Massachusetts Likely To Approve OOXML

Ian Lamont writes "The IT department of the state government of Massachusetts has designated Microsoft's Office Open XML as an open document format, along with ODF, plain text, and HTML. It's only a draft policy, but it sets the stage for the format being given an official stamp of approval by state authorities — and weakens earlier Massachusetts support for the Open Document Format. Microsoft got a big boost at the end of 2006 when Ecma approved OOXML, and again this spring when pro-ODF legislation was being defeated or watered down in six states."

Comments

ob

[edittard]

Coming up later, Massachusets negotiates big discount from Microsoft. film at 11.

Re:ob

[smilindog2000]

It's not all about money. A lot of this is about trust. How far do you trust Microsoft with your data? OOXML's biggest drawback is that it's not truely open. I'm glad Microsoft is moving towards openness, but as is often the case in the corporate world, this isn't just some company being nice and giving users what they want. It's a direct attack against the ODF threat. It will likely be very effective, resulting in your having to continue to Trust in Microsoft (TM). Trust the big corporation. Good doggie.

Re:ob

[Volante3192]

I trust MS with my data as far about as far as I could throw the individual bits that contain that data...

Re:ob

[Rik Sweeney]

It's a direct attack against the ODF threat

Agreed, the name in itself has been chosen just to confuse Open Office and Office Open XML being the same thing. I can imagine the standards body meeting now:

"OK great, we'll pick the Open Document Format over Office Open XML"

(Some poor sod writing up the meeting notes)

Right, they've chosen the standard by the guys who do Open Office... aha! Here it is, Office Open XML...

Re:ob

[smittyoneeach]

Turn up the volume for Metallica playing in the background:

Come crawling faster,
Obey your master...

Re:ob

[Monchanger]

I don't understand this mention about being certified by ECMA. Granted, I'm not well versed in the document format wars, but I've never heard of this outfit. A brief glance at their "standards list" looks to me they simply allow corporations to take their existing technology and call them a "standard". So guess how surprised I was, when I took a look at the page on "Office Open XML Formats"

Is it me, or is that "certification" highly suspect?

As a consumer, I expect standards to come before commercial implementations, such as we've seen here regarding the many 802.11n progress updates. I want standards to be smart, not just come from a de facto implementation. I want many interested parties working together to hammer out an acceptable standard, so that I won't be told that I need Internet Explorer to view some lazy slob's web page. I think the free market would benefit if competition would not be between so-called "standards", but between implementations.

It looks like it's also about money to me. And when it comes to money, Microsoft is the last entity I would trust.

Re:ob

[flakier]

A lot of people say it's not really open, but I don't see anywhere how that's the case. In fact, people following the link to wikipedia will not see any criticisms against open-ness. There is quite a bit of shouting about why this is not this way or that way however.

So, there are two arguments I see people use to say OOXML is not open:

First, people like to say that OOXML is patented. OK, yes, we all know that's true, just like it's true that ODF is patented in *exactly* the same way by another large and litigious company. Full stop, end of story. Really, it's time to throw this one out folks...

Second, some people are concerned that OOXML allows documents that use proprietary image formats or other elements? I ask you, what moron (l)user in this day and age is going to use a WMF file instead of jpg, bmp, gif, or png when creating a word document? If an author does this in 2007, who is at fault for creating a proprietary document, Microsoft or the author (or maybe the company that hired the author)? The same goes for all the other alleged "non-open" parts. They comprise formats that no one has actively used for years or even decades.

Re:ob

[tsa]

Sure it's about trust. Who do you trust: a well-established and widely known company, or a nearly invisible (compared to MS) group of Open Source advocates? For many decision-makers at companies, the choice is a no-brainer.

Re:ob

[Narcissus]

When parts of a spec say 'and implement this how Word 95 did it', then it's not really open as it doesn't actually tell you how to implement it...

That's one reason, at least.

Re:ob

[ozmanjusri]

A lot of people say it's not really open, but I don't see anywhere how that's the case.

This is the canonical list of cotradictions so far http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog/articl e.php?story=20070117145745854. There are also links to Groklaw's analysis at the bottom of the list

OOXML is clearly not open. As the man says, its purpose is to describe Microsoft's Office product - bugs, rats and all.

Re:ob

[PFI_Optix]

So building legacy compatibility into a new system is a bad thing? In those 6000 pages of specs, is there documentation so other developers can implement that legacy mode? That's what I don't see talked about, and what is really important.

It sounds as if MS is providing a way to move old documents from a number of formats into OOXML without losing their proprietary formatting. This yields more accurate conversions and will generally make people happy. The trouble will come if OOXML isn't quite so open if and when these tags are used. As I said, I've seen no indication that the implementation of the legacy tags is being kept secret.

Re:ob

[cduffy]

So, there are two arguments I see people use to say OOXML is not open:

Neither of those things concerns me much; I'm a lot more concerned about failure to reuse preexisting standards. Forcing anyone who wants to build a full implementation of OOXML to implement Microsoft's own vector graphics language rather than using one of the many available SVG libraries is unnecessary and excessive. Same thing goes for MathML, XLink, etc. OOXML reinvents the wheel frequently, down to having their own date formatting quirks and names for colors (for which there are also ISO-standardized versions). To be sure, OOXML may still technically be "open" -- but if it's unnecessarily complex for anyone to implement without access to Microsoft's legacy codebase (from which the funky restrictions were cribbed), what's the difference?

Any "standard" which is so clearly developed with ease of implementation by a single vendor in mind has a rather obvious scent of unilaterality to it.

Second, some people are concerned that OOXML allows documents that use proprietary image formats or other elements? I ask you, what moron (l)user in this day and age is going to use a WMF file instead of jpg, bmp, gif, or png when creating a word document?

Is Microsoft's clipart library no longer largely WMF? Even if that's the case, modern OOXML implementations will need to implement these ancient, antiquated formats to be able to read documents which were imported into OOXML from Word 95 (or other versions which *did* use WMF as the primary format for imported documents) -- meaning that backwards compatibility will remain much of the headache it was even before documents were converted into a "standardized format". The right way to convert things is normalization, damnit -- if, rather than simply forcing all implementors of the new format to support all the quirks of the old, the conversion process always normalized out the old quirks (ideally into modern, standards-centric formats for which preexisting implementations are available under a variety of licenses), the standard would be much smaller, more manageable and simpler to implement. As an additional benefit, we wouldn't see things like buffer overflows in the parser code for Microsoft's more obscure, obsolete formats causing security holes (as has happened in recent memory).

Part of the point of having a standard is that anyone should be able to implement it. If the standard incorporates by reference other specifications which are not open standards, then the standard can only be implemented in full by those who have licensed said specifications. Is this not an obvious problem on its face? You say that those creating such documents are "(l)users" -- but most office workers just want to Get The Job Done, and don't care (and shouldn't need to care) what format their clip art library is in.

Re:ob

[Rogerborg]

Round of applause, that commentor. Given how much tax money they've wasted on rattling their pathetic little sabre up to now, only to utterly cave on their 'principles' when push came to shove, what else could it ever have been about?

Re:ob

[TheRaven64]

So building legacy compatibility into a new system is a bad thing? Yes, if you do it like OOXML. The correct way of doing it is to make your format expressive enough to store all of the information that legacy documents contain, and then have a converter which translates the old markup into the new format. Consider the following made-up example:

Word processors generally have default style for headings. Which of these would make more sense in a standard:

• Have an element indicating the outline level, and one indicating the display style to use.
• Have an element saying 'use Word 95 format headings,' one saying 'use WordPerfect 3 format headings' etc.

Implementing a spec using the first is non-trivial. Implementing a spec using the second is almost impossible, unless you happen to already have code for importing documents in those formats. OOXML doesn't do this for heading styles (I don't think it does, anyway), but it does do this in a number of other elements.

In summary, the correct place for legacy support is in the importer, not the format. If you're doing things the OOXML way, you may as well have a couple of bytes reserved at the start of the file with one value reserved for 'this document is in Word 95 format' etc.

Re:ob

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks, Grace.

Re:ob

[jZnat]

Microsoft could just fully document their old formats, and those documents could remain in those formats with full compatibility in other applications (other than the original program used to write the document). Hell, they could fully document the new format, but instead they say, "refer to Word version x", where x is an undocumented, proprietary format.

Also, Microsoft could provide conversion programs that convert your old documents into the current standard (whether it be ODF or a version of OOXML without all the cruft).

Another thing they could have done is make OOXML a bit more of a modular standard (especially since they're using XML) and allow full standards compliance with applications that don't implement the backwards-compatibility cruft.

And regarding patents, instead of some unenforceable "covenant not to sue", they could explicitly give up all related patents or even license the OOXML specs under some sort of GPL3-like license where they are giving away their related patents to all uses of said standard.

Instead of all the logical approaches, they've decided it would be better to just pipe their old OLE format to an XML format with little to no changes and document it. Problem is, they left the cruft intact and didn't fully document the format. Hell, there's also the issue with patents, but if all they wanted to do was crush the ODF standard, they didn't really need to release their patents for it.

Re:ob

[ContractualObligatio]

On the subject of trust, it is harder to trust your opinion when you support "it's not truly open" with a link to a list of criticisms that doesn't even mention whether it is open or not. On what basis do you say that the current Office Open XML format not "truely" open?

But in essence you're right. It's not all about money. Many ODF advocates are making heavy use of misleading FUD. It's not "open" in the generic sense of "honest", it seems to be heavily driven by ideology or self-interest, and often they simply cannot be trusted.

Re:ob

[Macthorpe]

I'd have some sympathy if the name of OpenOffice wasn't specifically chosen to make people think of Microsoft Office.

