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India Votes Against OOXML
harsha_c sends in a local Indian perspective on the vote against Microsoft's OOXML ahead of the March 29 deadline. Of 19 companies participating, only 5 voted in favor of OOXML. "It was the ultimate battle for control over global IT standard for documents — between Microsoft-promoted OOXML and Sun and IBM-backed Open Document Format. It was played out between Indian IT giants, namely Infosys, Wipro, TCS supported by Nasscom on one side and the global IT biggies like IBM, Sun Microsystems, Red Hat backed by te IITs, IIMs and IISc on the other, on their respective positions on Microsoft's OOXML standard. Microsoft understandably expressed its disspointment. 'While we are disappointed with the decision of the BIS committee, we are encouraged by the support from NASSCOM.'
While voting for OOXML does not automatically make one dishonest, I think it is fair to say that voting against is a sign of honesty.
Please don't click it.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
In fact facilitating technical progress requires that the "no contradicting standards" rule cannot be strictly enforced.
In this situation however there is a serious problem. Because of Microsoft's dominant market position, if OOXML gets ISO/IEC approval, that will probably kill ODF. The problem with this is that this kills investments in ODF. If Microsoft is allowed to get away with this, the net result will be a chilling effect on all investments in non-Microsoft standards.
OOXML sucks technically, but that's not even the real problem. The real problem is Microsoft's waffling on making the standard open. If they had unequivocally placed the standard and all necessary patents in the public domain and committed to keeping it stable, more people might vote for it.
Althouth I really like Windows and the proprietary software, I think that we all have to accept the crushing truth.
In these times it really doesn't matter if is launched Windows Vista Premium or Windows Vista Home, because while both variants (and other less populars like the fucking Windows Vista Starter Edition) require hardware that cost fortunes, Linux and others free OSs were maintained with modest hardware, letting us get benefit even with really old PCs. Windows Vista is incompatible,costlier, and most importantly slower.
The reality is that Windows Vista has litter to offer to the average user.The same user surprised with how his recent installed Windows Vista is running slow in his PC where Windows XP worked very well. Also he'll support the frustration when he is notified by force that many of the software that he used to work is now incompatible with this version. Microsoft did it again: I (Try to) sell us the same mediocre product over and over again.
Then what is suggested to this poor user is that he need to buy a least 1GB RAM or throw his PC away and get a new one. How many users returned to XP after that? How many decided to try Linux? A lot more than we think, I would risk to say.
Explain him why he won't be able to watch videos becuase of the absurd DRM that is incorporated in this version. Also explain him that in his Starter Edition (bundled in his new PC that he bought at Wall Mart) he can't launch more than three applications, or that the max resolution is 800x600, among many others limitations completly artificials. A shit.
While Microsoft was boasting with the new interface and the visual effects of this version, Linux was incorporating windows managers like Beryl (now Compiz Fusion) and Compiz, that without a doubt make Vista (and even MacOsX) look like crap.
The proof of the Windows Vista failure is seen when computers makers like Dell or HP reintroduce Windows XP or preinstall Linux. Or the contless corporations that get PCs with Vista and the first thing they do is install a stable OS. It's a just matter of time before Linux or the BSDs are offer like a usual alternative in any country.
Keep defending Vista. Keep defending a OS that is offered like "new and improved" and the new features are the exaggerated system requirements that are needed in order to run decently. Keep trying to sell us a product that have practitly nothing new and can't give us development tools for itself (While any Linux distribution or BSD comes with plenty of software) , but worst of all, it's incompatible with many actual software/hardware . Keep trying to make us believe that the DRM is a normal thing, trying to implant a industry that is now obsolete.
And you? Where will they let you go today?
Thanks for you attention.
While I applaud the moves in recent times to give us standards within the field of office documents that we can all work with, it doesn't solve the fundamental problems. Chasing after Microsoft, trying to get ISO committees to reject OOXML and trying to get governments to mandate proper standards (a worthy goal, as IT has so very few) is, unfortunately, a saga destined to never end. The reason for this is that Microsoft has the dominant office suite in the world today held in place by the platform they control (Windows), they can mandate any formats they like and they can keep going back to the ISO to get a puppet standard through.
