[XML-DEV Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] Re: Do you enjoy neighborhoods where every house looks the sam
When in the process of shopping for a new door I discovered it was cheaper to have one custom made than using a factory item. This for pre-hung in frame, with both inside and outside moldings, double-pane glass, drilled for lock hardware and all mahogany construction. Made by a local lumber yard that has it's own door and trim shop. Totally customized to match the curve of the porch roof above it. For about a grand less. It did, however, take about a month to get it made. But worth the wait, for both the look and the savings. What does that say for standardization harming choice? Nothing, but that was a bad analogy to start with. -Bill Kearney -----Original Message----- I recently installed a new front door in my house. When you buy a door, there are a lot of choices to be made: what will it look like, how many windows, what material, what size? Some of these you have more or less freedom to choose as you please (within aesthetic constraints that are somewhat arbitrary): others, like size, you can vary if you choose, but at a much greater cost (reframing the entire door, knocking down walls, etc). I chose to buy a pre-hung door from a factory that manufactures these. I used a manufacturer that was suggested to me by a guy who helped me at our local lumber yard. I realized from looking on the web that there are many other manufacturers, but I eliminated all of them, and the wider array of choices that they represented, at an early step in the process, because I was desperate for help in understanding the bewildering measuring required. Choosing a pre-hung door (which comes with hinges installed, a lightweight frame, knob holes pre-drilled, and a threshold with weatherstripping already attached) also limited my freedom to be creative considerably. I probably couldn't use a random antique doorknob since the hole wouldn't have been in the correct location. Many "choices" regarding the appearance and design of the door, which, given a non-industrialized society, I would have been forced to make myself, were made for me, by virtue of standardization. Pre-hung factory-made doors only come in certain sizes, for example. Even with all this standardization to help me, it was barely possible for me, a sometime amateur carpenter, to install the door and get it to swing freely and close neatly, but I was able to do that. As I say, there were some compromises: I'm not totally thrilled with the appearance of the aluminum threshold, and I think if I had taken more care I might have been able to get a different one I would have liked better. What can we conclude from this? Standardization is neither good nor bad: what it gives is the ability to achieve a passable result without diving too deeply into details, but of course it takes away the ability, or makes it less natural, to sweat those details when you want to. Everyone has to choose for themselves (if they don't have the decision thrust on them) which area of endeavor they will be an expert in, and which they will leave to others. Experts will never be content with standardized solutions in their area of expertise -- often *they are the ones defining the standards*. But amateurs tend to appreciate standards that can enable their participation, in an amateurish way, in fields of endeavor in which they would otherwise be incompetent. Is that bad? I don't think so: I saved some money, I have a feeling of great accomplishment, and *I have new front door*. --Mike _______________________________________________________________________ XML-DEV is a publicly archived, unmoderated list hosted by OASIS to support XML implementation and development. To minimize spam in the archives, you must subscribe before posting. [Un]Subscribe/change address: http://www.oasis-open.org/mlmanage/ Or unsubscribe: xml-dev-unsubscribe@lists.xml.org subscribe: xml-dev-subscribe@lists.xml.org List archive: http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/ List Guidelines: http://www.oasis-open.org/maillists/guidelines.php
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