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Counter-Claims On Flaws In OOXML Meeting
ericatcw writes "Critics have charged that last week's ISO Ballot Resolution Meeting (BRM) to decide the fate of changes to Office Open XML standards proposal was too perfunctory and deviated from accepted ISO practices, possibly in an attempt to smooth the passage of the Microsoft format. This week, the ISO 'convener' of the BRM disputed those charges, saying that voting to dispose of 900 changes to the spec at once and allowing 'O' Observer countries to vote were the correct moves. ISO released a statement backing him up. Also, Patrick Durusau, editor of the competing OpenDocument Format specification and a late convert to OOXML's passage, also said that claims the process was flawed were overstated."
This OOXML standardization process was actually flawed from the begining.
It wasn't finished when ECMA submitted it to ISO for standardization (flaw 1). It was submitted as a fast-track process, which is clearly not appropriate, and ISO passed the fast-tracking anyway (flaw 2), the first vote was completely corrupted, with banana republics joining as "P" (as in "participating") members one or two weeks before the vote (flaw 3), even though the first vote raised more than 3,000 issues, they went ahead with the fast-tracking (flaw 4), all of them to be discussed and fixed at a 5 week meeting behind closed doors (flaw 5), where all 1,000 corrections were supposed to be discussed and agreed by consensus, but 900 of them were voted instead (flaw 6).
These are only some of the flaws of the process itself, not to mention the flaws of the text or of the format itself (issues with dates before 1900, unnecessary high complexity, bit-masks instead of XML, using proprietary formats for images [VML, DrawingML] and equations [OOML] instead of SVG and MathML).
I hope at least that sanity will prevail until the end of the month, and that the fast-tracking of this standard will be gloriously dropped!
I also read yesterday that US was advised to vote "yes" by INCITS, despite of what the US delegates and the HoD Frank Farance told about the BRM on the media.
Because the countries raised issues in alphabetic order, and the second round wasn't even completed, US delegates could raise only one issue for discussion. And yet, they recommend that the text is good enough for approval. Unbelievable. As you said, it really smells. Bad.
It wasn't broken until Microsoft specifically set out to break it, but ISO is screwed now doesn't have bylaws which allow it to fix itself. Microsoft has put it's finger on a button which tones the death bell for ISO, everyone is now in full damage control mode to disguise that fact ... but it's all in vain. If you give very small countries with corrupt governments disproportional voting power in international bodies your process will get corrupted. Look at FIFA.
It strikes me that M$ is only utilising the very same model that is used in the USA, where might has right. As an external (to the USA) observer the "corrupt" M$ techniques mirror the USA congress lobbying techniques very closely.
... and the American way.
To quote the [very] old Superman TV series. Truth, Justice
> And, it would give Microsoft
> developers, many of who are members of national bodies,
> an important forum where Microsoft has
> been shown to listen and respond to their concerns.
>
The conciliar tone of this response makes some fundamental errors:
1) The fallacy of lowering the bar: We could ensure that almost everyone has a medical degree by changing the medical degree exams to a potty training exam. Of course, if that were to happen, a medical degree wouldn't be worth the paper it was written on. Similarly, if a poorly documented, incomplete, sparsely reviewed (ODF's review took *years*), heavily manipulated standard proposal, is allowed to pass ISO, how credible would ISO standards be? If Patrick is sincere in wanting OOXML to pass as a proper standard, he'd propose that OOXML be sent back for a complete review.
2) The fallacy of appeasement to encourage reform: If Microsoft is unwilling to have OOXML go through at least as rigorous a review as ODF before standardization, then how on earth can Patrick expect that they'll hang around after standardization. One OOXML is standard, the pressure is off. If he *really* believes Microsoft is serious about standardizing OOXML, then disapproval would do nothing other than allow for OOXML to undergo a *real* review to iron out all the details.
3) The fallacy of "Let's just do this once...Never again, I promise": If you let Microsoft off the hook this time, how on earth can we turn them or any other major company down again?
4) The fallacy of assuming that OOXML is any good. Joel (a key former Microsoft developer) justified why OOXML is so complicated ( http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/02/19.htm l) and why no-one, even Microsoft is able to implement it from scratch (they use code from old versions of Windows). If OOXML is virtually impossible to implement, then what good is it?
