CSV is a great example of this phenomenon. There is a "spec" RFC4180 and there are tools that generate CSV files that do not technically conform to the spec. One such tool is Excel. For most users, Excel is doing the right thing. Blaming Excel for not handling CSV files according to the spec is passing the buck. The CSV tools that are worth using generally take great pains to work with Excel files at the cost of some ideological purity.
IMHO it's a reflection of the software developers involved. The best tools, the ones we turn to time and time again, generally just work.
IMHO it's a reflection of the software developers involved. The best tools, the ones we turn to time and time again, generally just work.