If IBM and others are as serious as people like Rob Weir seem to be then I strongly suggest they stop being chicken shits after the way in which they capitulated OS/2 in the face of Windows, start funding a really viable alternative to Windows and start really getting just what is required. This would be a desktop operating system that would circumvent the OEM channels Microsoft controls by being given away freely so that everybody, including OEMs, can install it free of Microsoft's control, and it will be a desktop good enough in terms of developers' tools and installation so software can get to users. With enough effort then you'd definitely carve out a market large enough to make it viable, and you'd then have an office suite with enough of an installed base. Governments and other organisations would then pick it up as a result.
Winging about OOXML isn't going to get anybody anywhere, sadly. It's only maintaining the status quo.
Either they are dishonest because they don't understand what they're doing while claiming to understand, or they're dishonest because they're knowingly voting against their country's best interest.
Nota bene, the representatives of Microsoft Corporation and partner companies are not necessarily dishonest in their lobbying for "APPROVE" votes, since what they ask for is genuinely in their interest. But the national bodies are supposed to represent the correspondiong national interest!
While Mr Gates may be starting to feel that he's loosing it,this really means good news for India. In a country where more than 70% of the people use pirated software,ignorant of any software licenses. As an Indian,i've seen that when people buy a computer,they just pay for the hardware. It probably is too obvious for them that software (pirated windows) should come free with it! Here only Open Source can ensure that people get it right. Rejecting OOXML is of course a big step for starters. ODF FTW :)
It's a bite that MS can always come late to the table with something broken and then get equal billing in the press. MOOX came as an attempt to compete with ODF, after some 600 companies reviewed ODF as an open standard. How is it then, that no matter how positive the articles is to open standards, the situation always gets spun as MS vs MS competitors? Really, how else can it be? One the one side you have the cult of MS. On the other side, all the major companies, governments and universities, except for the cult of MS. So by definition these are going to be 'MS competitors'. How about some reality injections here.
OOXML can't kill ODF, because ODF is open, and OOXML isnt. People who want to guarantee access to their documents in perpetuity (eg legitimate governments) cannot use OOXML because it cannot meet their needs.
Microsoft is working hard on making OOXML as open as it needs to be in order to meet the requirements of the relevant decision-makers. Of course, whether that is open enough to allow genuine free software implementations is not a question that Microsoft really cares about, so we have to educate the decision-makers about what are the important criteria.
But if you think that ODF can survive in competition against OOXML if both are ISO standards, you're kidding yourself.
Completely agreed. Voting for what is genuinely in the public interest doesn't imply honesty. In fact, most of the arguments which are being made against MS-OOXML are based on misinformed, false premises or are otherwise dishonest. (The same can be said about most of the arguments in favor of MS-OOXML).
...that fight between Darth Vader and Obi-Wan Kenobi? Bah, look who I'm asking! This feels like a slow-motion fight for the soul of computer development and standard's future. I hope the forces of good (with whom India has aligned themselves) do better than Ol' Ben.
While I'm as much opposed as you are to "approval as an ISO/iEC standard" of the mess which OOXML currently is, to my knowledge the above criticism is not valid anymore. What specifically is in your opinion "not properly documented"?
First you say "I don't think it means a thing for honesty", then you say "it might mean there is less corporate corruption going on". That is a contradiction, dude. If you said it in fewer words, it would be called an "oxymoron".
Then, you say "OOXML really makes no difference", and continue on to say "except for... not having... an overpriced, closed vendor...".
Ditto. You start each sentence one way, then contradict yourself later in the same sentence. Sorry, but you can't have it both ways.
Yes, AND??? All you are doing is justifying my original statement. Being unwilling to succumb to corporate corruption and coercion is one definition of "honesty".
