CompuServe Messages

Kathy: Both micro-fiche and -film can have an expectancy of 40-50 years and more with optimum storage conditions. But the word "optimum" can imply a lot. And of course searchability is a major advantage of electronic forms. As for "blowing up" the results (pun intended?), certainly you can do that with fiche or film optically also. And for scanning, yes, the data have to be captured in any case. But film is a photographic process accomplished in a part of a second, as opposed to the slightly slower requirements of electronic scanning (and the greatly longer process of OCR). The time difference may be slight for a small project, but it can add up to a lot in a large one. Plus you must consider that the "indexing" of page images – in wither case – must be done, at least to some extent, manually, adding additional time requirement. I am not an advocate of film particularly, but I think it only fair to lay out some of the positive and negative attributes of both approaches to give the company the best shot of finding the optimal solution in their specific context. Certainly, it seems that the electronic scheme is gaining ground all over the map. Best — Rich Bowers