Re:ob

[dlapine]

Uh, duh, the OOXML spec simples says "Do this the way Word95 did". That's it. That's the extent of the "standard" and the "documentation" for the process of "doing it the way Word95 did".

How the heck do you implement that?.
The trouble will come if OOXML isn't quite so open if and when these tags are used.

Isn't quite so open? ROTFLMAO. This "standard" is a bloody nightmare of not being open. Here's a quote from Groklaw that sums up the openness of this "standard:"
"Fully documented? Open XML? Sir, you jest. If it were, Microsoft wouldn't need to make Novell and Xandros and Linspire sign NDAs and then write translators for them, now, would they?"

Re:ob

[Pentavirate]

Some standards are developed before the implementation like the 802.11n standard. That makes sure everyone can interopperate. You can also open a previously closed format which is what Microsoft is doing. This will allow other companies to implement Microsoft's format in their own products without having to reverse engineer it or pay for it.

I believe ODF worked the same way. They defined the format and then allowed it to be open so others can implement it. It's not exactly the same because ODF is Open Source but it's similar. I could be wrong about this one. I can't remember how it was developed very well.

Re:ob

[mrchaotica]

So building legacy compatibility into a new system is a bad thing?

Considering that the whole point was to make a format that was actually good and free of all that cruft? YES!

Re:ob

[Just Some Guy]

I'd have some sympathy if the name of OpenOffice wasn't specifically chosen to make people think of Microsoft Office.

StarOffice started in 1986. Microsoft Office debuted in 1989.

So, now it has your sympathy?

Re:ob

[CheeseTroll]

Because "Office" is such an original name for software designed to be used in a corporate office?

Re:ob

[Fred_A]

I'd have some sympathy if the name of OpenOffice wasn't specifically chosen to make people think of Microsoft Office.

I think they did consider calling it "Open Fantasy Strip Poker" to try and make it more popular but that they thought that it wouldn't correctly reflect what the software was about, i.e. office software... So there you are. And it's OpenOffice.org btw.

Re:ob

[Macthorpe]

And it's OpenOffice.org btw. Just because you said that, I almost started caring, but not quite.

Hard luck.

Re:ob

[SEMW]

I ask you, what moron (l)user in this day and age is going to use a WMF file instead of jpg, bmp, gif, or png when creating a word document? Ummm... Someone who wants to keep an image in a vector format instead of rasterizing it? Neither jpg, nor bmp, nor gif, nor png, are vector formats. If you're arguing that there are never any reasons to use vector graphics over raster graphics, a lot of people are going to disagree with you.

SVG is an alternative, but it's still a relatively new format and has only just begun to gain a foothold.

Re:ob

[Fred_A]

You can also open a previously closed format which is what Microsoft is doing. This will allow other companies to implement Microsoft's format in their own products without having to reverse engineer it or pay for it.

Except that this is only what Microsoft is pretending to do. Despite its huge size at 6000 pages (sic) the ooxml spec is full of holes.

Re:ob

[SEMW]

Is Microsoft's clipart library no longer largely WMF? Even if that's the case, modern OOXML implementations will need to implement these ancient, antiquated formats I've just checked (Word 2007), and the most of the clipart is, indeed, in WMF. Which isn't that surprising: it's a relatively compact vector graphics format that also allows the inclusion of raster graphics. What else can say the same? MS is hardly going to adopt Adobe or Corel's own proprietry vector formats. EPS is a possibility, but it's hardly very convenient. SVG is a relatively new entry, and doesn't support the inclusion of raster graphics. The only one I can think of is Open-Document Graphics; which I've never used, but is presumably perfectly capable. I assume that if MS ever did switch to OpenDocument formats, it would go over to ODG; but until then, WMF/EMF is hardly some ancient, deprecated, now useless format.

Re:ob

[Anonymous Coward]

What is truly open? The link you mention has comments along the lines of "inflexible", "inconsistent" , "Doesnt follow certain standards(Does creating a standard (OOXML) automatically force you to follow other standards?)", "Use of DrawingML and VML instead of SVG". Some of them seem downright silly. E.g. "At 6000 pages long, the specification is too large to evaluate in the 30-day"
or.. "Duplication of, overlap with, and inability to merge with the OpenDocument Format." Well.. DUH !
Having flaws in design has nothing to do with being closed/open. You could have the best design in either camp. Next time do some reading of what it is you actually are linking to.
kthxbye :/

Re:ob

[Macthorpe]

Surely that would make it equally as ridiculous that somebody would complain that Microsoft would use "Open" and "Office" in a file format that they're marketing as open and for Office?

Re:ob

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're doing things the OOXML way, you may as well have a couple of bytes reserved at the start of the file with one value reserved for 'this document is in Word 95 format' etc. So you'd like MS to create a totally useless format that is expensive (for corporations who have millions of documents collectively in the word format) to convert to?
There is a reason Apple uses the Universal Binary with 100% redundancy/compatibility, Intel still piles on the x86 instruction set,etc..

Re:ob

[Intron]

Your argument would be better except that Word used to allow embedded postscript (I think it was Word 4) and took that feature out.

Re:ob

[Anonymous Coward]

All the way through the intertubes?

Re:ob

[Anonymous Coward]

If only it wasn't named OpenStarOffice.org...

Re:ob

[legirons]

"Surely that would make it equally as ridiculous that somebody would complain that Microsoft would use "Open" and "Office" in a file format that they're marketing as open and for Office?"

Trying to make sure nobody confuses it with the Open Office XML format by calling it Office Open XML format?

Surely trademark law stops you from doing things like that: deliberately trying to confuse a customer by using a variation of your competitor's product name?

Re:ob

[cduffy]

I don't really object to WMF so much in particular, and was using it as an example strictly at the parent's suggestion; consider it a placeholder for any nonstandardized format included by reference, in the context of the refutation of an argument that only "(l)users" will make use of functionality that embeds such content (and thus, by extension, that having a standard which includes nonstandardized specifications by reference is somehow acceptable).

What concerns me much more significantly is Microsoft's internally-developed XML-based vector graphics standard, which ISO refused to accept when it was submitted individually. Slipping a format which ISO refused when it was submitted standalone in through the back door by making it a subset of a much larger (and more politically charged) standard strikes me as exceedingly bad behavior for any vendor to get away with.

Re:ob

[Macthorpe]

And now we've come in full circle. *walks away*

Re:ob

[Maxo-Texas]

It is not that it is legacy.

It is that "do it like word95 did it" doesn't tell you how word95 did it unless you have the code.

It needs to say specifically what behavior is expected.

It would be like your dad telling you to mow the back lawn "like I mow it" vs saying 'Cut all the grass in the back yard to a height of no more and no less than 3 once every 14 days."' It doesn't matter how you get it cut to 3"- you could use sharks with frikkin laser beams, robots with little scissors, or a wide variety of lawn mowers from many different manufacturers.

Re:ob

[I'm Don Giovanni]

WMF/EMF is a well-known format. WINE fully implements it (even the bugs!).

And there are plenty of converters to other formats. For example, for years, Apple used their version of WMF, the PICT format, and many apps over the years contain code to faithfully convert between the two. And there are third-party libraries that do such conversions. There's nothing wrong with WMF/EMF.

Re:ob

[cduffy]

As mentioned here, I don't really object to WMF in particular; the parent post had it as an example (complete with their own assertions as to its outdated status), and I reused it making my point on that account.

Re:ob

[Anonymous Coward]

Second, some people are concerned that OOXML allows documents that use proprietary image formats or other elements? I ask you, what moron (l)user in this day and age is going to use a WMF file instead of jpg, bmp, gif, or png when creating a word document?

If you paste a screen dump from the clipboard into a Word doc, it'll be saved as a WMF. And this is precisely what you do if you're the sort of user who never thinks about file formats at all, i.e. about 93% of real users.

This is a key part of Microsoft's standard strategy. You *can* use their tools properly and carefully - but it's so very much easier to use them slapdash and any old how, and when you do *that*, it becomes exponentially harder to avoid lock-in.

Re:ob

[Meski]

I'd have sympathy for Microsoft if they'd just used Office Open XML, instead of inventing a new standard. Wait, I mean Open Office XML. Argh!

You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.

Question

[JamesRose]

Is it not the case that its negotiating using OOXML as well as ODF?

I mean, if so surely this is a big sign about the usefulness of ODF and in direct competition it'd be likely that ODF, if not only because some states only allow ODF and other states would want to have files compatible inter-states....

Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting AC for obvious reasons...

What many people probably don't know is that Microsoft have been lobbying companies, especially technology partners, to lobby their local standards body to get them to lobby ISO. You receive an email talking about "choice" and why that is important and what OOXML is all about, you also get a handy word document (not in OOXML ironically) which you can fill in, sign and post, or an email template that you can send off to the organisation in question. MS also would like a "quote" from the companies to say that they support "choice" and hence OOXML.

And of course good partners of Microsoft often get cash investment in sales campaigns and go to markets.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[morgan_greywolf]

Can anyone say RICO? I can't wait for the new head of the DOJ coming in January 2009. Let's just hope for a Democrat in the White House.

I can see it now ... Hillary throws a chair: "I'm gonna F***ING KILL Microsoft!"

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

What is your point? I also support choice and Microsoft is not even paying me. The pertinent question is this: is OOXML an open format? If it is, then Massachusetts has no reason not to include it on a list of acceptable document formats.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Skrynesaver]

This story piqued my interest as I got a mail today from our national standards body. In it we were informed that there is a 5 month ballot currently underway with a deadline of September 2 2007. They are looking at the national position WRT this proposed standard and are seeking submissions from those who submitted previously at the one month contradiction stage.

Check your own national standards organisation and see if they too are seeking submissions.

The outcome of the Ecma report can be had here http://www.ecma-international.org/news/TC45_curren t_work/Ecma%20responses.pdf

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[visualight]

The pertinent question is this: is OOXML an open format?