Your argument does not support your subject line. And in fact, the argument is incorrect. "Most" of the arguments being made against OOXML are based on these two facts: (1) There are hundreds of technical problems with OOXML (literally hundreds... read the articles) that were found by those who studied it, and which Microsoft has refused to address, and (2) the fact that it does not conform to the often-stated needs of a truly "open" standard.
This is not something I made up. All you have to do is read the articles linked to from here, and perhaps Ars Technica. Other places too, but that should be enough to convince anyone.
India voting against OOXML is not news, they already voted against it in September.
The only news here is (possibly) the insight the article gives as to why and how India has been and will be voting against OOXML, therefore the "India Votes Against OOXML" title is really stupid.
Recently I accidentally went to a short promotional Microsoft presentation (non-US) about OOXML for work. From the description about integrating with Office from a programmers' perspective, I'd thought it was going to be about writing Office addins, but it turned out to be a promotional-fest for OOXML in front of about 30 or so local software architechts for various companies and government organisations.
They started with a couple of locals without explaining what was coming -- one guy had built a Silverlight application that could parse basic OOXML Word documents and display them according to the OOXML specification. The other guy had written a web app that generated its own Office 2007 documents (Word and Excel) without having to rely on any third party or binary manipulation.
Then the local Microsoft CIO jumped up, having recently returned from Geneva, and started complaining about how there were really a small segment of people who had gripes with Microsoft and were refusing to work with Microsoft and trying to stop the standard going through for its own sake. They made a big thing about how the two people who'd just presented hadn't needed to read a complete 6000 page specification to do what they'd done, and he used the phrase "defacto standard" in virtually every sentence. They were preaching to the converted on this occasion, considering the room was full of people who were already big Microsoft customers, and really only wanted reassurance rather than to be convinced. I was tempted to ask if Microsoft ever had any plans to support the OASIS standard, but I didn't in the end.
I came away from that presentation with the impression that Microsoft as a company, and especially at the executive level, doesn't actually have a clear understanding of what an Open Standard is. The entire focus of Microsoft is that their Office suite is by far the most popular (for whatever reason), and therefore Microsoft should be the one to decide the standard. If someone else did that while Microsoft was looking the other way, then it must have been an accidental quirk that now needs to be corrected.
Perhaps there's some idea somewhere up in the ranks of leveraging their broken format in the future to reinforce their market dominance should there ever be a problem, but I think for most of them, they're just a bit pissed off or shocked that someone else has already defined a standard and is now trying to tell Microsoft that it can't do what it wants to do. After all, it's not "supposed" to work that way in their minds... Surely the "defacto standard" that's used everywhere should be the one that matters, right?
In their own minds, most of the Microsoft managers are quite certain that Microsoft would never abuse its position, or their already fundamentally of the belief that it's only fair that money should always change hands for these kinds of things, and that if Open Source apps can't find sources of funding then it's their own problem. (Money makes Microsoft go round, after all. It shouldn't be surprising for Microsoft employees to have those kinds of ethics.)
The frustrating addendum to this is that many businesses are in exactly the same mindset as Microsoft because money makes their business go around, too. If Microsoft starts using badly documented parts of their spec and charging for others to implement it, those people will quite happily either keep using Microsoft products, or pay for a product that costs extra as part of the necessity of paying the Microsoft tax. These people haven't even consciously dealt with concepts like standards definitions before, they don't appreciate how critically important it is to get it right, and they don't want to now. That's where Microsoft is getting its support from.
India, IBM, and every one at the fight against OOXML expect to break down the dominance of Microsoft at the desktop.
IBM, Google, and many others have a vision on a ubiquity desktop, even Microsoft have this. But due the dominance of the desktop. This isn't able because the locking of the server and desktop for the collaboration and the portability to slimmed down applications. This doesn't work for IBM, Google and many others, so they're aligning to put ODF as an standard, because is a warrant for a better opportunity to get a stake at the desktop, first the corporative desktop, then the desktop @ home, so since ur application will be "service provided" u don't need to install anything and further more with the wireless technology, called wimax, 3g and or whatever flavor u like, u will have the bandwidth to use ur document or data everywhere.
