be a great read if I was one of the ten people on the face of the planet who could actually understand every detail. Oh, sorry, that's the people who wrote it.

    I know it's going to get downloaded a ton of times and probably deleted before most readers ever get to the 3rd page, if it's even read at all.

    Save them poor guys some bandwidth, torrent it. Too many people are going to be wasting their resources with no serious intentions of reading the contents.
    • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by kesuki ( 321456 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:11AM (#24747223) Journal

      well, they have the abstracts... you don't have to download the whole thing... but having read one abstract, i'm lost in the technical jargon, that large particle collider scientists write about without hesitation.

      "Abstract. The TOTEM Experiment will measure the total pp cross-section with the luminosity-independent method and study elastic and diffractive scattering at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the interaction point IP5, two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudorapidity region 3.1 || 6.5, and Roman Pot stations will be placed at distances of ±147 m and ±220 m from IP5. Being an independent experiment but technically integrated into CMS, TOTEM will first operate in standalone mode to pursue its own physics programme and at a later stage together with CMS for a common physics programme. This article gives a description of the TOTEM apparatus and its performance."

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        Except for the "luminosity-independent method" part, which I am not familiar with, I understood that pretty well, maybe I should give it a download, and of course, as many others have said, build my own...

        I wonder what these president candidates will do about my constitutional right to bear doomsday devices...

      • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Matt Edd ( 884107 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:31AM (#24747379)
        People should keep this kinda stuff in mind when bashing scientists (like intelligent design supporters, anti-vaccination people, and other alternative medicine supporters.) The experts in a field really are experts. The argument from authority fallacy only applies to people talking outside of their field.
        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by polar red ( 215081 )

          or climate scientists ?

        • Psh. I can absolutely blow the minds of all the Joe Sixpacks out there when it comes to computers and make it seem as though I know far more than I do. It's very easy for me to mislead people because, well, I'm the expert as far as they can tell. This does not mean I'm going to be 100% truthful and not exploit the situation for my own personal gain. Of course this is all hypothetical... I'm completely altruistic, of course :D

          Just because someone can throw technical jargon out at me doesn't necessaril
        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          What do you mean, the argument from authority fallacy only applies to people talking outside their field? I thought a main part of the spirit of science was a complete rejection of argument from authority in any form. If Richard Feynman himself showed up and told me something crazy about theoretical physics, I'd be like, "you fool, that's crazy."

          Perhaps I misunderstood you.

          • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Just Some Guy ( 3352 ) <kirk+slashdot@strauser.com> on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @11:00AM (#24751459) Homepage Journal

            If Richard Feynman himself showed up and told me something crazy about theoretical physics, I'd be like, "you fool, that's crazy."

            From what I've studied, everything in theoretical physics is crazy.

            Perhaps I misunderstood you.

            I think you're conflating issues. When you're in a field, it's your job to question everything the other experts in the field claim, especially when the claims are dramatic or unexpected. When you're not in a field and want to know something about it, then it's perfectly OK to use experts analysis as a baseline for further study.

            It's not OK to dismiss all the experts in that field as crackpots just because you don't understand what they're saying. For instance, if Feynman showed up and told me that there are charm quarks, then I'd be unjustified in dismissing him. That's what ID and anti-vaccine folks do all the time: reject all authority they disagree with. Call it "appeal to anti-authority".

      • by Maelwryth ( 982896 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @01:48AM (#24747879) Homepage Journal
        I found the abstract perfectly understandable. All you have to do is translate from english to greek and then greek to english. This gives you a very clear discription in laymans terms.

        Summary. The experience of Totem will measure the intersection of pp completed by the method of brightness and independent study and the rubber band diffractive dispersing the LHC. To fulfill the best possible coverage for advanced charged particles issued by conflicts pp mutual action show télescopes IP5, two of pistage, T1 and T2, will be installed on each side of the region of pseudofastness 3,1 | | 6,5 and Roman stations Pot will be at a distance of 147 meters ±
      • To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the interaction point

        Warning: Do not cross the streams! This must really be a doomsday device.

      • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by moosesocks ( 264553 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @02:01AM (#24747941) Homepage

        This is interesting, because this is exactly the sort of thing that Tim Berners Lee sought to avoid when he envisioned the semantic web.

        These papers and abstracts should be properly hyperlinked to other papers (or even a google search) to properly define what many of these terms mean. A lot of the jargon seems specific to either accelerator science, or even just the LHC.

