RTF Vs. OOXML

Rob Weir has an interesting essay comparing the viciousness of RTF and OOXML: "The [document format standard] concerns of 2004 (or 1995 even) are very similar to the concerns of 2007... 'RTF is defined as whatever Word saves when you ask it to save as RTF.' This should sound familiar. OOXML is nothing more than the preferences of Microsoft Office. Whenever Word changes, OOXML will change. And if you are a user or competitor of Word, you will be the last one to hear about these changes. The coding of Office 14 a.k.a. Office 2009 is well underway. Beta releases are expected in early 2008. But are file format changes needed to accommodate the new features being discussed in Ecma? No. Are they being discussed in ISO? No. Are they being discussed anywhere publicly? No. By owning the 'standard' and developing it in secret, in an Ecma rubber-stamp process, Microsoft rigs the system so they can author an ISO standard with which they are effortlessly compatible, while at the same time ensuring that their products maintain an insurmountable head start in implementing these same standards. Is this how an open standard is developed?"

Comments

well, not effortlessly

[yagu]

Up front disclaimer: This article has a tangible odor of troll, so don't blame me and the other posters for responding in kind (flamebait, troll, offtopic, etc.)

FTS:

By owning the 'standard' and developing it in secret, in an Ecma rubber-stamp process, Microsoft rigs the system so they can author an ISO standard with which they are effortlessly compatible

I wouldn't say this is entirely true (effortless) on Microsoft's part. Any user of any Microsoft product is well aware of how difficult it is to work in and out of various new vs. old formats. Yes, even Microsoft has a difficult time being compatible and interoperable with Microsoft (actually, I seem to have better luck overall with interoperability using OpenOffice...).

And, also FTS:

Is this how an open standard is developed?

Actually no, usually Microsoft takes an existing open standard (e.g., sockets), implements it poorly (winsock), and puts it everywhere (95,98, NT, XP, etc.) forcing the technical community to re-adopt the standard in Microsoft's cast.

Re:well, not effortlessly

[Corporate Troll]

Any user of any Microsoft product is well aware of how difficult it is to work in and out of various new vs. old formats.

You'd think that, wouldn't you? Actually, my experience is that users are blissfully ignorant about document incompatibilities caused by any software (not particular to Microsoft). Today, I received an email from a friend of mine asking how she could open a .rm file on her Apple. I was more surprised that some people still use that format. However, it was required listening (viewing?) for one of her courses.

In this case I fault the professor of that course, but how many times do you get people that say it's your fault when you can't open a document they said. After all, it works on their machines.

Re:well, not effortlessly

[kebes]

By owning the 'standard' and developing it in secret, in an Ecma rubber-stamp process, Microsoft rigs the system so they can author an ISO standard with which they are effortlessly compatible

I wouldn't say this is entirely true (effortless) on Microsoft's part. Any user of any Microsoft product is well aware of how difficult it is to work in and out of various new vs. old formats I think the "accusation" of it being effortless for Microsoft was not in relation to backwards-compatibility, but rather that Microsoft's new products are effortlessly compatible with Microsoft's new standards, for the simple reason that they become the definition of the standard.

If, for instance, Office 2009 has several bugs with respect to how it renders OOXML, then these bugs will actually become part of the de facto OOXML standard. Anyone who wants to implement the "standard" will have to reproduce those bugs in order to appear to be "the same as MS Office." This is the same problem the Wine team has when re-implementing the Windows API: they actually have to deviate from the established API documentation and reproduce Windows bugs since Windows applications rely on these bugs.

If you let a "standard" (like OOXML) be tied to a specific implementation of the standard, then anyone who wants to re-implement the standard must make the tough choice between being true to the letter of the standard (as written) or the de facto standard as embodied in the dominant implementation. We saw with IE's buggy implementation of HTML the problems this can cause, and are only now pulling ourselves out of that particular mess.

The problem is that Microsoft can alter the OOXML "standard" to their heart's content simply by changing the way MS Office works in future versions. Documented or not, those changes will effortlessly become "the new standard" by virtue of their dominant market position.

Help organize problem reports on OOXML

[Anonymous Coward]

It's definitely important that those who agree that OOXML is not a good standard should help organize a list of problems that can be easily seen by the members of the upcoming ISO OOXML ballot meeting in February 2008 and all the Internet in general.

OpenISO.org, an independent open organization much inspired by slashdot, is planning to include the issue of this post in the problem report document produces in its OpenISO.org Review of OOXML. OpenISO.org is asking for help to organize the comments of your country in a wiki at http://f29500.openiso.org./

Please have a look at all the problem reports at http://f29500.openiso.org/ and help to include more and organize the ones already included, even if only one or two. The more documented and organized the OOXML problems are for discussion in an easy accessible manner, the less likely it will be accepted as a standard.

ps: I'm not associated in any way with openiso.org, it just seems to be the right thing to do.

The article talks about something else!

[bogaboga]

The headline says "RTF vs OOXML" so one would think that the writer is outlining the weaknesses and strengths of the two. But the linked article appears to show how the RTF failed to solve interoperability problems or concerns in its time.

My suggestion: Get a better title for the slashdot piece. How about "OOXML will not work just like RTF failed."

Re:The article talks about something else!

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Not exactly. TFA is saying that RTF was the de facto "format of file exchange" between word processors like Word and Word Perfect; and that if OOXML becomes the new medium of exchange that we have another generation of Microsoft-format-change-whim to look forward to.

National Standards Bodies

[Marcion]

While making a new standards body like OpenISO sounds like a good idea, I don't want to rain on that parade.