As long as we are tied down the desktop, using doc documents. That will not happen.
Another virtue of XML, is that u doesn't need to understand all the tags of a XML file, only what you really care, and just don't touch everything else, this kind of virtue, plus wireless, plus low cost mobile devices (not talking about treos, ipaq, and so on, talking about under 100 usd regular cellphone), and you have the ultimate production platform for ur task force.
The future is now, and Microsoft is holding us down, also the ISPs....
out there there is a big variety of interesting hardware, that can be used for situation where u don't need to parse all the xml, and doesn't need to handle bloated binary files...
That is the real fight, thinking about India as good because vote against OOXML is naive, this is a battle for a stake of that BIG, BIG, BIG cake called the desktops computer. And since, India has a vast amount of capacity to create applications, they are tied to develop "big" applications mostly due Microsoft position at the market. Make the market able to shift away from Microsoft, and a hole new world of revenue is opened... Look at the server market with Linux. Ask Redhat and Suse and Xandros and many Linux vendors...
That's is all about. Sure, one part is about freedom to access your information. But really thats a small part compared to the monetary interest behind the "war of formats"...
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And can someone please mod this guy down? -1 Redundant doesn't exactly express the nature of his comment.
Welcome to the land of the free...pay toll ahead...no photography...please open your bag...
that most probabably thousand of Indians authored (directly or indirectly) the OOXML spec...
In their own minds, most of the Microsoft managers are quite certain that Microsoft would never abuse its position,
I think you're right: ridiculous as it is, many Microsoft managers really think they are winning in the market through quality and innovation.
These people haven't even consciously dealt with concepts like standards definitions before, they don't appreciate how critically important it is to get it right, and they don't want to now.
But these people presumably also want various office suite related tools from third party vendors, which are hard to create on the basis of OOXML.
In any case, in the end, I think OOXML vs ODF doesn't even matter that much anymore. Give it another few years, and all that stuff will be web-based.
No. He's correct: My Anti-virus found this upon loading: VBS:Malware-gen
I tried to, but Slashdot infomed me that I can't downmod a post already at -1. So that post will remain Redundant unless someone mods it up. Which I don't really recommend.
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
Modding something down as "flamebait" when all it is doing is politely pointing out where others are incorrect is simply wrong. Somebody had done that twice just today. I don't have the power to stop you, dear moderator, but you are making yourself look ignorant.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080302-xml-spec-editor-ooxml-iso-process-is-unadulterated-bs.html
Ok, here's whats going to happen.
ODF is going to become the "accepted" standard, and MS will promptly ignore it. Then, a bunch of MS-wannabees are going to release various flavors of Open Office, everyone is going to realize the applications really suck ball, and the ODF standard will languish in death for a few years, before finally being declaired a failure.
At that point, the FOSSie/Shitslot community will whine about how MS "torpedoed" ODF, rather than wonder why MS doesn't want to use a standard created by a bunch of MS-haters trying to dictate to MS how Office should work.
Moral of the story? Standards only matter when MS uses them, and there's no reason for them to use ODF. Customers aren't screaming for it, that's for sure. And if customers don't want it, MS doesn't worry about it.
While I agree that web will matter more and more, I disagree that format won't be important. It will be and it will have more importance in archival means, not document exchange. So in fact it is where ODF comes out perfectly, because it maybe don't have equal apps like Microsoft Office, but it is more open and on much clearer grounds than OOXML.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Unknown tags only work if the XML is correctly structured (namespaces used correctly, tags nested correctly, no modal tags). MSOOXML is not properly structured XML.
Missing tags only work if the XML is consistent (I.e. only one name for a feature). MSOOXML doesn't.
When MS use binary blobs to hold formatting information, it isn't a display option to forget about the non-XML sections.
From the perspective of document format users, OOXML is better than what MS customers had before.
