What Is Holding Back the Paperless Office? 511
Drethon writes "CNN has an article (are we up to the millionth article on this topic?) asking if the paperless office has arrived. This got me wondering, what are the main things holding back the paperless office? Just off the top of my head, the main thing keeping me printing out documents is the ability to spread a dozen pages of a document under review out on my table and marking it up by hand. PDF and Word markups are not too bad but they still lack the ability to spread many pages out to look over at the same time and could be improved to make markup a bit less restrictive. I do find myself printing out less with the use of dual monitors to have source documents and work under progress up at the same time, perhaps something like Microsoft's tabletop computer used as a desk will let me have at least a paperless desk. I know there are other reasons why offices are not becoming paperless. What are your reasons?"
Basically? (Score:5, Insightful)
Humans... We like to have a piece of paper in our hands, we can easily hand it to a coworker, we can scribble on it to take notes. I know it sounds oldskool, but for many tasks, a piece of paper is just superior. Sure, most of it is for temporary use, but paper isn't going anywhere. For many people reading from screen just isn't anywhere as comfortable as reading from paper. (That's why we still buy real books!)
People who bought the "paperless office" fad years ago were living in a dreamland.
Also, one thing to keep in mind. I have worked on large scale "scan documents from archives and the commit to big-ass proprietary content management systems". The conversion was extremely expensive, and the maintenance even more so. After all, you now needed expensive content manager Consultants, and competent DBAs (who have to be on call). For the paper version, you just needed one or two archivars. Just having tons and tons of paper sitting in a warehouse was was much cheaper, I heard later. These were Police documents, and they scanned in B&W... Photos were as such became unusable... I sure hope they'll keep the originals. I wonder who ever in his right mind approved that project.
Basic tools (Score:3, Insightful)
In short (Score:3, Insightful)
Technology:
I have yet to find anything that can replace the flexibility of a notepad..
Some stuff comes close (or even surpasses) in specific areas, but for general day to day stuff like taking notes at a meeting or scribbling out something to argue a point.. nah
People:
There are still people.. lots of them.. who will print out emails to read them. No technology will fix this.
Drawing (Score:5, Insightful)
Sometimes when working on some algorithmical or mathematical problem, I draw stuff on paper to visualize the problem better and find the solution. Drawing on a computer screen will never replace drawing with a pen on paper for that purpose for me.
Display size (Score:3, Insightful)
> the main thing keeping me printing out documents is the ability to spread a dozen pages of a document under review out on my table and marking it up by hand.
So, in short, the paperless office is waiting on bigger displays. Sounds about right to me...
Reliability (Score:3, Insightful)
I've never had my desk crash, losing all pieces of paper on it. Contrast that to Windows.
When push comes to shove, I can always get a paper form to the person that needs it. Contrast that to relying on an Exchange server.
When a form needs authorization, having the right person sign it with a pen always works. Contrast that to trying to get digital signatures to work.
A: The law. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you work in health care, at a law office, in insurance, in a financial institution or virtually anything else heavily regulated by the government, you must keep paper copies of most of your stuff. You just can't have a paperless office in those situations.
Change as good as a holiday (Score:3, Insightful)
Paper offers the chance to get up and walk around while reading or the chance to go to another part of the office to write.
Re:Basically? (Score:4, Insightful)
Only one thing, really. Contracts and other signed documents. As far as i know there is no way to electronically sign formal contracts in a generally accepted fashion. If that capability was available i would never use faxes/scanners or paper again except in very rare circumstances ...
Anyone have a good approach to the legal signature problem?
I couldn't agree more. (Score:2, Insightful)
Many people feel that some pieces of sensitive information are safer on a piece of paper in a locked desk than they are on a drive on your network.
The feel of assurance one gets from a physical, actual, handwritten signature (sad to say but even a generic 'rubber stamped' signature has a better "feel" to it than receiving a generic pdf form regardless of what new digital cert/signature accompanies the pdf.)
If you graduated from a nice college, how would you feel if they just emailed you a PDF of your diploma? It wouldn't 'feel' the same printing it out and hanging it on the wall, for whatever reason. (I'd say it goes deeper than that, though. 1s and 0s aren't directly tangible in and of themselves. Since they are so easy to reproduce copies of them, there really isn't the same type of sentimental value. If you 'lost' a PDF book your girlfriend gave you, for example, you could redownload the exact same copy of the file over again-- and you would experience no sense of loss... However, if your girlfriend bought you a physical copy of the book, and you lost it, even if you went to the store and repurchased an exact same copy of the same printing of the same book-- it wouldn't be the same 'book'. There is something empty about the 1's and 0's, and, though I love the possibilities that technology makes available to us, I hope that never changes.)
Physical placement of actual papers registers in the mind. If you have a collage of papers above your desk with various phone numbers, IPs, or whatever, your mind usually connects with that easier than 'what file/folder is that in?', and it's easier to look up than it is to click through multiple folders. (It's less steps to look up, than it is to sift through).
I think that paper and digital copies compliment eachother. They each have certain advantages over the other, but they can never fully replace one another.
We've been hearing about "e-ink" since the 1970s! (Score:1, Insightful)
For fuck's sake, can you e-ink advocates finally give us something we can actually use, or maybe just shut your mouths until there's a usable implementation available?
Literally every year since the 1970s I've had to endure one of you guys saying, "E-ink will be available next year!" First that "next year" was 1973, then it was eventually 1997, and now it's apparently 2011.
No, there won't be usable e-ink displays next year. All we'll get is a shitty iPad.
Re:In short (Score:4, Insightful)
Agreed. My place of work takes orders from the website, prints them and plops them into their ERP system. I have been brought in to fix this but there are active parties fighting me tooth and claw.
For too many reasons to list. Needing a "Human Glue" means job security.
- Dan.
Computers break. Books don't. (Score:2, Insightful)
I mean, so as to be completely unusable. I have books that are torn, missing spines, water damaged, defaced, and they still work. With no other hardware. Even during a power cut, or on the beach, and without any kind of hardware, and no language problems even after centuries. Paper is just superior technology.
Re:Old saying (Score:4, Insightful)
Instead of paper you could use water, hand (just use your other hand for eating) or cloth in the toilet. Ancient Romans used a cloth around a stick and it worked fine for them.
Re:Old saying (Score:3, Insightful)
just use your other hand for eating
Why use your other hand? Don't you wash your hands? If I use water and my hand to clean my ass (which is what I do in the shower because soap drys out your anus) and then I wash my hands with soap and water, why should I not use that hand for everything?
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Old saying (Score:2, Insightful)
Never seen a Japanese toilet, eh? The better ones will wash and dry you. Infinitely superior to the old paper friction "cleaning" method.
Proprietary (closed) and Incompatible Technology (Score:1, Insightful)
Kindle, iPad, Reader, Nook and OLPC all offer closed, to varying degrees, incompatability
readers. And, some require you to use THEIR servers to load YOUR own documents to
your OWN device. Companies need to be able to have control over what documents are
available in what formats and to what devices they choose. Personally, I am not going
to buy a device unless I have control over how I use it. The first company to offer a
cheap ($100 - $200) and open document view/reader will change the status quo.
Two Good Reasons (Score:4, Insightful)
1) A crisp blank sheet of paper is the greatest design tool ever invented.
2) Most computer applications don't support the many-to-many relationships with the same ease physical mediums do.
Re:Workflow (Score:3, Insightful)