        I am a physicist who has worked on accelerator applications, and could only barely understand that abstract. It's very poorly written, and makes a far too extensive use of very specific jargon/acronyms to be comprehensible to even a physicist that happens to not be affiliated with the LHC.

        Even an undergraduate should know better than to write an abstract like that. The general incomprehensibility, the use of extremely specific and unnecessary information ("±147 m and ±220 m from IP5") would be perfectly sufficient justification for a failing grade.

        I'm truly ashamed of my colleagues for writing this.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by aztektum ( 170569 )

          They're nerds. What do you expect? We like to seem smart and lack social skills :)

        • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Gromius ( 677157 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @03:01AM (#24748223)
          I understand every word. Any experimental particle physicist does. I will conceed its not clearn to non-experts.

          However an important feature of a luminosity and diffractive phyics detector such as TOTEM is its coverage, ie at what angle it can go to. Therefor its pseudorapidy range (basically the angle it covers from the beam line) and the distances of the roman pots from CMS (and effecting the angular coverage of this part of the detector) are key peices of information. This is perhaps the most important thing to know about TOTEM.
          • by ag0ny ( 59629 )

            I understand every word. Any experimental particle physicist does. I will conceed its not clearn to non-experts.

            However an important feature of a luminosity and diffractive phyics detector such as TOTEM is its coverage, ie at what angle it can go to. Therefor its pseudorapidy range (basically the angle it covers from the beam line) and the distances of the roman pots from CMS (and effecting the angular coverage of this part of the detector) are key peices of information. This is perhaps the most important t

            • by Thiez ( 1281866 )

              > You seem to be claiming that you understand this highly technical jargon (implying that you're a highly educated individual). However, you fail at basic spelling. You even fail to correctly spell a technical word that you should be familiar with ("pseudorapidity").

              I assume he is also familiar with the words 'clear' and 'pieces'. Since he also missspells these words, he is probably either dyslexic or drunk, neither of which is reason to believe that he is not a highly educated individual (indeed, if he

              • Absolutely... however, I have to wonder if physicists get the a similar thing that programmers get - the ability to write amazingly well working code while completely smashed, but be completely unable to determine the workings of it a few days later when completely sober. (well, that happens to me anyway)
                (also note that I say "well working code" since calling it "good code" is FAR from accurate!)
        • by rasmack ( 808487 ) <rasmusNO@SPAMmackeprang.com> on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @03:06AM (#24748243)

          I am not in TOTEM (other side of the ring) but I understand the abstract just fine and consider it an immensely valuable contribution to the physics programme of the LHC.

          These weren't written to be read end to end by the layman. They were meant as reference publications for professionals. I don't know how I would have gotten through my ph.d. without publications like these. Where else do I get the exact layout of the ATLAS semi-conductor tracker? Where else do I look for the muon momentum resolution of CMS vs. ATLAS? I am sorry if you think that renders them incomprehensible but this is what we need.

      • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Informative)

        by jabernathy ( 1152921 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @02:47AM (#24748147)

        "Abstract. The TOTEM Experiment will measure the total pp cross-section with the luminosity-independent method and study elastic and diffractive scattering at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the interaction point IP5, two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudorapidity region 3.1 || 6.5, and Roman Pot stations will be placed at distances of ±147 m and ±220 m from IP5. Being an independent experiment but technically integrated into CMS, TOTEM will first operate in standalone mode to pursue its own physics programme and at a later stage together with CMS for a common physics programme. This article gives a description of the TOTEM apparatus and its performance."

        The TOTEM experiment will measure the total pp (proton-proton) cross-section (probability of collision) with the luminosity-independent method (does not depend on the amount of incoming particles) and study elastic and diffractive scattering (particle and wave scattering) at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward (close to the beam-pipe) coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collision in the interaction point (where the beams cross) IP5, two tracking telescopes (planes of silicon or something that can detect charge particles), (named) T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudorapidity (the angle above the beampipe) region 3.1 (~5 degrees) || 6.5 (1 degree), and Roman Pot stations (to measure the luminosity) will be placed at distances of +- 147m and +-220m from IP5 (those distances from where the particles collide). Being an independent experiment but technically integrated into CMS (the Compact Muon Spectrometer), TOTEM will first operate in standalone mode to pursue it's own physics programme...