No. I think openxml is a scam. My unverified assumption is that at present there is no translater that is 100% compatible with any document MS Office might produce with openxml, including Novells. Even if my assumptions are incorrect (I'm convinced they are not), it will still be possible for MS to "extend" openxml later with new shiny features that will effectively keep documents locked in.
I can't imagine that any intelligent human will not realize this. The only explanation for openxml approval by ECMA, ISO, or the State of Massachusetts is corruption and bribery.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

The pertinent question is this: is OOXML an open format?

Is .DOC an open format? The OOXML "standard" several places refences earlier versions of Microsoft Office (and even Word Perfect). Rather than explaining what a tag means, it just says "this must do like Microsoft Word version so and so", making a non-MS implementation a work of reverse engineering just like .DOC, or incomplete (missing those parts).

Why is OOXML considered "open", when .DOC is not? The primary difference is that .DOC is already mostly reverse engineered, OOXML is not. So someone using e.g. OpenOffice would get better results by sending the OOXML file back, and asking for a .DOC version.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[BruceCage]

IT Conversations: Gary Edwards
OpenDocument and the Move to XML Formats
http://osc.gigavox.com/audio/download/itconversati ons-1810.mp3
[runtime: 01:14:48, 34.2 mb, recorded 2007-04-30]

OpenDocument expert Gary Edwards believes that adopting OpenXML means lock-in to Microsoft products on an unprecedented scale. In this podcast, Edwards defends OpenDocument's capabilities but also challenges the ODF community to out-innovate Microsoft to provide a competitive alternative to Microsoft's lock-in. He also challenges the open standards community to focus on delivering alternatives to Microsoft Exchange and SharePoint servers. Edwards also describes Open Document Foundation's da Vinci plug-ins for Microsoft Office. Listen to it and see for yourself.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Vidar Leathershod]

Yeah, the Democrats will help. Especially when you consider that there is a Democrat Governor in Massachussetts now, and ODF was accepted under a Republican. Being Slashdot, this of course is supposed to be considered an exception to the rule. After all, Democrats support the people, and Republicans support evil corporations, right?

Unfortunately, party affiliation has no bearing upon moral judgement. Hillary has probably already been taking contributions from Microsoft. Besides the fact that with her, it's whichever way the wind blows.

But go on, enjoy your leftist fantasies. But why wait? Why not write to your Democrat-lead legislature and ask them to repeal the DMCA. I'm sure they will be more than happy to return some sanity and limits to copyright.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

pssst: it was a joke. The chair throwing reference makes this obvious.

-- morgan_greywolf, posting as AC cause I'm not near my PC right now.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[howlingmadhowie]

the point is, choice in data formats is actually sometimes a bad thing. does it help if people are allowed to choose in a scientific context if they wish to express energy in joule or in calories? a standard exists in this case, it is the joule. document formats should be regarded similarly. a perfectly good standard existed so instead of implementing this standard, microsoft develops their own (which isn't even implementable, or so i'm told, and therefore does not qualify as a standard) just to muddy the water. so when it looks like they will have to compete on a level playing field, microsoft throws up their arms and shouts "the consumer needs choice". how about a choice of software to read/write the existing word-format? why not just release the specs on that? why go to the trouble of designing a whole new data format?

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

And why should I trust one of the members of the Open Document Foundation to give a truthful analysis of Microsoft's formats? That aside, this interview is too long for me to listen to at work. Can you give me a start time where he starts explaining why OOXML is not really open?

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

What you think it is is irrelevant. Is it open or not? That is the only relevant question. I honestly don't know since I haven't read either standard. But if it is truly open then it should be on the list. If it isn't then it shouldn't be on the list. It's pretty simple.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, I have read that OOXML has these tags for maintaining backward compatibility with the behaviour of previous versions of MS Office. I have also read that these are only used for documents converted from the old Office formats to the new ones. So the solution is simple. Specify that only new MS Office documents created as OOXML will be accepted. Older documents should be converted to one of the other acceptable formats.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[jZnat]

I doubt the Democrats will do anything useful either. Sure, if the DoJ is fixed again with lawyers who have experience in the field (e.g., the lawyers Bush fired that were prosecuting Microsoft in the first place), it's possible that Microsoft might get more than a slap on the wrist if antitrust charges are brought against them again. However, the individual people behind the party are far more important than the party itself, especially with Democrats (the neocons that took over the Republican party are all the same, but not all Republicans are neocons; see Ron Paul for example).

It might be more useful to "spam" your congressmen and other representatives (including state ones; a state can sue Microsoft just as easily as the feds can) with letters, phone calls, personal meetings, etc., regarding the abuses of Microsoft.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[_Sprocket_]

And why should I trust one of the members of the Open Document Foundation to give a truthful analysis of Microsoft's formats? For the same reason you might think Microsoft is providing a truly open document format despite historical precedence. If you want to really give the benefit of the doubt, you should listen to both sides of a debate.

Re:Microsoft lobbying

[juhaz]

That is subterfuge.

There's no reason why they would be required even in converted documents, if $MUSEUMAPP V0.000000000001 uses 1.23125634754432px line spacing, then you specify 1.23125634754432px in the new document when converting, not DoLikeMuseumAppV0000000000001, to do otherwise is not conversion, it's wrapping.

Having those closed definitions, whatever the excuse, means OOXML is not an open standard.

You heard it here first..

[EveryNickIsTaken]

This means the Kennedy clan are in bed with Microsoft, right?

can someone explain

[rtphokie]

Why the rest of the country, much less the rest of the world, cares about what Massachusetts thinks is standard?

Re:can someone explain

[will_die]

Ignoreing the world...
Massachusetts kind of became important because it was the first state that really pushed for requing goverenment offices to use a non-propietary format for the storage of information. Other states then followed the laws originally written by Mass. Since most other laws are similiar to the Mass. one if Mass. allows the microsoft format the other states will follow.
Since microsoft is going for ECMA and ISO standardization of thier file format, personally I think it should be approved; once the ECMA and ISO approval is done.

Re:can someone explain

[risk one]

Because this is the first crack in the dam of Microsoft's vendor lock-in. If Massachusetts stores and releases all government material in an open format, then Microsoft must support that format, or lose a lot of business. Remember that Massachusetts is the home of MIT, lots of businesses there that care about government regulation. And once a couple businesses in Massachusetts stop using office, it can spread. They email some document to another company across the globe, in ODF, then that company comes into contact with ODF, and it will have to either install separate software for it, or even switch away from office, if Microsoft still refuses to support ODF.

Of course, if they do support ODF, then they lose their vendor lock-in outright. No problem switching to OpenOffice if all your clients have Office, just send your stuff in ODF, and they can open it. Microsoft chose the one way out that would let them have some control, develop their own open standard, and lobby like mad to get everyone to use that instead of ODF. That way, at least they own the standard, and that's what Microsoft's always been after.

Re:can someone explain

[apathy maybe]

Simply really.

The same reason that people care if Munich has adopted Linux. If governments adopt open standards or Free Software, then it makes it gives more credibility to these standards or software.

Currently MS Office is the de facto standard for office software, companies want people who know how to use MS Office. Yet, if they see that they need to be compatible with OpenDocument, then they might start asking for people who can use more general office software, or for people who can use OpenOffice.org.

One reason that people use MS Word so much, and why Free Software alternatives have to be compatible, is simply that the MS Word format is the default. If that changes to something else, why then perhaps we might see more Free Software being adopted.

If nothing else choice is good (Pikachu, I choose you!).

Re:can someone explain

[spiritraveller]

Uhm, because standards tend to be defined by what others are doing more than anything else.

What MA does will influence what its suppliers do.

What its suppliers do will influence what their other customers do.

All of this will also affect whether Microsoft takes ODF seriously and provides adequate support for it in their software.

Re:can someone explain

[morgan_greywolf]

Since microsoft is going for ECMA and ISO standardization of thier file format, personally I think it should be approved; once the ECMA and ISO approval is done.

The ECMA and ISO approvals for OOXML are a sham. They're bought and paid for by Microsoft. Microsoft has been bribing the committees and stuffing them with their own people to all but guarantee approval. This, IMHO, just weakens the ECMA and ISO standards bodies to the point that they can no longer be trusted. Thanks, Microsoft! You truly make the world a better place! *cough* *cough* *hack* *puke*

Re:can someone explain

[Ngarrang]

... personally I think it should be approved; once the ECMA and ISO approval is done. You have apparently not read the OOXML standard, or you might think differently on the subject. I have read it. It is has to be one the poorest attempts at a "standard" I have ever seen. It is incredibly complex and obtuse. Go, check it out. Please.

Re:can someone explain

[Coryoth]

Since microsoft is going for ECMA and ISO standardization of thier file format, personally I think it should be approved; once the ECMA and ISO approval is done. Given some of what has achieved ECMA and ISO standardization, and indeed, the quality of the documentation of the "standard" that OOXML purports to be, you're basically just asking for rubber stamps, not openness. Then again, this is government, so perhaps rubber stamps are actually more important than the qualities the rubber stamps are supposed to guarantee.

This does raise an interesting question though, because MS is successfully slipping through the door here. It is a case of following the letter of, but not the spirit of, the law. They have provided a "standard" that is just good enough, just open enough, just documented enough, to meet the ISO and ECMA requirements (and really, it is pretty borderline on that, and could still go either way). At the same time it has a whole host of what are essentially closed unimplementable features riddled through it, guaranteeing lock in which MS so desperately needs (do they really? Is MS Office so mediocre that it can't actually fight toe to toe? I suspect it would do fine; it may lose some market share, but would probably cope well). The question is: how do we close the loophole? Exactly what needs to be asked for in a standard to ensure it is actually an open standard?