5) The fallacy that OOXML solves any real need. There are virtually no OOXML documents out there (even if you include the various OOXML-like formats exported from MS-Office) so the "backwards compatibility" mandate. OOXML presents no other mandate other than getting the ISO stamp so Microsoft can get contracts that require ISO standards. If there's something legitimate missing in ODF, then it should be added to ODF, otherwise OOXML is pointless. And if "backwards compatibility" required, then DOC would make a *much* better thing to standardize for legacy data given that it's been frozen since Office 2000, it's been reverse engineered to death by OpenOffice and many other Office competitors, and most documents out there are (unfortunately) in the DOC format. Why isn't any effort spent on fixing a *real* need as opposed to a fake one?
Being "fair and balanced" is often the most popular position, but if a thief comes into your house and claims all your money, you'd be a fool or a wimp to settle on the "fair and balanced" approach of choose to splitting the difference. If ISO doesn't have the backbone to reject OOXML from fast track so it can be resubmitted for proper review at least as thorough as ODF, then ISO *will* be broken....which is just fine according to Microsoft since when you have no standards you can trust, defacto market standards win.
Durusau, as the co-editor of ISO ODF and OASIS ODF, should be more interested in pushing Microsoft to implement ODF as a native file format. After all, isn't ODF his own child?
He doesn't realise (or does he?) that if OOXML is standardized, ODF will never be picked up by Microsoft, and all other competitors will be forced to implement OOXML, which will (once again) make Microsoft's format the de facto standard. Just look at how bad it was for everybody to try to follow binary formats as Microsoft changed them once and again.
What father would see a bully beating his child, and praise the bully for "at least listening", even though all is ignored?
Mod parent funny!!! ROTFL!!!
Only in software is this even considered. You don't hear about how Toyota or GM should be forced to accept Daewoo or Suzuki parts in their cars for "interoperability" purposes.Terrible car analogy. If you've had a Toyota for 5 years, which is getting old and requiring high maintenance, and you want to buy a new car, will you just have to buy a new Toyota? No! You may choose any car you want. Maybe you won't be able to use the radio you bought for the old car on the new brand, and you'll have to relearn how to turn the A/C on on the new brand, but these are far from showstoppers.
Microsoft has done everything to lock in customers to their products. They've used their embrace, extend, extinguish tactics to drive competitors off the market. And then they've bastardized standards and created proprietary formats to raise the cost of the change. So, the next time you buy a computer, if you use products other than Microsoft's, you'll have problems to open your old documents.
"Hi, our product is super successful and makes tons of money. So obviously the right thing to do now is to spend lots of resources making our competitors's product better!" Crazy, just crazy.Following standards is in no way using resources to improve the competitor's product! And nobody is saying that Microsoft should improve on Open Office or any other product. The only point in following standards is that, if you want to choose a different product, you'll still be able to access all your documents.
Standards are good because they force products to improve. With standards, customers can choose another product if they don't like or don't want to pay for the newer version of your product. This forces companies to improve their own products, to lower prices, and to compete fairly in a free market. With vendor lock-in, all those benefits are lost, and the only one who gains from it is the monopolist.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll There was a little sarcasm and a little criticism in the parent's post, but I fail to see what makes it a troll comment.
The car analogy is used far too often on Slashdot. I first saw it when it was talking about needing a specific car to drive on specific roads back when it was a Mac-PC debate. Let's look at this more closely.
The car analogy cannot be used here, and this is why. You use MSO products to create works. The issue with interoperability is that, like with everything, you keep moving to later versions of software (later models of cars, newer fridges, comfier chairs, whatever). Under the non-interoperable model, you are unable to view the work you created without their software, which has an associated cost. That's lock-in.
There is no analogy because in traditional times when you created a work (artistic, literary, whatever) you wouldn't have any trouble viewing or modifying it, because it was on paper. By the nature of computers, everything is encoded (which is for most parallel to encrypted) and you need MSO to decode it. This is not true of most things - we have open standards for plain text (ASCII, UTF), images (JPEG, PNG, EPS, SVG), print layouts (PS, PDF), formatted text (RTF), audio (PCM, MP3, Vorbis), video (MPEG) and data generally (XML, [TC]SV).
The issue here is that if you want to preserve your work done in MSO products you must use a lossy format (RTF, ASCII) or use a Microsoft product. By the nature of how people use computers, keeping Word 6 isn't really an excuse either. That's a different argument about monopolies though; perhaps the fact that everyone is using the latest word is more about good marketing than anything else (e.g. the It's Not Cheating program).