      • Re:I would but.... (Score:5, Informative)

        by mcelrath ( 8027 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @03:41AM (#24748425) Homepage
        Okay, why not...
        • pp: proton - proton
        • cross-section: particle interaction rates are measured using "cross section". Imagine a billiard ball colliding with another a billiard ball. The cross section is just it's area seen from one side: pi r^2. But quantum particles are not hard solid spheres and can pass through each other, resulting in cross sections much smaller. The unit here is the "barn" = 10^-28 m^2. The total p p cross section is about a milli-barn. Higgs is about a pico-barn. Z bosons are about a nano-barn.
        • luminosity: inverse of a cross section. This is how we measure the amount of data. It is the "intensity" of the beam. (luminosity)*(cross section) = number of (expected) collisions. The LHC is expected to collect about 1 inverse femtobarn in the first year of operation, and 300 total.
        • elastic scattering: p p -> p p. Used to measure luminosity. (TOTEM's primary function)
        • diffractive scattering: p p -> p p + X. This has been proposed as a high precision but low rate way to detect the X=Higgs. In this scenario, TOTEM sees the final p p and X ends up inside the CMS detector. (TOTEM's other primary function)
        • pseudorapidity: a measure of angle: \eta = -ln \tan \theta/2. At \eta=\infinity, \theta=0 and at \eta=0, \theta=90 degrees. Pseudorapidity has nicer properties under Lorentz Transformations [wikipedia.org] than angle.
        • Roman Pot: a particle detector device which is lowered into the beam line to detect particles traveling very close to the beam. It detects protons scattered by very small angles.

        There's a reason a Ph.D. takes 4-6 years. Gotta learn all this.

        P.S. TOTEM is one of the minor experiments. Now go read about CMS and ATLAS. :)

        Disclaimer: I am an American theoretical physicist at CERN.

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        From what I can tell they are using telescopes to watch batteries collide in orbit, then watch them with the totem media player.
      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by dargaud ( 518470 )
        So basically this is not the complete LHC user's manual, but just some technical notes about TOTEM wich is part of CMS which is one of the 3 main detectors (with ALICE and ATLAS) and not even _part_ of the accelerator ring itself. 1600 pages is nothing for a project like that. The full documentation is available on an EDMS system that several orders of magnitude more.
    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Save them poor guys some bandwidth, torrent it.

      I have Comcast you insensitive clod!

  • by maillemaker ( 924053 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:00AM (#24747109)

    If you need me, I'll be in my basement.

    • by aztektum ( 170569 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:07AM (#24747185)

      Don't you mean your parent's basement?

      • Pfft, some of us own or rent our own basements. In fact, there's a free basement above me at the moment, in case you want to rent it.

    • If you need me, I'll be in my basement, feeling the effects of the rather destructive force of the micro black hole created during one of the first collisions ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider#Safety_of_particle_collisions [wikipedia.org] ).

      I have actually done some theoretical calculations based upon other people/scientist's "crazy" theories, and it is possible that an explosion the equivalent to a 3 gigaton TNT explosion ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TNT_equivalent [wikipedia.org] ) to be created. Depending on wher

    • Wait! (Score:3, Insightful)

      by jd ( 1658 )
      The LEGO Mindstorm version will be released any day now!
  • doomed! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Rdickinson ( 160810 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:01AM (#24747113)

    Now I can build my own the planet is DOOMED!

  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:02AM (#24747137)

    ...1600 pages for every detail of the making of a LHC, 6546 pages in the specs for OOXML and it's still not enough detail to let you open and create OOXML documents. Obviously the LHC is not adequately complex.

    • by Kjella ( 173770 )

      I haven't had time to look at it, but I'm fairly certain that's 1600 pages of scientific documentation, not 1600 pages of engineering documentation describing the nuts and bolts for keeping it together or the components in any great detail. I have no idea how many parts the LHC has, but it's said that the space shuttle has 250,000 parts or so. 1600 pages would barely be enough to list that, far less describe their functional requirements. The OOXML specification on the other hand is supposed to define every

    • by Chemisor ( 97276 )

      > Obviously the LHC is not adequately complex.

      Oh, my God! This means that anybody can just read those 1600 pages and build one for himself! Get out the lawyers and the DMCA, people, and let's fight!

  • TL;DR (Score:3, Funny)

    by Spring182 ( 1338645 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:03AM (#24747145) Homepage
    TL;DR
  • Funny... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by SuperBanana ( 662181 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:09AM (#24747203)
    I recall hitting numerous sections of the site that were protected. One was a log of superconducting magnet quenches. I guess that openness doesn't extend to embarrassing operational problems...
  • by Onyma ( 1018104 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:18AM (#24747263)
    I am very much looking forward to what comes out of the LHC. It's been wonderful to watch its construction and that's only a fraction of the satisfaction its discoveries will provide.
  • by Just Some Guy ( 3352 ) <kirk+slashdot@strauser.com> on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:19AM (#24747271) Homepage Journal

    At sixteen hundred pages, it can only create about a fourth of the suckiness of the OOXML standard. Since that hasn't generated a black hole - except for maybe a few terabytes of lost data here and there - we should be safe.

