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MA To Adopt Short-Term Plug-in Strategy for ODF
feminazi writes "Massachusetts is committed to saving documents in Open Document Format. Massachusetts is also committed to using applications that are accessible. Therefore, the Jan. 1, 2007, deadline for the executive branch to begin using applicationsv that default to ODF is being postponed until the applications can be proven to be accessible. 'Instead, the state will on a near-term basis adopt a plug-in strategy to fulfill its policy calling for executive-branch agencies to make use of ODF ... ITD will be following through with testing of the ODF plug-ins in preparation for a phased rollout, expected to begin later this year.'"
... they're saying that they won't necessarily be adopting OpenOffice.org software for their users with disabilities, instead allowing them to use plugins with MS Office.
That seems like good news - Microsoft needs to produce such plugins in order to keep doing business with the state; users get a choice in the software they use; and nobody's locked in to a proprietary document format.
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Why not let people who don't need accessibility use the cheap 'inaccessible' applications, and let the 5% who need accessibility use the "MS Office with a plugin" option?
You know, I really hate it when people use postal abbreviations on anything other than addresses. Reading the headline for this, I had no clue what MA was until I read the digest below. That's not a huge chore or anything, but the fact remains that it would have been much clearer from the beginning if they had just abbreviaed it Mass., which is the normally accepted abbreviation. I'm willing to be flexible on stuff like this, but these postal abbreviations were never meant to be used in the context of a paragraph or even sentence of text. Imagine if it was PA... Pennsylvania? Port Authority? Palestinian Authority? Mass. is obvious. Pa. is correct for AP style and others, and Penn. is almost unmistakable in context. Am I being too pedantic?
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Accissibility is very much a front-door concern. It is the software equivilant of a wheelchair ramp.
I think the Operating System should take care of representing the data whether it be reading a text field or error messages out loud or being able to have an overlay with bigger text. In Mac OS X you can take any text out of any application and let it be read.
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To refine your analogy, it's like bringing up the wheelchair access requirement as an obstacle to zoning the land on which the government building is to sit.
This suggests a lot of differences from the original plan.
The original deadline was ODF at the start of 2007. The general plan was to get a suitable plugin for existing MS Office deployments to keep using the same MS licenses, but save all documents as ODF. This plugin would also be available to recipients of the documents, so that they could read documents in the new format. The original plan did not include using a different office suite, open-source or otherwise, as part of this directive (although the directive would obviously facilitate later transitions).
It looks to me like MA has outwitted MS here; MS's FUD about this directive has convinced everybody that MA is ditching MS Office, to the point where MA can make a concession where they switch to OpenOffice later than the deadline, when their original position was not to switch at all.
Now, it's possible that the new CIO is unaware that the old CIO had made the current plan originally, and actually thinks that he was supposed to get new software in place, and thinks he's missing that milestone. But, most likely, he's just making it sound that way so the disablity groups can feel victorious, when their concerns were already handled in the general goal of continuing to use existing working software deployments.
No, I think it was bad politics on the part of the MA executive agency that brought forth ODF in the first place.
First, state agencies have affirmative responsibilities to hire people with disabilities, so they make up a large fraction of the workforce in state agencies than they do in the private sector. Second, in a state like MA, many groups like the disabled are quite powerful, especially when combined with strong public sector unions. That they were not brought into the process from the beginning was a big political mistake that opponents like Microsoft exploited.
ODF is an ISO standard and unencumbered by patents. OpenXML is still somewhat restricted in its licensing, and it is encumbered by Microsoft patents. The only guarantee that the patents won't be used offensively is Microsoft's word (no pun intended).
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
- Much of the information is stored in binary and enclosed in xml tags. This information is not straightforward to be written
- Why use a non-standard format when there is already a ISO-standarized one
- There are already many applications already preparated for reading/writing ODF documents that are already working on a multi-platform basis. Whilst there is only one version of a program (produced by a single company for only two plataforms). Many users did not upgrade yet (and they SHOULD PAY FOR THIS). So that should be a load of money (for MS) which makes no-sense
- the Massachussets goverment should also pay a lot of licences for that software.
So, please give us a single reason for doing such a silly thing