How do you figure that? Anyone implementing OOXML readers or writers still has to reverse-engineer Microsoft's applications. It doesn't make a lot of difference whether the undocumented proprietary code looks like "xmlns..." instead of "{\rtf..." or binary gibberish.
Can someone with a better knowledge of XML can explain to me (I'm an infrastructure guy) why the OOXML 'standard' is 6000 pages? Surely a DTD defining a document format should be relatively simple - Doc Title goes here, body text here, format info here, etc.
I thought the whole point of XML is that it's effectively self documenting - simply publishing the XML DTD should suffice. I can't see how this should be more than 10's of pages. Am I being too simplistic?
Somehow, that got modded "funny"...
Annoyed to find anything I've written marked as Troll. Grrr.
I call bullshit on the parent that suggests that Noooxml is a virus page. That should never have been modded up: it's an attempt to stop people finding out about what has been happening, and I'm prepared to waste karma pointing that out.
Evidence against noooxml:
Some random person says that it's a virus but doesn't provide any proof.
Evidence for nooxml being valid:
- It's linked from the front page of Groklaw - www.grokla.net. Currently item 2 in the right hand column. "Belgium also stuffed with Microsoft business partners?"
- It's linked to from Bob Sutors blog 6 times. Bob is IBM VP for Open Source and Standards, and isn't positive about OOXML.
- It's been supported by the FFII and the Shuttleworth foundation (i.e. Mr Ubuntu) amongst others.
- It has a proper contacts page and gives telephone numbers.
"NoOOXML.org was started by Benjamin Henrion in January 2007 to campaign against Microsoft's push for ISO standardization of their captive document formats. This campaign was part of a global project by the FFII's open standards workgroup that reached standards campaigners in over eighty countries. We thank all those who signed the petition. We gratefully acknowledge the contributions of many, many people including the FFII open standards workgroup, which has worked on the issue of open document formats for many years, coordinators in many countries who helped communicate the issue to national boards and local standards experts, and standards groups and activists globally, who helped build NoOOXML.org into a global success. We thanks those who helped us eat and pay the rent while we did this campaign. NoOOXML.org was mainly funded by ESOMA, with support from the FFII, Shuttleworth Foundation, the Open Society Institute, OpenForum Europe, FTISA, and iMatix Corporation. We thank Microsoft too, who gave us such amusement with their capers that we were obliged to give them the FFII Kayak Award. But open standards are serious business, and the NoOOXML.org campaign has proven that the Community takes this business very seriously.
* Benjamin Henrion +32-484-566109 (French/English)
* Andre Rebentisch +49 4421 301122 (German)
* Pieter Hintjens +32 475 235 984 (English/Dutch/French)
* Alberto Barrionuevo (Spanish)"
Now, moderators, do you seriously think that it's a virus page, and that this is a troll? Or do you think that the parent one-liner without any proof is crap? Mod the original link up. Mod the troll who is trying to stop people finding out about the behaviour of Microsoft down. And mod my original up.
Yeah, but whoever owns the web apps is going to set the interchange standards, and it ain't Microsoft.
IT services companies fell coz of their big alliances with Microsoft, which generates service revenues for them. MS recommends these companies as their preferred vendors and they get their pie. No wonder NASSCOMM, an association of these companies, sings the MS tune. Anyway, I am happy that better sense prevailed in the academia, which refused to bow down. The IITs, IISC etc. get millions in grant from the Indian govt and are autonomous. Hence, MS's money might not be very appealing to them. All said, it could be a strategic positioning and marketing failure from Microsoft. The big company doesn't seem to be relenting though. Think we will see more flying chairs in Redmond.
> But what would you suggest that should be done with this information?
... ... endParagraph
... endParagraph
Remove obscure rendering instructions from the standard. Have the vendor saving the document decide to set 'autoSpaceRule="ExplicitRule"' and 'lineBreak="ExplicitRule"'.