  • It's time I applied for my personalized Capital One credit card.

    With sharks.
    And lasers.
    And maybe some ninja midgets.
    And warkittens.

  • by Deliveranc3 ( 629997 ) <<deliverance> <at> <level4.org>> on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:35AM (#24747397) Journal
    It's a hobby, I'm way outside of the brainpower to do the math.

    So I found some videos and articles to help me out: YouTube [youtube.com] to the rescue [youtube.com] Warning there's some crap with bird in there.

    Finding the Higg's Boson is the big prize, if they find it it will help with this which disrupts the notion of black holes as "singularities" and raises some philosophical, and religious questions... largely if the theorized particle is not found. [wikipedia.org]

    Also interesting is the evaporating black hole theory, which is all but proven so don't worry (Cough CNN).

    Personally I've always been facinated by Virtual particles [wikipedia.org] and am curious about the implication of examining non-singularity black holes.

    Enjoy it, it's gonna be cool as hell!
    • Finding the Higg's Boson is the big prize

      I thought the Hadron Collider was after the Bonre particle...

    • by Rei ( 128717 )

      Finding the Higg's Boson is the big prize

      Well, that *is* the one that everybody talks about. If the Higgs exists, they ought to see it right away.

  • by Shag ( 3737 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:37AM (#24747417) Journal

    On page 867, there's mention of a two-meter-wide thermal exhaust port, right below the main port. The exhaust shaft leads directly to the reactor system, and a precise hit would start a chain reaction which should destroy the LHC.

    • by Koiu Lpoi ( 632570 ) <koiulpoi@gmail.cDALIom minus painter> on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:59AM (#24747573)
      I'm afraid the LHC will be quite operational when your friends arrive.
    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by neoform ( 551705 )

      Sounds pretty serious, can we cover it with some plywood or something?

      • Plywood? Are you mad? This is a job for gaffer tape!

        • by moosesocks ( 264553 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @02:07AM (#24747963) Homepage

          Now that we're venturing out into the realm of "extremely offtopic," I should point out that Americans have no idea what gaffer tape is, unless they've worked as a roadie or stage tech at some point in their lives.

          For those of you who still don't know what gaffer tape is, you may substitute "duct tape" to sufficiently understand the parent poster's humor.

          However, gaffer tape is far superior to duct tape in many aspects. It's made from cloth, rather than plastic, and doesn't tend to destroy whatever surface it happens to be applied to. It can generally be removed without causing damage, despite being nearly as strong (if not stronger) than duct tape.

          • Duct tape is made of cloth. It's vinyl coated to make it water resistant.

            As for the "remove without damage" bit, that depends on the brand.

            Though gorilla tape takes the fixes-practically-anything prize IMO. It's great for jury rig car repairs.

  • Neat! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Quiet_Desperation ( 858215 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:54AM (#24747543)

    I especially like appendix B, or "Build Your Own Large Hadron Collider"

    I totally have a project for this weekend!

    Home Depot has extra large superconducting electromagnets, right?

    • by sokoban ( 142301 )

      Home Depot has extra large superconducting electromagnets, right?

      No, they dont. Wal-Mart has Yttrium, Barium, and Copper Oxides on sale right now though. Pick up a tube furnace and a compressed oxygen cylinder and you can make your own

      http://materials.binghamton.edu/labs/super/superc.html [binghamton.edu]

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        No, they dont. Wal-Mart has Yttrium, Barium, and Copper Oxides on sale right now though

        Ummm... isn't traffic in human beings illegal? Or do I not count? Please don't buy me. :-(
        - Yttrium Oxide

    • There's a big mistake on page 987: The neutrino coupling in the diagram is connected backwards and will cause ripples in the vortex when it reaches 57 MeV.

      I'm trying to call them to abort the project but I'm in a different time zone. Let's hope they read this before it's too late!

  • Great... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Perseid ( 660451 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @12:58AM (#24747565)
    ...now we have to worry about random third-world countries building weapons of mass-collision.
    • WMD (Weapons of Mass Destruction)
      WMC (Weapons of Mass Collision)
      WMB (Weapons of Mass Bullying)
      WMA (Windows Media Audio)

      There you have it, folks! WMA is the pinnacle of EVIL!