The bigger problem is that Microsoft is trying to create a new standard (OOXML) that has exactly the same function as an existing one (ODF). And through the same organisation (ISO). Now while we all love having lots of standards to choose from, in reality this is A Bad Thing for people trying to send data to each other. While it's nice that Microsoft is letting others use their format, it would be nicer if they used the existing standard that offers the same functionality. Combine that with patent issues and you see why people complain about OOXML.
"But everyone should know everything." -markab
The ISO just does not understand that once you are under the microscope, defending your poor choices and covering up just causes loss of face and trust.
No one is buying the spin!
If they had reacted properly to the stacking of votes in the first place, they would have gained credibility. Now it looks like they are just pupets that can be bought by big multinationals.
I used to respect them, but now I know the good work that has come through them is because of the member countries being diligent, not from any intrisic goodness of the ISO.
Circumcision is child abuse.
I was involved with the C committee during the work on C9X.
The process described here shows essentially no similarity to a real standardization process. We have established, conclusively, that OOXML is not ready to be called a standard; it needs serious revision and work. The only time a "fast-track" process makes sense is when a standard is widely implemented and in use as a de facto standard, and is known to be workable.
It does not make sense when the "standard" is known not to be workable, has been implemented at most once, and there are literally thousands of unresolved comments, questions, or concerns -- many of them, as reported previously, impossible to resolve without the addition of huge chunks of new text to the specification.
It took years to get the C standard, about a tenth the size of OOXML, to a state where we could in good conscience vote to adopt it as an actual standard.
This process is an insult to standardization, and that the Microsoft-paid folks are talking about it as though it were a success leaves me utterly stunned. I can't decide whether to ascribe such claims to malice, incompetence, or both.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
You are wrong. I've been reading both sides of the story from the start, both pro-ODF (Rob Weir, Updegrove, Sutor, Groklaw, and OOXML [which is indeed quite extremist]) and Microsoft's side as well (Brian Jones, Jason Matusow, and the [sarcasm]"independent"[/sarcasm] consultants Rick Jelliffe, Miguel de Icaza and Patrick Durusau, which have clearly been biased from the start). From viewing what both sides have to say, I can filter out what seems to be exagerated or even a lie, and I can say that I have firm basis for my opinions.
I agree that my bias would be against Microsoft from the start, but that is not unbased either. That is based on a history of Microsoft abusing their monopoly. It's undeniable, EU fined them for US$ 1.3 billion last month for it. I still resent having to use the lower-quality Internet Explorer because Microsoft clearly used their embrace, extend, extinguish tactics to drive Netscape out of the market. That said, even without my predisposition against Microsoft, the facts on this case are very clear to indicate foul play from them.
Some of the arguments from the ODF side seem to be a little over to me. For instance, the argument that Microsoft's promise not to sue is not enough, I never bought that. Microsoft would never try to suit anyone for interoperability, specially with the EU over them as much as they are. Another point was the importance given to the outcome of the votes on the BRM, and to the fact that O members could vote. I think that's not really that important, even if the outcome of the votes was different, the text would be no better or no worse, I don't think the quality of the text is the problem to start with. The standard is unnecessary from the start, and it shouldn't have gotten so far to start with. The only problem in that case was the decision to use a ballot instead of discussing and reaching consensus for every resolution, which was, of course, impossible. That should, in turn, trigger the alarm that fast track was not an appropriate choice, and that should have stopped the process then.
On the other side, most of the arguments from the Microsoft side are pure marketing. "OOXML is a superb standard" and "Everyone was heard" make me laugh particularly hard. The arguments for the need of OOXML are completely flawed, and Microsoft's speech on their openness and will for interoperability are only the new version of the vendor lock-in on times when the EU is watching them closely. It's the less worse they can do for their business to assure other products will have a fidelity level below theirs when they're forced to interoperate, if you have to disclose, you make sure you disclose something so huge, so complex, so tied to other proprietary technologies, that nobody will be able to implement it, at least not before you extend to implementation on the next version and push it for fast tracking after the product is out, making sure your competitors are always busy catching up, and always one step behind.
Anyway, if you want to read the most balanced opinion on OOXML you should read what Tim Bray has to say.