If "autoSpaceLikeWord95" and "useWord97LineBreakRules" rendering requires making paragraph level or even word level changes to autospacing and line breaks, then apply the attributes to the affeceted paragraphs. In other words, instead of 'useWord97LineBreakRules="true"', you'd have:
beginDocument lineBreak="BeforeParagraph"
beginParagraph lineBreak="AfterParagraph"
beginParagraph lineBreak="BeforeParagraph"
endDocument
Which is exactly what vendors with native formats OTHER THAN WORD will do when saving their document formats. Make MS play by the same rule. Using autoSpaceLikeWord95 and useWord97LineBreakRules just lets Microsoft cheap out on document conversion, allowing their Word processor to provide faster translation to and from their own native document format.
...is to have just *one* standard that all applications can use to interoperate.
If the point of the standard was to provide interoperability with a single application that is expected to dominate the marketplace, as Office 2007 would be, the standard should have been published, vetted and approved long ago.
It's too late now. We have one standard, ODF, and I plan on using it. MS should just suck it up, get over it (their loss) and adopt the ODF standard without their usual embrace, extend, extinguish plans.
That's enough for me.
So I agree with you that OOXML doesn't do what proponents say it will do. I just disagree with the premise for the standard in the first place.
The diversity and expression of human opinion is essential to human survival.
They have some interesting information about the defects of the OOXML proposed standard (as well as a good sense of the big picture between (OOXML/ODF). You can find them here:
http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=20051216153153504
Enjoy.
The diversity and expression of human opinion is essential to human survival.
Voting against a foreign vendor used to have another name - protectionism. Voting against the standard diminishes the vendor's power in your country. You can bet that if an Indian company was pushing a domesticaly grown standard the tables would be turned.
Now I'm not making a judgment on the desire to diminish a foreign vendor's power in your nation, but let's not call it a blow for freedom and especially not free markets. If this was free market choice, the USER would choose what products made sense for them.
The one point that MS simply DOES NOT GET is that we only need ONE, just ONE standard. The standard for office type documents has already been vetted and produced. And it's being implemented by more than 40 different applications, supported by 600 entities including governments around the world.
MS could have participated in the creation of that format, but they chose not to.
The ONLY reason MS ever woke up to the issue of document formats is because the State of Massachusetts decided to publish requirements for applications that are used by their government to use open standards for document production going forward. Had that never happened, anywhere, MS would have carried on, blissfully unaware of *competition* through government standards. Why? Because they thought they had that already wrapped up with politicians firmly in pocket.
I'm glad to hear that India voted "NO" to the OOXML. They have more than a billion people behind that position. More power to you, India!
The diversity and expression of human opinion is essential to human survival.
it does me good to see the Microsoft juggernaut take one on the chin, now for round 2!
prepare the survey weasels.
They REALLY need to fix that Slashcode bug to fix the re-parenting of replies to comments modded -1. Right now, it looks like the parent of THIS post is the one someone is referring to as a "virus link" when it's actually some goatse post at -1.
Parent is NOT a virus, BTW. It's actually a map of which countries voted what on OOXML.
Hope springs eternal.
They forget rtf.
Or they think that Microsoft really means it this time because they are making promises. (Not realizing what drives those promises, and not considering how empty those promises will turn out to be once the competition is out of the way, because ODF hasn't really registered in their minds yet. They don't know why they need to read between the lines.)
Shoot, many of them are still under the impression that only Microsoft has what it takes to make a document format.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
Hey, did you realize, we're actually holding the real BRMs here!
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
You know stevie is not programmed for that.
Bill might be able to stand it now, it's hard to tell.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
Google apps, for starters.
Open Office has some functionality issues, but most users don't notice. It's a free install, only takes some time. When your manager hands you a CD and says, here you go, install this at home, it's already licensed even if you quit, most users will get around to installing it.
The real kicker is when we start seeing application specific document software built using ODF. ODF still has too much formatting information in it, but it can be used in a semantic sense.
Microsoft has never cared in the slightest for meaning, and their software shows it. (Well, they do care about meaning in one context, their perverted version of how an office should be run.) For Microsoft, meaning is always in the format. Microsoft simply cannot grok tags.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
Huh?