For the most part this hasn't been a problem; people seeking standards mostly wanted them to be universally implementable. The idea of someone trying to get an ISO standard that was useless to all but the submitter; well, that was rather ridiculous -- it would seem to be defeating the point. Now, however, it is very much the case. So what needs to be asked for to actually guarantee openness? This is not a trivial question.

Re:can someone explain

[jack455]

Look, everyone knows that whether you're talking about video, sound, spreadsheets, text documents, or whatever; MS wants to compete and then dominate. As a Linux user I am still ok with this as I believe in competition.

There comes a point, however, when you have to take notice. When MS faced off with java for instance they tried to break it with their own, broken, implementation as well as competing directly with it with .net.

You may be ok with them lobbying MA to (unfortunately successfully) weaken their resolve as to open formats. I won't debate that now. This, though, is obviously is an example of their gaining of ground in their secondary battle. It's not wma battling aac, mp3, ogg and flac. It's not msn battling yahoo. It's not zune battling ipod.

MS is a proprietary company that is subverting use of open standards by implementing, and lobbying for, their pseudo-open "Office Open XML" because their irrationally afraid of OpenOffice.org, which is the leading implementation of "Open Document Format", an existing ISO standard.

MS users can still support them generally, but want their gov't to use a different, long-lived storage format that centuries later can be implemented because of its accurately documented specifications.

Some of this may seem dubious to you if you haven't read much. RTFAs. (I didn't...)

Re:can someone explain

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

OK, but in that case, surely the problem is that the standards bodies don't agree with you. Now, this may be a demonstration of technical competence on a par with the USPTO, but it seems rather harsh to blame the state legislature for saying it will adopt recognised standards, and for recognising standards supported by ISO for that purpose. I would think the correct target would be the standards bodies, which seem to be approving documents that shouldn't qualify for the reasons given elsewhere in this discussion. It might seem like an obvious question, but has anyone actually challenged the validity of OOXML as a standard with the organisations concerned? I'm sure every trick in the book is being used to "fast track" the approval, but they do have mechanisms for people to object to proposed standards...

Re:can someone explain

[ozmanjusri]

personally I think it should be approved; once the ECMA and ISO approval is done.

You're assuming OOXML will be accepted as an ISO standard. At this stage, with 16 of the 30 P-Countries offering contradictions, I wouldn't be counting it as a fait accompli.

Re:can someone explain

[Anonymous Coward]

But if only it WERE a crack in the dam of Microsoft's lock-in. Massachusetts claimed they'd be going completely ODF at the start of 2007. I've previously pointed out that there are something like a total of 30 ODF documents available from the Massachusetts government, period. (Go ahead, check Google, I'm not going to repeat that.) This compares against nearly 60,000 Microsoft format documents.

All this new policy has really done is push PDF. (Nearly 80,000 found by Google.) Almost everything government-related is now available using PDF. I suppose they might even accept PDFs, but I've yet to find any government-related service available online that wasn't handled through HTML forms and required sending documents via email. (But I'd imagine any department capable of accepting faxes can accept PDFs.)

Ultimately Massachusetts isn't doing dick to advance ODF. They're advancing the availability of PDFs, which is nice, but they've done absolutely nothing to push ODF use. Go ahead, search for even a mention of ODF by the Massachusetts government. I can only find two things - one from 2005, talking about the possible switch, and one from 2006, saying they'd switch by the end of January, 2007.

Well, it's July, 2007. They haven't switched.

Re:can someone explain

[TheRaven64]

Why not add a second condition: The standard must be implemented by at least two independent implementations. PDF qualifies (there are at least half a dozen PDF renderers I know of, and even more creators), so does ODF. OOXML does not.

Re:can someone explain

[KarmaMB84]

Work on OpenXML at Microsoft actually predates ODF. Whether they were going to submit it as a standard is a whole other thing though.

Re:can someone explain

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes it does. There's the Office 2007 implementation and the Novell plug-in implementation for OpenOffice.

Re:can someone explain

[Citizen of Earth]

just good enough, just open enough, just documented enough, to meet the ISO and ECMA requirements (and really, it is pretty borderline on that, and could still go either way)

This seems quite doubtful. If anyone else submitted such a poorly crafted specification and didn't move heaven and earth to ram it through with massive political power, both organizations would throw it out in the initial phase for being too flawed.

If you look at the standards that ECMA has passed, you will see that it is little more than a rubber stamp for Microsoft.

Re:can someone explain

[Macthorpe]

The Wikipedia list is not a complete list. Try here instead to see other standards backed by Siemens, IBM, Sony, HP, Toshiba, Philips, Boeing, Xerox, Fujifilm, Intel, Apple and Adobe, to name but a few.

Describing ECMA as "a rubber stamp for Microsoft" shows a lack of knowledge. Wikipedia doesn't have all the answers, sometimes it's worth doing some real research.

Re:can someone explain

[Maxo-Texas]

Because they were going to promote a vendor neutral standard that anyone could write a word processor for.

And now it looks like they have been bullied and bribed and have rolled over on their back and are whimpering like a whipped cur.

'How many fingers, Winston?' said O'Brien.
Four. I suppose there are four. I would see five if I could. I am trying to see five.'
'Which do you wish: to persuade me that you see five, or really to see them?'
'Really to see them.'
'Again,' said O'Brien.

Re:can someone explain

[bojan tesanovic]

Very interesting explanation, did not know that. But is there some law in US that can prevent this kind od MS abuse?

Re:can someone explain

[Anonymous Coward]

Novell plugin is not a complete implementation (and never can be, nor can any other non-Microsoft implementation), so it doesn't count.

Re:can someone explain

[xanadu-xtroot.com]

Personally, I prefer Kadabra or Alakazam. Well, unless I'm going up against a Ghost type... or was it Dark type? Geesh, I forget. I'll have to ask my Son again. I really ought to stop playing his GBA games...

So what's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

What's the point in standardizing on an open standard if you're going to allow an XML container format that allows undocumented blobs?

Microsoft have lobbied hard for this, write to your representatives and let them know that Microsoft is stacking the deck.

Paid off Ted!

[gabrieltss]

Microsoft obviously cut a deal with Ted Kennedy.

Microsoft schrill: "Hey, tell you what, we will supply you with 2 years worth of free booze, cars to drive, and a cover story for any women that end up in the river. In exchange you allow OOXML in."

Ted Kennedy: "Really, that's all I have to do. It's a deal! Where's my booze?"
 

Re:Paid off Ted!

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a state mandate. It has nothing to do with Ted Kennedy you knob.

ODF is not being dismissed

[eck011219]

and weakens earlier Massachusetts support for the Open Document Format.

It weakens ODF's potential for exclusive adoption in Massachusetts. It would be very unlikely that a state (particularly one as large as Massachusetts) would ever completely refuse to accept documents in a format as soon-to-be-common (like it or not) as OOXML.

Granted if they did it, they'd have a better chance of getting private vendors to use ODF than, say, Montana. But you've got to figure that as OOXML gets slowly adopted, there are going to be a lot of outside vendors (not to mention other states) with whom Massachusetts will have to interact who will make the jump to OOXML. And if you think the conversion from old Word to new Word is rife with peril, the conversion from ODF to OOXML and back would likely cause quite a bit of inefficiency and lost data.

Re:ODF is not being dismissed

[a-zarkon!]

Yep, according to TFA ODF, HTML, and my personal favorite Plaintext are all going to be included in the tech spec. I suspect this is more like what the parent suggests - Massachusetts is recognizing Microsoft's lock on enterprise office software, and rather than trying to dictate terms to the rest of the world they're being realistic in expecting they'll need to handle M$ format documents. Nothing to see here...

Re:ODF is not being dismissed

[asuffield]

It would be very unlikely that a state (particularly one as large as Massachusetts) would ever completely refuse to accept documents in a format as soon-to-be-common (like it or not) as OOXML.

Massachusetts has never even suggested that they would refuse to accept any Office documents. This is solely about what they are going to run on their own computers, with a presumption that government documents must be archived for extended periods of time and that they would like to do this in digital form.

lol

[Colin Smith]

Politicians and bureaucrats.

Look. When someone says "The government should" or "The state should". What they're talking about is politicians and bureaucrats.

And Microsoft have tens of billions of dollars.

Open? My arse..

[Shuntros]

Techie: is OOXML an open format?
MS: Yes
Techie: Can you give me the specs?
MS: No

Ho Hum. I work with a guy who hates FOSS. Is it because he loves Windows? No. It's simply because he loves spending money, and hates not being able to do a deal on something... because it's free!

The real problem is the politicians

[Anonymous Coward]

We just went through 10 years of extreme out in the open corruption from the republicans. It is obvious that the dems are in the same tub. They are just as much on the take. I can not blame MS for political bribes. Afterall, they have been doing it all over the world. But America needs to strengthen our laws to prevent this.

Re:i think my anus is bleeding

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's normal after conducting a transaction with Microsoft.

The noOOXML.org petition

[pieterh]

Yes, Microsoft are moving heaven and earth to get OOXML stamped as an ISO standard.

One example: in Italy's technical committee a few weeks back there were 11 organisations. When Microsoft had finished mobilising their partners, there were 70. No surprise that Italy will vote "yes" on the OOXML vote. It is disgraceful; ISO will become a "made in Redmond" rubber-stamping tool that helps Microsoft sell upgrades and kick away ODF.

There is an online petition with 16,000 signatures and a lot more information on the noOOXML.org site.

Everyone who cares about open standards needs to sign this petition.

Re:The noOOXML.org petition

[Anonymous Coward]

One example: in Italy's technical committee a few weeks back there were 11 organisations. When Microsoft had finished mobilising their partners, there were 70. No surprise that Italy will vote "yes" on the OOXML vote. It is disgraceful;

There is an online petition with 16,000 signatures and a lot more information on the noOOXML.org site.