  • by Rei ( 128717 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @01:18AM (#24747703) Homepage

    Come on, don't you remember the slashdot article [slashdot.org] about it?

    Twenty-seven kilometers of tunnel under ground
    Designed with mind to send protons around
    A circle that crosses through Switzerland and France
    Sixty nations contribute to scientific advance
    Two beams of protons swing round, through the ring they ride
    Til in the hearts of the detectors, theyre made to collide
    And all that energy packed in such a tiny bit of room
    Becomes mass, particles created from the vacuum
    And then

    LHCb sees where the antimatters gone
    ALICE looks at collisions of lead ions
    CMS and ATLAS are two of a kind
    Theyre looking for whatever new particles they can find.
    The LHC accelerates the protons and the lead
    And the things that it discovers will rock you in the head.

    Come on, let's drop some particle physics in the club!

  • by fuzzyfuzzyfungus ( 1223518 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @01:28AM (#24747775) Journal
    I was expected at least a mirror and placeholder wiki at openlhc.org by now.
  • TLA (Score:2, Redundant)

    by KGIII ( 973947 )

    I don't think that it is illegitimate for me to say:

    TLDR

  • I had thought that NIM (Nuclear Instrumentation & Methods, owned by Elsevier) was the only game in town, but it's good to see that there's another journal for this sort of stuff.

    (five minutes of browsing later) The Symmetry mag article has a link to the SLAC "blue book", which looks substantially more approachable.

    Plus, given how slow my download is going, JINST is being slashdotted. ;)

  • by Maelwryth ( 982896 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @01:56AM (#24747901) Homepage Journal
    If anyone ever needs a reason to wallop copyright, let this quote from the article [symmetrymagazine.org] be that reason;

    Most copies of The Blue Book had vanished from the SLAC Library, and the librarians wanted to make it available electronically. But they ran into a snag: No one could figure out who owned the copyright, so there was no one to give permission to put it on the Web.
    "It's an orphan work," SLAC archivist Jean Deken told me Friday. The original publisher was bought by another, which was bought by another, and so on. Finally, with the help of an expert from Stanford Law School, librarian Abraham Wheeler tracked down the current owner of the copyright-which said that since it could not find any documentation on the book, it could not grant permission to reproduce it.
  • by bit01 ( 644603 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @02:13AM (#24748001)

    Are they mad? The work of thousands of scientists published on line for all to see. A reasonable generic copyright license. All downloadable.

    What about the poor deserving lawyers? Where is the DRM? The commercial propaganda about "IP"? The hundred page license? The attempts by assorted hangers on to profit at other people's expense?

    I think the lawyers should form a class action lawsuit for loss of income. It's just not right that somebody should be able to do something without numerous lawyers attached.

  • There's a mistake on page 1471.

              Brett

  • Where's the stuff about how they'll turn the world into a black hole? Hopefully that won't happen. It would suck. Like a vacuum cleaner. But with gravity instead of vacuum. :-(
  • Now at last I can build my own Large Hadron Collider, with hookers! and blackjack!

    In fact, forget the LHC!

  • by CopaceticOpus ( 965603 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @03:36AM (#24748399)

    Help to save the world from being destroyed by a black hole! The specs to the LHC (Large Hole Creator) are available. Create a detailed proof showing that the LHC will create a planet-destroying black hole when it is switched on. Send the proof, with your $75 entry fee, directly to me. The person submitting the first valid proof will be awarded a prize of $50 Million, to be awarded on Sept 12th.

  • Funny? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by vainov ( 107102 ) on Tuesday August 26, 2008 @03:45AM (#24748441)

    Isn't it funny that the entire LHC spec is 1.600 pages, while the OOXML documentation, as submitted by Microsoft, is a full 6.000 pages.
    Does this reflect a difference in complexity, or is it a sign of something else?

    • Now *THAT* is the observation of the month.

      Don't get carried away though, there are only a few day of August left :-)

    • by Arimus ( 198136 )

      I was going to mod this up but can't decide if its funny, informative or what...

      Regardless it doesn't reflect well on the OOXML spec - wonder how many of those pages could be culled by a good editing session and removing all the redundant repeated information?

      • by cnettel ( 836611 )
        Try reading the ISO SQL spec. It might be shorter than OOXML (to be honest, I don't remember), but I am quite sure that it's longer than the 1600 pages mentioned here, when the relevant appendices are included.
    • MS is known for bloat and the LHC ain't as complex as people think.
  • The specification for Office Open XML has 6000 pages. And is missing some important stuff.

What is algebra, exactly? Is it one of those three-cornered things? -- J.M. Barrie

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