Are you serious?
In this particular case, voting in the public interest, as opposed to a specific vendor's interest, is the honest thing to do. The standard is a public standard.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
Get it?
Microsoft can wave their arms and scream loudly, "We'll fix it! WE'LL FIX IT!!!!!!"
"JUST VOTE FOR IT NOW AND WE'LL FIX IT!!!!!"
Yes, they can do that all they want. But if they really meant it, they would have seen the thousands of problems that there is no time to deal with now and said, "Oh.!" and withdrawn the thing, taken it back home, stripped it down, made a real standard out of it, and submitted it to a _normal_ process.
If I were trying to build such a standard all by myself, I might need the political clout of standardization to fund the process of getting it right. (And fat chance of actually getting access to a fast-track process for any of the standards I would like to present to the world.)
Microsoft has lots of money, lots of engineers, lots of time. The only possible reason for fast-tracking this is to shore up their monopoly in the face of ODF. Therefore, all the thousands of technical problems which have not even been considered, as compared to the hundreds that did get some sort of attention, are evidence of Microsoft's refusal to address the issues before the vote.
And, yes, they have to address the issues before the vote. No weasel-worded promises.
If they really mean to fix the rest of the problems, they must at bare minimum present the ISO with an iron-clad covenant to not only fix them in a timely manner, but to make the process and technology (including all patents) open enough to be confirmed in public process. But they are unwilling to even do that.
Not hundreds, but thousands of issues, that they have refused to address.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
If they were really willing to listen, they would take the thing off fast-track.
Fear of ODF would be no excuse for real engineers.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
If Microsoft really wants to answer the supposedly invalid arguments, take it off fast-track. In fact, withdraw it. Strip it down. Rework it. Make it a real standard. (Three or four separate standards, actually, at minimum.)
Then re-submit on a normal track.
They don't have to have the standard to build their software. (Although we could wish they had waited.) They can compete fairly in the present without having this non-standard be made a standard. They could behave responsibly, like the rest of the industry tries to from time to time.
Until they do, even the not-very-valid arguments are plenty valid.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
You do bring up some valid points before you stand on your head to look at them.
ODF is bloated. But, given the context, where Microsoft has been hiding the reality of how functional plain text is for as long as they've existed, and where Microsoft has been trying their hardest to distract people from the power of plaintext + tags ever since XML saw the light of day, ODF had to have the bloat to get the consideration.
Customers are beginning to demand documents they can use. They want their information back. Microsoft is not going to give it to them willingly.
If the early ODF apps are really slipshod, customers are going to find themselves face to face with the conflict between form and substance, and most of them are going to accept that, at least sometimes, they want more substance than Microsoft can give them. In fact, not want, but need.
Ignoring ODF will kill Microsoft, unless they can make the leap from form to substance and ignore it for the right reasons.
If they could make that leap, however, I think that would kill Microsoft in a different sense. Microsoft is too big to properly deal with the semantics of ordinary end-users.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
But, anyway, Apple has bought specs from Microsoft. Apple's software can open some of Microsoft's documents with reasonable results, but that is because they bought the information from Microsoft.
As far as NeoOffice, that's inheriting from the reverse engineering done by the openoffice group. Inheriting directly, I might add. And anything that requires reverse engineering to be done without paying a fee is not free in either of the senses usually argued here.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
Can you name one viable standard where the sponsoring organization has been as blatant as Microsoft?
(Strong thrust, if a bit wild. Too bad the foil got under your mask. Suggest we take a break while you run down to the medic and get your eye attended?)
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
An interesting point is that, if Web based applications such as Google Docs start to take hold, I think you will find that there is a sudden reversal in the complexity of most documents. One of the things about both ODF and OOXML is that they define HUGELY complicated document formats. (ODF hides a lot of its complexity by referencing other standards. OOXML is just, well, ridiculously complicated, with four or five different ways to do any one action.) On the other hand, if you look at what you can do with Google Docs, you are really quite constrained in terms of complexity. My question is, In most cases, is that complexity REALLY NEEDED? Certainly it is in some cases, but probably 99.99% of the documents you see every day could get by with a couple of paragraph types, simple outline numbering and bullet lists with a couple of different levels. Throw in a couple of embedded types (tables, drawings and images), and you've got it covered.