There's no irony in complaining about a corporation mobilizing its partners, but closing with your own attempt to mobilize your partners. None at all.

Re:The noOOXML.org petition

[Danse]

There's no irony in complaining about a corporation mobilizing its partners, but closing with your own attempt to mobilize your partners. None at all. Partners? I'm thinking that we're just talking about people here, not organizations that depend on the parent-poster for their financial welfare. I also don't see any irony involved in pointing out that letting Microsoft purchase the approval for their standard doesn't benefit anyone but Microsoft, and that if you agree, you can sign a petition stating that. No financial involvement or coercion of any sort is involved. Definitely not the case with Microsoft's partners.

And here comes XPS too

[gr8_phk]

Microsoft pushing XPS over PDF

One question...

[Warbothong]

Did any of those involved (outside the Microsoft lobbyists) actually read it? I mean personally? The whole thing? Somehow I have my doubts...

Re:One question...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure no one at microsoft read it. they certainly didn't use it to code there implementation.

Good ol' politics in action !

[unity100]

you gotta love politics. you can make them congresscritters say "fishes live in sequoia trees" if you pay them enough.

Backwater

[PenguinGuy]

Just another step to the US becoming a IT backwater with Microsoft calling the shots.

When the 'cyberwar' comes, it will be interesting to see how fast the IT infrastructure goes down due to all of the Microsoft products in it.

Headline is incorrect

[sribe]

They have designated OOXML as a potiential open format to be considered. Seriously, how would it be appropriate to not fully evaluate Microsoft's offering? This might be bad news as suggested, the first step in an predetermined process to adopt OOXML, or it might be that someone has realized that it would be politically not viable to reject OOXML without an obvious and public evaluation that would broadcast OOXML's problems in clear terms. We can only hope ;-)

I want 132 v electricity supply!

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Why the whole of USA is forcing down our collective throats one-size-fits-all 110 V, 60 Hz electricity supply? America is about choice and freedom. We want more choices in standards. You could choose 17 inch square wheel standard for your car that uses 125 octane gasoline standard and a 7.3 V battery standard. The world would be much better place if every vendor and manufacturer could specify his own standards. In fact we could have multiple standard specifying bodies too. You choose GE-IEEE standard or Ford-ANSI standard or Boeing-FAA standard. Wow! What a brave new world awaits us!!! Cant wait for 24 hours (why that standard, why cant we have a 13 hour day and 7.3 hour night standard) to see the tomorrow!!!!!

Re:I want 132 v electricity supply!

[Penguinisto]

Why the whole of USA is forcing down our collective throats one-size-fits-all 110 V, 60 Hz electricity supply? America is about choice and freedom. We want more choices in standards.

Dunno if that was tongue-in-cheek or not, but it's a bad analogy ye be usin' up there: "60Hz single-phase sine wave @ 110VAC" is a pretty flippin' open consumer product spec, by any definition of the term. Incidentally, the stuff that gets to your house is usually 2-phase @ 220VAC, which gets split at your breaker box.

What happens to it after that is all up to you so long as you own the joint. ;)

'course, industry distribution standards --for North America, anyway-- range from 2-phase 220VAC to three phase 220/440/660 VAC, with lots of nice options on the side. Most decent-sized industrial sites usually get their stuff raw off the city/rural/regional grid as three-phase juice, which can be anywhere from 8.8 kV to 13,200 kV and up.

AAMOF, the only real 'standard' in electrical distribution is that you make a best effort to keep it at a 60Hz sine waveform, and that you follow standard NEC (and other) safety practices and guidelines - what you do with it after that is all up to you.

The really funny part is, I hadn't even touched on High-Cycle (180Hz) or industrial AC to DC conversion, both of which are valid and useful options for industrial application throughout North America... Oh, yeah, forgot: many other countries and regions have far differing standards entirely that they use (e.g. the 220-240VAC @ 50Hz std. household power found in much of Europe, IIRC).

/P

Re:I want 132 v electricity supply!

[Tacvek]

Actually to me more correct, 3 phases are likely found on the power lines. (Power lines usually have 3 main wires, plus often a fourth wire containing ground potential and grounded every couple of poles. I'm not sure what connection is found on the pole side of the transformer, but I'm guessing that side is two tap, with one live phase and ground. On Home side of the transformer is 3 tap. The center tap is grounded at the pole. It is also grounded at the house (safety in case the neutral wire breaks between the house and the pole). The two other taps have a voltage differential of 220 volt, and only a differential of 120 volts to the neutral line(the grounded line). The 2 live lines could be described as 180 degrees out of phase with each other, however that is not considered a different phase, but just the inverse of the same phase. So calling the system in homes "2-phase" is misleading.

Re:I want 132 v electricity supply!

[Penguinisto]

Actually to me more correct, 3 phases are likely found on the power lines. (Power lines usually have 3 main wires, plus often a fourth wire containing ground potential and grounded every couple of poles.

True for most distribution, though once it gets down to the residential poles or the 'neighborhood level' (for lack of a better term)it often drops to two wires, and sometimes maybe a third along top as a lightning catcher. Same with rural areas, IIRC.

Otherwise you're 100% correct - the 'grid' itself and most major distribution lines are 3-phase.

The two other taps have a voltage differential of 220 volt, and only a differential of 120 volts to the neutral line(the grounded line).

Yep; but it's rigged like that to allow 220V appliances (stove, washer/dryer, furnace, and other suchstuff).

The 2 live lines could be described as 180 degrees out of phase with each other, however that is not considered a different phase, but just the inverse of the same phase. So calling the system in homes "2-phase" is misleading.

Sort of - I'd have to start looking things up from here (admittedly - it's been literally over a decade since I've had to deal w/ any of it), though IIRC any two signals out of phase with each other is still considered multi-phase, useless as it may be for actual use as such.

/P

Re:I want 132 v electricity supply!

[Tacvek]

Of course it can be used to power 220 volt devices, although obviously there are two live wires in that case. Wikipedia recommends the system be called "3-wire, single-phase, mid-point neutral" or at the very least "split phase". See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split_phase for the main page.

Also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyphase_system which says:

A polyphase system must provide a defined direction of phase rotation, so mirror image voltages do not count towards the phase order. A 3-wire system with two phase conductors 180 degrees apart is still only single phase. Such systems are sometimes described as split phase.

Re:I want 132 v electricity supply!

[Penguinisto]

Ah - that's where I went astray! :)

(I was mixing polyphase with split phase.)

/P

Re:I want 132 v electricity supply!

[Allador]

Thats a terrible analogy.

Electricity is largely fungible once its in your house. You can power a lamp, a TV, a refrigerator, etc. Whether the standard is 110v or 132v doesnt fundamentally change what you can do with it, as long as you get it in the standard way.

There are fundamental things different about OOXML and ODF however. OOXML contains features and functionality that ODF does not (both bad and good). So you can fundamentally do things with OOXML that you cannot in ODF, because its part of one standard and not part of another.

The analogy would only work if 110v worked on lamps and tvs, but 132v only worked on lamps.

Multiple Programs/Vendors

[QMO]

Wasn't one of the requirements for eligibility of a format the existence of multiple word processors (spreadsheet programs, presentation programs, etc.) that read and write the format?

Did that change, or is someone else licensed to use their formats to write competing software with MS formats, or is there some other way that MS is trying to get around that?

Why support any lock in?

[jorghis]

So you guys are mad that there isnt going to be a law forcing states to be locked into ODF? Can you imagine the outrage if it was the other way around and there was a law requiring some open MS standard to be used for all government work? Is it really so ridiculous to say that people should just use whatever standard they feel is best for the task at hand. Personally I would think any law locking people in to one standard is a terrible idea regardless of whether its by IBM, MS, or any other big tech corporation.

OOXML is an open standard. People are making a mountain out of a molehill based on the corner case of importing a document from wordperfect of many years ago and having a clause in the formatting that just says "this footer here shall be aligned as it would be in wordperfect x.y" or whatever. For all intents and purposes its open, people are just nitpicking over the fact that importing files from long ago and having the description for how a few obscure formatting issues should be handled is a little vague.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[TheRaven64]

Can you imagine the outrage if it was the other way around and there was a law requiring some open MS standard to be used for all government work? If the standard were freely implementable by anyone who wanted to, with no royalties, a reasonably complete specification and one non-MS implementation already existed.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's Massachusetts. If they can manage to define "marriage" as "a union between a man and a man or a woman and a woman - oh yeah, or that other one, man and woman" then why would you be surprised that they're forcing a format on anyone doing business with them while claiming it improves choice?

And forcing OpenOffice at that. I've tried the latest 2.2 release, and it's still just as terrible. OpenOffice make me willing to shell out the $400 to get real Office, just to ease the pain.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[kebes]

You seem to be confused as to what the point of a standard is, and what the point of an open standard, specifically, is.

Is it really so ridiculous to say that people should just use whatever standard they feel is best for the task at hand.

Well the whole purpose of a "standard" is to get a group of people using the same rules, so that interoperability and transfer of data becomes much easier. Of course there will always be multiple standards, and different groups may decide that one standard fits their needs better than another. No one is arguing that point.

So you guys are mad that there isnt going to be a law forcing states to be locked into ODF?

Actually the proposed law is that the government should be using an open standard. No one is 'forcing' you (or any person or any company) to use this standard. The purpose of the law is to say that the government has a responsibility to use a standard that is open, so that archiving of data is easier (and can be accessed years later), and so that all citizens have access to the data. This makes sense: the government is an instrument of the people, and all the citizens of a democracy should have easy access to government data (and for all time!).