However, I think there is also a problem with the national standards bodies. They can vary from a formal technical committees answerable to democratically elected governments according to what their country needs, through to a ragtag bunch of nobodies who can dictate whatever they want according to their specific corporate interests. I think ISO needs to start with itself and standardise how national bodies work.

Also I think that if you are unhappy with the decision your national body made, then you need to either seek to get on it (or make a group that raises funds to get one of you on it), or setup a competing national standards organisation, get to work, and then try to replace the old one as ISO's National standards body for your country.

Reference Apps are nice in the Real World.

[LWATCDR]

I have worked on industry standards before. Writing spec is just half the battle. You then have the problem with implementation. Every company will implement it in slightly different ways. You would be surprised on how many ways there are to read a spec! Then you get in a yelling match over who is actually doing it correctly.
When you have a reference application to test with then you have less yelling.

not just competitors, but users

[fermion]

I wish that MS would come up with some format that was standard, easily implemented, and provided some level of predictability. It would mean that I might start using their office products again. The problem is that every version has radical changes in design, and even similar versions can cause problems. Then then there is the issue of the formats holding active content, so MS then limits what can be done with the files. It is way to limiting. I suppose that if I just wrote memos, or had a spreadsheet I needed to work on everyday, or needed to fool people with a presentation, MS OOXML would be fine. But I need to have reliably get access to stuff a from a couple years ago, work on any machine I happen to find, and put book chapters together. With RTF, ODF and TeX I can always download and install what I need within 10 minutes. I had a case the other day where a file was brought in using the latest format, and the only way to deal with it was to upgrade the license for hundreds of dollars. If OOXML was open, I would at least be able to download something that would allow some level of functionality.

But given the MS of embrace and extend, I must resign myself to a world in which MS products are just too unreliable to use for real work of any significant magnitude. I know that RTF is not sufficient to make the fancy memos people like, but it does seem to work.

Re:It's open once published

[jopsen]

the one in which the vendor publishes what they've done,

This type of document is not a standard it called a documentation. OOXML is not a standard it's a documentation of MS office's default format...
You can also find a documentation of HTML on MSDN, this is not a standard either it's a documentation of the HTML implementation in Internet Explorer.

and the other in which the vendor publishes what they will do

This type of document is usually called a standard. While it's true that ODF started as a documentation of StarOffice XML, it's worth noting that ODF went through a long standardization process and have been changed by many parties. Including Microsoft!

The openness of the process is the key

[DrYak]

To be fair, ODF started out as a documentation of the 'StarOffice XML' format. And it still pretty much is, although changes were made late in the process to further ensure document portability and to improve multilingual support.

But the key point is that the whole process was open.
The ODF standard was designed by an comitee (OASIS), where several of the various office suite maker collaborate.
The procedure has been openly documented and everyone was able to know what was being done.
The standard was available "in advance" of the products, not the other way around. The standard will be followed by the various maker as you said.

The critics made to microsoft in TFA are that Microsoft is designing the standard alone without consulting the concurrence or even letting them know what they are doing.
The next iteration of OOXML is probably going to be made available "afterward" : they're going to first build MSOffice 14 and then publish "What we've done new in MSOffice 2010" or some other king of list of modification they did (notice past tense) to the standart. As you say, it's the product which will define de standard.

Yes, in both case the standard are published.
Yes, in both case they started life as internal representation of specific softwares.

BUT, OOXML is still an internal representation of word, and is best defined as "whatever the next version of word spills when you hit "Save" ", if Office change, OOXML will change with nobody knowing it in advance and being able to take part into the process. Want to make cross-operating software ? Please wait until Microsoft takes their next product to the market and makes it mind about what they'll throw next into it. Too bad that this will introduce delays into your own product.

The "standard" is still a moving target, the only difference with reverse engineering is that nobody needs to decypher cryptic binary data but only read 1700 pages, appart from that it's the same "play catch up".

WHEREAS ODF has been beated into a standard by a body where different vendors/makers could give their opinion and everyone can be informed of potential modification of the standard as it's a public procedure.
Want to take part in the development of the next standard ? You can !
Want to write software compatible with it ? Just stick to what is published in the ISO standard no need to track a single specific vendor and it's proprietary product.

ODF may be a bad standard for some people but it's still an OPEN standard, as in "the procedure of the creation of this standard was open".
OOXML is just a "we let you read the text we print to document what we've thrown in Office 2010" closed standard.

I don't understand why this is so hard for people to understand.

Yup. I agree with you.
Must probably all the noise comming from Microsoft's marketing department "But see, our is a standard too : we publish the specs too !!!"

Re:It's not the standard, stupids

[Divebus]

If you filter the A/C's rant, there's a point of view in there which essentially says "just follow what Microsoft wants you to do". That's fine if you want stagnation of capabilities and to pay through the nose for the privilege.

Example, the Browser War was more than just a browser - it was hijacking the Internet Ecosystem which was supposed to be open and available to all. Microsoft saw open standard browsers and servers, particularly with Java, as a mortal threat to their platform.

To counteract, Microsoft developed IE and IIS to be a client-server relationship instead of a stateless browser as intended. Tools were widely distributed to create web sites for that system which were wholly incompatible with anything else. The goal was for anyone NOT using a complete Microsoft chain of technology to see a blank page on the Internet.

They almost pulled it off. The result was IE gained market dominance and, with the exception of exploits and treachery of completely hijacked computers, no other technical advances in browsers came about for many years. The fly in the ointment was they didn't have server dominance. Had they been able to overcome Apache, you can bet we'd be paying Microsoft for every page view on the Internet.

That's why we shouldn't just do what Microsoft says.