OOXML is like using a nuclear submarine to cross a small stream. ODF is more like using a 100ft yacht to cross the same stream. Google Docs is crossing the stream by tossing across a few 2x12's and walking. If they all get you to the other side, which one really works best?
Your Servant, B. Baggins
The differences are that the ODF is much smaller, much less messy, and not an anticompetitive attack on a previous ISO standard.
This is an excellent article. I'm from Hyderabad, India and I personally know of the number of problems that Microsoft for us here.This is an excellent article. I'm from Hyderabad, India and I personally know of the number of problems that Microsoft for us here.
As a developing nation with high inflation, the computerisation of all Government offices throughout the country, has not given the expected results simply because of the "inelastic" MS products. Every one knows that Microsoft is highly virus prone and buggy. So lots of money has to wasted on anti-virus products. Along with this, even now lots of common people and government employees are comfortable with the regional language rather than English. Unfortunately, Microsoft supports only English.
It is also important that a government wants documents to be viewable for several decades and centuries, something Microsoft won't support, because it has to finish off its "old products" regularly, in order to ensure the sales of its new products.
Another not widely reported fact is that Microsoft is investing lots of money through Bill and Mellinda Gates Foundation. The condition is that the Government should "prefer"( read as promise) to use only Microsoft products, which also adds a lot of AVOIDABLE financial burden to the government treasury.
Its good that BIS has refused to waver in spite of the "pressure" from Microsoft. It is a very good decision. Moving to the open standards is always something to be appreciated!!:)
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
Au Contraire Mon Ami. It's all about the Web.
Check out the MSOffice SDK beta and you'll find a nifty conversion component that can be called with a few lines of code. The component perfects a high fidelity conversion of OOXML documents to XAML (fixed/flow).
XAML is a proprietary WPF format that is a web ready alternative to W3C XHTML - CSS. Combined with Silverlight (check out TextGlow) and Smart Tags, XAML represents a proprietary challenge to W3C XHTML, CSS-3, SVG, RDF, CDF and/or RIA Adobe PDF - Flash/Flex/AIR.
Now note that IE-8 does not support XHTML, SVG, XForms or RDF. CSS support is limited to CSS 2.1.
Consider the integration advantage the MS Web Server Stack (Exchange/SharePoint/MS SQL Server) juggernaut has with some 500 million MSOffice-Outlook desktops, many of which anchor the client side of more than a few business processes.
Sadly, ISO approval of OOXML will stamp MSOffice as a standards compliant editor for the proprietary Microsoft cloud, setting the stage for a massive migration of existing desktop bound business processes to the MS Web Server Stack.
Interestingly, IE-8 will force W3C compliant web sights to dumb their documents down (HTML 5- CSS 2.1), reserving for Microsoft the realm of complex data rich business documents transitioning from legacy client/server information systems to an exclusive MS Web-Cloud business process management system of global collaborative computing reach.
Good thing Windows can't do cloud computing! But maybe the acquisition of Yahoo! will combine with the Viridian-on-Solaris Data Centers to cover that embarrassment?
The real threat to Microsoft has always been HTML. In the Iowa antitrust case there was discovered this interesting 1998 memo from Chairman Bill to the MSOffice development team:
The challenge for Microsoft is that of transitioning their monopoly base to the Web without losing control. This meant developing IE, Exchange, SharePoint, Windows Server, and MS SQL Server while fully protecting the integration channel to MSOffice/Outlook. At the heart of this strategy though is the dilemma of limiting HTML to consumer only web applications until such time as the business process management systems were ready.
Of course, there is also that little problem with continuing anti trust oversight. At the core of the Sherman Anti Trust Act is the issue of leveraging an existing monopoly into other markets.
Hope this helps,
~ge~