It's rather disingenuous to say "locked into ODF" since ODF is an open standard which means that anyone can generate their own ODF reader and writer. In fact, every computer on the market right now can basically read ODF (in a primitive way), since any modern OS can extract a zip archive and read the plaintext that is inside. Yes, ODF is really that open! You can read it and work with it with very simple tools. There are also many full office suites that can read/write ODF. So it's hard to see how you can say that the government will be "locked into ODF" when it will be trivial for them to convert the data to other formats, copy the data elsewhere, extract it for other use, automate searching through the data, etc. Where's the lockin?

The point with ODF is that you are not locked in. It is so open that it is very easy to convert your data, using a wide variety of tools (many of them freely available). The same cannot be said for MS's offering... which is why it cannot be legitimately called "open" and is a poor match to the needs of archiving and disseminating government data.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

No one is 'forcing' you (or any person or any company) to use this standard. Unless, of course, I happen to want to, you know, communicate with the government. And why would that ever come up, huh? Why would I ever want to communicate with a government "for the people and of the people"?

You'd think Massachusetts, one of the original states in the Revolutionary war, would understand that the government shouldn't force things on its people. But instead, Massachusetts has to have its fingers in choosing what office suite you're allowed to use.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[kebes]

Your argument makes no sense. Massachusetts has to select a standard. No matter what standard they use, people wanting to access those documents will, yes, have to obtain software that can read that standard. There is no escaping that fact.

However the precise difference between an open standard and a closed standard is that the open standard can be freely implemented by any party. This means that you, the average citizen, can in principle write your own program to read the standard. More realistically, it means in practice that there will be numerous products on the market available to read the standard. In fact in the case of ODF, every computer nowadays can read it (by extracting the zip and reading the XML inside using any text editor), and there are free and Free options (such as OpenOffice, or free ODF->PDF converters or whatever) for reading the data is prettier forms.

So, yes, no matter what standard the government selects, you will be "forced" to use that standard to read their documents. So then the government must decide between a "open and human-readable format that numerous vendors can currently read/write, and for which there is not restriction on future implementations" and a "proprietary or semi-open standard that only one vendor can properly claim compliance with, and whose implementation specifications are not guaranteed to be freely available"...

It's also important to realize that it's much easier to use an open standard, and then convert from that to whatever other document types people want... rather than to use a proprietary standard, where finding or creating document converters may be much harder.

I think it's pretty obvious that the open standard forces very little on the citizens, whereas the proprietary standard does.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

"More realistically, it means in practice that there will be numerous products on the market available to read the standard. In fact in the case of ODF, every computer nowadays can read it (by extracting the zip and reading the XML inside using any text editor), "

You can do exactly this with OOXML too. Just rename it as .zip and open it up. Contraty to what you might read on slashdot, in practice OOXML is just as open as ODF.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[oyenstikker]

"OOXML is an open standard."

Can you read the specification and then write software that implements it? No? How is that an open standard?

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Where's the lockin?"

People build all their IT stuff around this standard. Their scripts, their wordprocessers, etc. all have to function with this standard. Ergo, they are locked into the standard. Just because a standard is open doesnt mean you cant be locked into it. Once you have got all your infrastructure set up around one standard it isnt easy to start using a different one.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, you absolutely can barring the obscure formatting issues inherited from ancient imported files that the GP mentioned.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[cparker15]

So, instead of guaranteeing my right to access documents produced by my state's government (born and raised in a Boston suburb), you're suggesting that the State House produce documents in a Microsoft-sponsored document format that may or may not work with my Free software applications? How do you suppose that is going to work? Even documents be ODF and odd documents be OOXML? One department use ODF and another OOXML? I doubt the State House would take the extra time/effort to save all documents in both formats every time.

What if document XYZ that provides an important form that I need is only available in OOXML, and that particular document makes use of a proprietary OOXML feature? I use Free software, so I'm not allowed to view the document? I have to pay Microsoft in order to conduct business with my government?

I'd rather have one standard that's guaranteed to be 100% transparent in order to guarantee unfettered access to government resources.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Ornedan]

The difference lies in whether you can, without having to resort to reverse engineering, understand all the details of what the document says. OOXML has several unspecified (technically specified, but the specification is just "Behaves as proprietary product X") behaviours, especially related to formatting.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[ZorbaTHut]

Actually, you're kind of wrong there.

If a standard is fully open, it's generally not particuarly hard to write a converter to convert to and from that standard. That means my SuperExpensiveProprietarySoftware which reads ODF can be easily modified to use OMG, the new open document standard, just by writing a little OMG->ODF converter and preprocessing files that are used as input.

It takes some work obviously, but it takes far less work than a proprietary closed format which you may not be able to build a working converter for. I don't really want to think about trying to write an OOXML->DOC converter, personally. Yes, it's possible Word will be able to automate that easily (in fact I suspect it will), but any bugs will just have to be accepted since it's not like the source is available.

I agree it's not easy to convert. But it's not all that hard either.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or the state could do what it already does: provide the documents as PDFs, and accept any format.

That way I'm not forced to use OpenOffice and can use a real office suite, and the various hippy-idiots who refuse to download the completely free Microsoft Office viewers can view documents.

(born and raised in a Boston suburb)

Pleading for sympathy? I'm sorry you're stuck with a baseball team that has only one a single World Series in the past - what is it now, 85 years?

Re:Why support any lock in?

[_Sprocket_]

Once you have got all your infrastructure set up around one standard it isnt easy to start using a different one. Migrations are hard. What makes it even harder is dealing with proprietary data formats. If you cant' be completely sure you (or your agent) will be able to 100% understand the data format that you've committed years worth of data to... how can you be sure you can migrate if or when the time comes without loosing some of that data? A truly open standard that allows complete transparency to the data (including meta data, markups, etc.) allows the ability to automatically transcribe from one format to another; freedom to migrate. Or at the very least, one less hurdle in an already difficult task.

That is what "lock-in" is about. It's not about the cost of migration. It's about whether committing to an infrastructure means you have little chance to migrate to another in the future.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it that you think that writing an ODF->OMG converter would be easier than OOXML->OMG? Im not trying to flame here, just trying to figure out what your rational is. My understanding is that barring the obscure imported files from ancient times issue with OOXML, its just as open as ODF.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[ZorbaTHut]

Well, partially because I wrote an ODS->CSV converter, and it was 216 lines long - in C++ :) I know just how simple the OpenOffice formats are - they're really, really simple.

And because I honestly don't believe Microsoft is trying to be open. Everything I've heard about the format says that it's technically an open format, once you figure out WTF they're talking about, assuming they're not using any weird non-open parts, assuming they don't extend it in a non-open way in the near future, assuming they even conform to their own spec. Considering that Microsoft has not been known for any of those - and are in fact known for violating essentially all of those points - I don't have much faith in the true openness and readability of OOXML.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[SanityInAnarchy]

People are making a mountain out of a molehill based on the corner case of importing a document from wordperfect of many years ago

Except it's not a corner case. The spec is absolutely FILLED with this kind of shit. And this is exactly the kind of thing that would cause problems when trying to switch to an alternate implementation: "Look, we tried OpenOffice, but it screwed up the formatting on some of our documents."

For all intents and purposes its open, people are just nitpicking over the fact that importing files from long ago and having the description for how a few obscure formatting issues should be handled is a little vague.

"A little vague" might be OK. Except it's beyond vague. It's non-existant.

If they're really about open standards, answer me this: Why didn't they use ODF? Or, failing that, why didn't they create a better standard, or fully spec out the one they've got?

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Anonymous Coward]

"So you guys are mad that there isnt going to be a law forcing states to be locked into ODF?"

Have a read:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vendor_lock-in

Hint: the format supported only by one vendor (OOXML) is capable of vendor lock-in. The format supported by multiple vendors (OpenDocument) is not capable of vendor lock-in.

"Can you imagine the outrage if it was the other way around and there was a law requiring some open MS standard to be used for all government work?"

According to the article, that's what Massachusetts' government is proposing.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Why is it that you think that writing an ODF->OMG converter would be easier than OOXML->OMG?

ODF is an open standard, thus you just have to follow the spec. OOXML is not an open standard since it references other, closed software behaviors. Trying to convert ODF to something else I can look at some formatting and know that needs to be a header that repeats at the top of every odd page. Reading the OOXML specification I know it is a header that is supposed to behave like headers in version 2.2 of Wordperfect for Windows. I don't know what that behavior is without finding a copy of Wordperfect 2.2 and exhaustively testing it.

My understanding is that barring the obscure imported files from ancient times issue with OOXML, its just as open as ODF.

Very few of the experts who have looked at both seem to agree with you. Even assuming you're right, what about obscure imported files? I already have had to deal with old Word .doc files that no currently marketed software can seem to read and others that no currently available version of Word can read. What makes you think the 6-10 year old files the state of Massachusetts has are all going to convert to something that will be easily readable in the future if they are converted to OOXML?

Re:Why support any lock in?

[The Master Control P]

I think you're misunderstanding some things. The whole entire point of ODF is that it's impossible go be locked in, because everything needed to implement the standard is open, hence the term "open standard." In the unlikely event you can't download a document translator for your needs, you can write your own. For the same reason, OOXML is not an open standard because saying "Do this like $PROPRIETARY_PROGRAM did it" requires information that is not open, ergo the standard is not open.

You have to remember that there is no such thing as an "open standard" from Microsoft. Anything that looks like it is almost certainly an attempt to lock your information into their formats again. It's not exactly "embrace, extend, extinguish," because this one came pre-extended. Guess who the only organization that knows how Word95 actually handles things is? So guess who's the only one that can gaurantee "100% accuracy" with OOXML? Microsoft have acheived their objective - OOXML will force you to use their software.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Allador]

... ODF is an open standard which means that anyone can generate their own ODF reader and writer. In fact, every computer on the market right now can basically read ODF (in a primitive way), since any modern OS can extract a zip archive and read the plaintext that is inside. Yes, ODF is really that open! You can read it and work with it with very simple tools. This is exactly the case with OOXML as well. It's the same setup. Open standard, stored as XML file(s) then zipped up.

