Jeremy Allison On Microsoft, OOXML and Standards

An anonymous reader writes "OOXML is already Microsoft's "de facto" standard as implemented in Office 2007, so when would any changes arising from the Comments Resolution meeting in February 2008 be put in place? According to Jeremy Allison's latest column, when last minute changes were suggested for the CIFS standard, which Samba exists to disentangle, "the response came back from Microsoft that although the fixes were valid, unfortunately the code was already written and was going to be shipped in the next service pack. End of discussion. It wasn't even in a shipping product yet, but the specification was determined to be unchangeable as they didn't want to change their existing code.""

Comments

That's true in India.

[Anonymous Coward]

The article is in an Indian-based web site. As odd as it may seem, Microsoft is the clear leader over there. You'd think that expensive, proprietary software wouldn't be used much in a nation where so many suffer from from extreme poverty, even to the point of starvation. One would expect Linux and OSS to be widely used.

However, many of the universities and technical institutes to use only Microsoft products. So you end up with these Indian schools generating many thousands of graduates each year who only know VB.NET, SQL Server and IIS. You ask them what Linux or Apache are, and you'll get blank stares. Some will even describe them as "lower quality" products, even though we've seen time after time that they're superior in essentially every way.

So in the end, this ignorance has resulted in Windows and other Microsoft software becoming very prevalent within the Indian enterprise. From those I know who work over there, that number might actually be somewhat lower. Many organizations, as stupid as it is, go with 100% Microsoft solutions. And when worms and other nasties come their way, they usually have to deal with thousands upon thousands of fucked up systems, ranging from servers to desktop PCs.

Re:Where does that leave the standardization proce

[jkrise]

isn't it that in order for a file format to be accepted as an ISO standard there has to be at least a couple of independent working implementations?

Actually I thought so too myself, but apparently this is forbidden by the ISO! However the spec itself must be complete, self-contained and authoritative... this bit I am quoting from a related link from a Groklaw article, in the comments section of Mr. Alex Brown's blog:
http://www.adjb.net/comments.php?y=07&m=09&entry=entry070909-104641
and the Groklaw article is here:
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20070910110639612

The relevant answer:

ISO rules forbid reference implementations. The thinking is that the text must itself by complete, self-contained, and authoritative; a reference implementation opens the possibility of deviation from the text, thereby creating uncertainty about which is "right".

That said, in SC34, we follow the practice of informally requiring that our "home-grown" standards (RELAX NG, NVDL, Schematron etc) are proved efficiently implementable during standardisation. If my time wasn't so taken up with DIS 29500 I would be working on an implementation of DTLL in Java to accompany the draft standard, for example!

Re:Where does that leave the standardization proce

[marcosdumay]

Requiring implementations is different from requiring "reference implementations". Since their network standard, ISO changed its procedures to encourage people to ask for functional implementations (from different vendors) of the standards they create.

But a reference implementation is "do it like Office 2007". ISO doesn't accept that, the specification should be on a document, not a software.

Re:Where does that leave the standardization proce

[legirons]

"Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't it that in order for a file format to be accepted as an ISO standard there has to be at least a couple of independent working implementations?"

It's RFCs and Internet Standards which need to have multiple implementations. See RFC 2026 for the meta-standard (explanation of what standards an RFC needs to meet)

Internet standards are also required have been tested in real-world scenarios for long periods, plus they should be as simple as possible to implement, plus all discussion needs to be in public, which might explain their popularity compared to ISO computing standards.

Interestingly, if there's a patent needed in an RFC, then the two reference implmentations even need to have used "separate exercises of the licensing process"

Re:Can't claim Office 2007 is ISO?

[Locutus]

That is correct and the state of Massachusetts has already caved on ODF and allowed MS OOXML as an "acceptable" open standard.

It blows me away how ignorant people are about Microsofts motives after over 15 years of anti-competitive business practices/methods. But then again, someone voted for Bush in 2004 even after no WMD's were found and most of them believed Iraq was tied to the 9/11 attacks... Boy does the US education system suck. IMO.

LoB