The point with ODF is that you are not locked in. It is so open that it is very easy to convert your data, using a wide variety of tools (many of them freely available). The same cannot be said for MS's offering... which is why it cannot be legitimately called "open" ... What is it about OOXML that is not open here? The only part of the spec that doesnt have enough details to implement are bug-preserving corner-cases from old versions. And MS SPECIFICALLY says in the spec that you should not implement these, they're only there as a marker, so you can convert to something else. You're very specifically instructed NOT to implement those tags, because they shouldnt be preserved.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Allador]

Well, partially because I wrote an ODS->CSV converter, and it was 216 lines long - in C++ :) I know just how simple the OpenOffice formats are - they're really, really simple. Did you implement 100% of the ODF spec? Can it convert any arbitrarily complex document that meets the spec into CSV? How does it convert graphics to CSV?

I'm not trying to be an ass here, but that seems to be the standard that OOXML is being held to, so I'm looking for some consistency.

Everything I've heard about the format says that it's technically an open format ... So wait, you're involved in an argument about the fitness of a standard spec that you've never even looked at?

Re:Why support any lock in?

[Allador]

Why didn't they use ODF? Or, failing that, why didn't they create a better standard, or fully spec out the one they've got? They didnt use ODF because ODF and OOXML are not isomorphic. You cannot do a lossless translation of one to another. Each contains features that the other does not (though this is mostly true on the OOXML side).

In addition, what if MS wants to add a new feature to Office (ie, word, excel, etc) that is not supported in ODF. If they only use ODF, then all of a sudden they are limited to what new innovations they can create around the office apps. They're forced into a lowest-common denominator situation. Makes it hard to differentiate your product.

If you ask them, they did create a better standard. And thats supportable from some perspectives (ie, number of features).

They did fully spec out what they've got. In the backwards compatibility cases, you're explicitly instructed in the spec to do what they do, and upconvert it to something else.

Re:Why support any lock in?

[SanityInAnarchy]

They didnt use ODF because ODF and OOXML are not isomorphic. You cannot do a lossless translation of one to another.

Which is really their fault for not speaking up when ODF was being drafted. I believe they were on that committee.

But you didn't answer my question. I asked "Why did they extend ODF instead of inventing OOXML?" And you said "Because OOXML supports more stuff." Well, duh. I'm asking, why did they go to the trouble to roll their own, new spec, instead of improving the existing one.

In addition, what if MS wants to add a new feature to Office (ie, word, excel, etc) that is not supported in ODF.

In that case, they extend ODF. And keep in mind, ODF is intended to become a bit like ASCII or UTF8 -- to cover the problem domain so completely and generically that no other standard is needed. I believe this to be possible.

If they only use ODF, then all of a sudden they are limited to what new innovations they can create around the office apps.

Kindly name one "innovation" you can think of that requires a change of office format.

Makes it hard to differentiate your product.

Well, the point is, we're asking them to differentiate on real features, not merely the "feature" of "We control the document format; if you switch to our competition, your documents might not convert properly."

They did fully spec out what they've got.

Oh? Then tell me, exactly what does "Auto Space Like Word 95" do? Where is that listed in the spec?

In the backwards compatibility cases, you're explicitly instructed in the spec to do what they do, and upconvert it to something else.

Except the problem is, they don't upconvert. Not really. They just slap an "AutoSpaceLikeWord95" tag on it and call it "standardized".

What would be nice is if the spec provided a generic way to define how an autospace should work (for example). Then, AutoSpaceLikeWord95 would be a document-specific style, and entirely transparent to any implementation -- and the implementations would be simpler, too. The only place where the word processor would require specific knowledge of AutoSpaceLikeWord95 would be when converting to/from an actual Word95 document, which seems a lot more sensible to me than carrying the baggage around in the word processor and the spec for the next hundred years.

Linus is rght

[Anonymous Coward]

I am with Linus on this one.

The nice thing about standards

[Gothmolly]

is that there are so many to choose from.

so much for fair competition in a free market

[Anonymous Coward]

would it be too bold to suggest that maybe all this neo-conservative / right-wing / republican / pro big-business posturing is the problem?

The good news is ...

[mikeb]

.. that if OOXML is accepted as a 'standard' and compliance with the 'standard' must be demonstrated, Massachusetts won't be able to deploy Word 2007 since it doesn't implement OOXML correctly. In fact nobody can implement OOXML correctly since the document is internally contradictory and many of the examples pieces of code are invalid XML.

The hope that anyone will test for compliance is though, probably, a pipe-dream. Maybe if concerned voters raised a legal challenge when procurement was done?

Only for old documents

[iabervon]

OOXML is only suitable as a standard way of representing old documents, written in old office software, whose precise formatting is important and must be retained when making a more portable representation. At least, that's what ECMA told ISO as for why there should be a second standard document format.

So, if Massachusetts follows these guidelines, it won't be permitted as a format to save new documents in, and will only be used to export archived Word documents. Beats me as to why you'd need to use something other than PDF for such things, since actually editting the document will screw it up much more than converting it to ODF would, but there are various things available as DOC files currently that recipients wouldn't be expected to edit (e.g., the reports on plans for troubled school districts), so there should be a standard replacement for that.

Can someone ALSO explain

[SterlingSylver]

Of course, if they do support ODF, then they lose their vendor lock-in outright. No problem switching to OpenOffice if all your clients have Office, just send your stuff in ODF, and they can open it. This is the part of the OpenOffice argument that I never seem to understand, so perhaps someone can explain it to me. If Microsoft simply supports ODF as a file extension, doesn't MS Office remain the default office productivity suite by virtue of Excel, Powerpoint, and Word. The actual programs in OO aren't up to Microsoft's level of quality, and even if they were you need to justify retraining your excel-experienced workforce to make the switch as a company.

Just changing the last 3 letters of a filename doesn't seem to indicate a massive exodus away from Microsoft's software, and retraining a workforce seems to be a slight problem in moving away from Office.

Re:Can someone ALSO explain

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

If Microsoft simply supports ODF as a file extension, doesn't MS Office remain the default office productivity suite by virtue of Excel, Powerpoint, and Word.

No, they don't. You see, if Word supports ODF, a format not tied to a specific piece of software, then there is no "default" office suite. Everyone is free to choose the application that best suits their needs. For many, this may still be MSOffice, but for a lot of others it will be something else, and that means MS loses money. Worse, when WordPerfect gains some cool new feature, it actually matters because any given individual or business can easily switch to using it and switch back when they want. This means MS has to expend money actually creating features users want and competing with other software vendors. MS does not like competing, they'd rather lock in customers and not have to pay attention to what customers want, while focusing on gaining a monopoly in a new market.

The actual programs in OO aren't up to Microsoft's level of quality, and even if they were you need to justify retraining your excel-experienced workforce to make the switch as a company.

OO is not the only competition, but lets take a look at it. Suppose only 1 in 100 of your employees need to be able to use the high end features of Excel and everyone else just needs to be able to open and edit the data. Can you move you company to OO without a lot of expense? Probably not. Can you move 99% of your company without a lot of expense? Yes. And that saves you 99% of your licensing fees to MS.

Just changing the last 3 letters of a filename doesn't seem to indicate a massive exodus away from Microsoft's software, and retraining a workforce seems to be a slight problem in moving away from Office.

Retraining costs are not as high as most people assume, and it is a recurring expense anyway with new versions of MS products coming out regularly. An important point you may be missing is that promoting ODF is not about getting people to stop using MSOffice. It is about giving users choice and flexibility so that MS has to make MSOffice a better product and so that we can be assured that we will still be able to open files 5, 10, or 20 years from now.

Re:Can someone ALSO explain

[risk one]

You're right, at this point Office is the market leader not just by virtue of vendor lock-in, but also because they're way ahead of anything. OpenOffice is OK, but Office these days is actually good software, and developing rapidly. It's also expensive, and it's the one product that Microsoft can't drop their prices on. Pretty much all of Microsoft's loss-leading products are funded by their Office earnings. So if you're just opening a one-man webdesign shop, OpenOffice is plenty for the average spreadsheet or word doc that someone sends you, as long as you're sure you'll be able to open them. And a userbase builds a product. The more OpenOffice (or any other competitor) gets used, the faster it grows.

Another advantage of opening up the market is that people will at least consider taking on Office. Two years ago, a startup creating anything remotely related to an Office product would never get funded. Companies providing support for OpenOffice of KOffice would never get out of their niches. Now, the market is opening up, and we can at least try. It will be hugely difficult to beat Office, considering the amount of capital and power behind it, but can be done. And with an open market, if Microsoft manages to stay in the lead, then good for them. That it probably means they have a good product for a good price. But this time they will have earned their position.

And a final note. Microsoft may have all the money and power in the world to throw at Office, and be maniacally paranoid about keeping their lead, but the great thing about software is that it's very easy for the Davids to defeat the Goliaths. Nine women can't make a baby in one month. Throwing money and developers at a project usually helps only very little. A team of twenty very good programmers, that work together well, communicate well, and believe in the project could probably come up with a competitive basic Office suite in a couple of years. And Microsoft can throw all the money they want at their team, it won't replicate that force. The only thing that will match that is good management and a good team. Of course, that's pretty much what Office has, but certain development power can't be manufactured. So it'll be difficult to beat Office (Firefox vs. IE is a walk in the park compared to this one), but it can be done.

Idiots!

[Nom du Keyboard]

Idiots! The whole point of a standard is to have one! But then again we're talking about Massachusetts.

Ecma sounds like a skin disease.

Re:It's all about choice

[MightyMartian]

I just had a nightmare with Outlook calendaring, and then some MS apologist tells me that MS products are more stable.

Give your head a shake. I've had more document corruptions with Word 2003 than I've ever had with OpenOffice. OpenOffice ain't perfect (it's awfully slow), but your complaint is sheer bullshit.

the workers want OOXML

[r00t]

More accurately, they are afraid to use anything other than Microsoft Word.

First, they think it's too hard to learn something new.

Second, especially when you point out the learning curve on the new Microsoft Word, they think (rightly) that not being Microsoft users will hurt them if they go looking for new jobs. They want to keep their Microsoft skills up to date.

Re:the workers want OOXML

[Anonymous Coward]

That may be but it's not about what the workers want or what software they use. Any state that supports a single vendor monopoly needs to get real, kick Microsoft lobbyists out of the discussion and address the issue.

Re:the workers want OOXML

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah! Why should the people who actually use this software get to decide what they want to use? It should be decided by a bunch of people on slashdot who will never work for the state of Massachussets! Anti-MS idealogy is way more important than the needs of the people who are actually going to be using these products!

Re:the workers want OOXML

[Anonymous Coward]

open office blows. Write better software if you want people to use it.

Let the government know how you feel

[tedivm]

The Massachusetts Governor, Deval Patrick, has a website that allows people to create issues and vote on ones they care about. There is an open issue on this right now-
http://devalpatrick.com/issue/opendocument
So go let your voices be heard.

Follow

[JohnnyGTO]

the money. enough said.

Write your reps!

[kayle]

Please write the government representatives about this issue. If only a third of comments here had been directed at people who make the decisions about this, that would make a substantial difference. You can use the petition as a starter for talking points.

http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=mg2utilities&L=1&sid=m assgov2&U=utility_contactus
Bethann Pepoli is the Acting CIO in charge of this decision.
http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=itdmodulechunk&L=1&L0= Home&sid=Aitd&b=terminalcontent&f=organization_adm inistration&csid=Aitd

Re:Write your reps!

[kayle]

Also, comments can be sent to: mailto:standards@state.ma.us
http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=itdsubtopic&L=3&L0=Hom e&L1=Policies%2C+Standards+%26+Guidance&L2=Drafts+ for+Review&sid=Aitd

Your bullshit-to-noise ratio is kind of high...

[SanityInAnarchy]

If they can manage to define "marriage" as "a union between a man and a man or a woman and a woman - oh yeah, or that other one, man and woman"

Isn't that about choice? No one's forcing you to marry either a man or a woman.

But even if you are going to be that closed-minded, WTF does marriage have to do with office formats? (I can just see you sitting there sipping a beer... "Yyyep... *burp* ... aah ... y'know, that them there Open shit's fer faggots.")

why would you be surprised that they're forcing a format on anyone doing business with them

Except they're not. From what I understand, this only reflects what format they would use internally for archiving, which means that it's as irrelevant to anyone doing business with them as whether they use FAT32 or NTFS on their workstations.

while claiming it improves choice?

Well, it does. More on that in a bit...

And forcing OpenOffice at that.

Except it's not. It forces you to choose between OpenOffice, KOffice, AbiWord, GNUmeric, StarOffice, NeoOffice, ajaxWrite, Google Docs, TextEdit, TextMaker, Zoho Writer, eZ publish, Scribus, Visioo Writer, EditGrid... hell, I even wrote a ruby script to read OpenDocument. Didn't take that long.

And if you're that attached to Microsoft Office, there is a third-party project to add ODF support to it, also.

Oh noes, how restricting to be forced to use only those programs! Please. With OpenXML, you get MS Office, Gnumeric (very limited), and maybe OpenOffice. And if you've read the spec, it seems doubtful anything but MS Office can implement it fully.

So tell me again how this is forcing anything on anyone? Really, it's funny. Just as much of a laugh as the idea that gay marriage hurts anyone.

Re:Your bullshit-to-noise ratio is kind of high...

[Anonymous Coward]

Whine, whine, whine, whine.

My point is simple: if Massachusetts is able to define a simple word that everyone knows the meaning of, that's had the same meaning since it was originally coined, and that can probably trace its origins back to the origin of speech itself, it's hardly surprising that they can redefine "choice" as well.

It's simple. I should be allowed to pick any format I want to use. The government shouldn't dictate the format I want to use.

If that format is Microsoft Office, I should be allowed to choose that. Nothing should prevent that. If I choose OOXML, I should be allowed to use that. If you want to use ODF, nothing should stop that.

This is about Massachusetts restricting that choice while claiming it improves choice. The government shouldn't dictate the formats I can communicate with them using. They should accept as many as feasible, and offer as many as feasible. Anything else isn't choice, it's the complete lack of choice.

Re:Your bullshit-to-noise ratio is kind of high...

[Allador]

And if you've read the spec, it seems doubtful anything but MS Office can implement it fully. This is a very important point that everyone seems to be missing.

Very few implementations (other than the impl of those who created the standard) ever 'fully' implement a spec. Google docs dont fully implement ODF, only a subset. In fact, I think you'll find that the bulk of those you listed dont fully implement the spec. They just implement the parts that they think are relevant to their target audience.

And as long as its a proper subset, it doesnt matter, because it will still be interoperable.

Yet, we have the same situation with OOXML, where there are sections that no one (except MS) will probably ever implement. But we also have the important subset of the spec that most people care about, and anyone is welcome to implement that. You dont have to implement every single bug-preserving corner-case of a spec in order to have 'implemented' it.

Heck, look at PDF. The third party implementations only do a tiny subset of the spec (and usually just of PDF-X, which is in itself a tiny subset of PDF), but that seems to work out okay.

Re:Your bullshit-to-noise ratio is kind of high...

[SanityInAnarchy]

Whine, whine, whine, whine.

Oh, well put, Anonymous Coward. If I was not convinced of your argument by now, that bit certainly changed my mind. </sarcasm>

My point is simple: if Massachusetts is able to define a simple word that everyone knows the meaning of, that's had the same meaning since it was originally coined

You know, "Freedom" used to mean "All white males get to do whatever they want, at the expense of everyone else." I'm sure as hell glad that the government redefines words sometimes. Sometimes they need a new definition.

For that matter, this isn't even new. The 1913 Webster's Dictionary provides this definition for marriage: "Any intimate or close union."

that can probably trace its origins back to the origin of speech itself

You don't have to go that far to find a shockingly different definition. Polygamy was quite popular in the Bible. Is that a form of marriage you endorse?

It's simple. I should be allowed to pick any format I want to use. The government shouldn't dictate the format I want to use.

Which is not what this is about. This is about what format the government dictates for itself.

The government shouldn't dictate the formats I can communicate with them using.

Really, if they can't dictate that, what can they dictate?

You're telling me that the government should support a particular monopoly, and buy a particular product, just in case you want to send documents to them in that form?

Gee, I guess we better buy them WordPerfect licenses... hell, why not Acrobat? You might send them a PDF to edit... Or hell, maybe some Flash source code. Better have them buy Flash.

You know, why don't we all send our notes scribbled on the walls of Quake 4 maps!

I'll concede that they should accept any document in a widely-implemented industry standard. But sorry, I don't accept OpenXML as a standard, and with good reason, I think. And the binary Microsoft Office is right out.

In any case, it's moot. This legislation only concerns what format they use internally, for archival purposes. They may still accept all of the above formats, meaning this doesn't affect you at all, dipshit. It's entirely an internal affair, and it is as much their right to regulate as what dress code government employees should wear. (And if you're going to complain about that, then Christ, who's whining now?)

What is ECMA International?

[Nybler]

Here's what ECMA says:
http://www.ecma-international.org/memento/index.ht ml

Checkout the chairpersons for the following technical committees:

Programming and Scripting Languages:
http://www.ecma-international.org/memento/TC39.htm

Office Open XML Formats:
http://www.ecma-international.org/memento/TC45.htm

Irony: OO reads old word better than word.

[Maxo-Texas]

I have word 95 documents that crash word or that load but look weird.

The fix is to read them into openoffice 2.0 (or higher) and save them as word documents.
OO is better and more stable reading many of my older word95 documents up to about 4 mb in size than Word 2003 to 2007.

I've also had word 2007 documents become corrupted so that they crash word when I try to read them. However, openoffice will read them and then I can save them often with no apparent loss of data (pointing to corrupt section headers I think).

ODF/OOXML conversions

[cbhacking]

Believe it or not, not only does such a converter exist, it is an open-source project sponsored by Microsoft, and has produced both an independent converter and an Office 2007 plugin. Using the plugin, ODF files can be opened in MS Office, saved in either XML-based format (I don't think it allows direct conversion to legacy formats), and OOXML files can be opened in Office and saved as ODF (or legacy versions). The conversion is largely done with XSL transformations.

It also appears that Novell is working on a Linux port and OpenOffice.org plugin as part of the same project. The whole project is .NET code so presumably Linux's version will use Mono.

The license is BSD-like and very simple.

SourceForge project site: http://odf-converter.sourceforge.net/
Download site: https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?grou p_id=169337

Proof in the pudding

[quixote218]

It seems to me easy to resolve the "is it open or not" question: the legislature can tack on an implementation requirement.

For example, state: "Beginning [insert date here], the only formats accepted for document submission will be those which have at least two (2) functionally complete implementations, available without restriction to the public for free; formats available for distribution will be those for which two (2) functionally complete implementations, available without restriction to the public for free, can translate from an approved submission format."

Note that I'm not saying MS Office needs to be free, just the format translator. AND I'm saying that someone besides MS needs to make one that works, too.

A standard ain't a standard if just one guy does it. If MS really wants a standard, they're going to have to do more than just declare it. They'll need to teach it.