What this needs is a promise that Office 2007 and this API will be synced to the ISO specification.
No, what this needs is a promise that this API will be synced to ODF as well as Office XML/OOXML
This is Microsoft's first attack on ODF on their platform. They were forced to grudgingly support the format in Office, now they are attempting to marginalise it by building an infrastructure around Office XML/OOXML.
The end result will be that customers already locked in to Microsoft with tools like.NET and Sharepoint will only be able to interoperate with Office XML/OOXML, not ODF. Anyone wishing to interoperate with them will be forced to make the same decision
This is an attack on ODF, an attempt to turn it into an orphan format. It will be half-heartedly supported in Office to appease regulators, but unsupported through the rest of the MS ecosystem.
Wouldn't a free market mean that they set the price at what they wanted and if you didn't want to buy it that you'd shop elsewhere for another?
Obviously.
And when a competitor offers a product cheaper, and you have a very large profit margin, your response in a competitive environment is either to reduce your price to that of your competitor, or to improve your product to make it attractive at the price you wish to charge.
Microsoft doesn't have that competition, which is why they can charge high prices for mediocre products.
So, well, why do you think you should set the price?
In a free market, the price of a product is an agreed value negotiated by both buyer and seller.
In a monopoly, the seller is able to set the price much higher that the true market value. That's why they're called "monopoly rents"
Microsoft has an estimated 87% profit margin on each Windows sale. Typical profit margins in open industries range around 15%. Since most of Microsoft's profits come from OEM sales at around $50/license, I'd say the OP's offer of $35/license would be generous in a free market.
This is borne out by the cost of similar products ($0) which are available to buyers who aren't locked into the monopoly by proprietary formats.
Controlling speed of vehicles? Good fucking luck with that one pal.
Actually, systems that do that are already very common in industry and railways. It may not be welcomed by the driving public, but there's plenty of other applications.
In fact, I'd be very surprised if automation and controller companies like Sick didn't already have off-the-shelf solutions.
And I don't think I've ever encountered ANY fabric that can't be cut with a sharp enough knife
There are fabrics that can withstand a running chainsaw, and they are in common use.
Likewise, stab or cut-resistant Vectran fabric is now relatively common. I've worn turn-out gear which is designed to resist that sort of damage, and while it's expensive, it isn't prohibitively so.
JThough I can well imagine a jealous walker-by accidentally slashing it with his pocket knife.
There are already plenty of fabrics which are resistant to casual slashes, and some in the pipeline which are even more durable.
Vandals can already do a significant amount of damage to a painted metal car body with a knife or even a coin. If the repair costs of the fabric are competitive with metal, it might even reduce costs over the life of the vehicle.
Irony is a literary or rhetorical device, in which there is an incongruity or discordance between what a speaker or writer says and what he or she means, or what is generally understood. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony
they just interpolate the color values between each pixel "point" instead of drawing huge square pixels.
It's not a new interpolation algorithm.
It's a live version of the The shift-and-add method or image-stacking technique used by astronomers for decades. It's just that now computer hardware is fast enough do it seamlessly.
Basically, the zoom is made from hundreds of still photographs taken from different vantage points. There was something similar being done with tourist destinations, if I remember correctly.
It's an interesting toy, but the practical applications are limited by the lengthy production process.
This is the key. They *approach* functionality, but don't *exceed* it.
Try using the tool before you slag it.
Kivio is better and easier than Visio for 99% of the users who typically work with flowcharting software. I used the term "approach" because it's functionality doesn't precisely overlap that of Visio.
I suspect part of the reason is that there isn't enough demand yet
No, there are FOSS alternatives that approach Visio functionality, so there's obviously demand.
This is another example of Microsoft's ubiquitous format lockin.
There are projects to reverse-engineer the VSD/VSS file formats, but it's complicated, and there are a number of closed sub-formats being used as well.
I'm not surprised. Check out the kernel it's running on.
guest@goosh.org:/web> uname -r
1) uname The uname() function shall return a string naming the current system in the character array sysname. Similarly, nodename shall contain the name of this node... http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/uname.html
4) Unix man pages: uname (2) UNAME(2) Linux Programmer's Manual UNAME(2) NAME uname - get name and information about current kernel SYNOPSIS #include int uname(struct... http://www.rt.com/man/uname.2.html
This has been debunked so many times.
To reiterate;
This discussion is about ODF, not Open Office. OOo is only one of many suites and applications supporting ODF.
More spin.
This statement is misleading. Every file written by OpenOffice.org, KOffice or IBM Symmphony (to use common examples) is ODF compliant. The file may not require every tag in the full specification to describe the contents each application is capable of writing, but it will comply with the standard.
In other words, each application is fully compliant with the subset of the standard mandated by the application's content creation role.
By contrast, MS Office does NOT write compliant OOXML files at all
It was important that the first comment not be some GNAA garbage.
It was, but it's even more important that people realise the problem is Microsoft, not ISO.
As long as they are allowed to continue wielding the amount of power they do today, they will corrupt ANY standards body. It's simply not possible to design a consultative standards body that's immune to the type of panel and committee stacking we've seen from Microsoft on this issue.
Yes, ISO is now badly damaged, and that's a tragedy all of it's own, because ISO was a body of great value to the whole world. Now the world needs to be looking at clipping the wings of the predator that did the damage, not at sinking the boot into a crippled ISO.
Will noone step up and defend the credibility and proud history of ISO here? They have done good work in the past. Cannot someone defend the way they've handled this?
No?
I don't understand this "blame the victim" mentality that's pervasive in Slashdot discussions on this.
Microsoft deliberately subverted ECMA, a number of national standards bodies as well as ISO itself. The influence they brought to bear was unprecedented, and ISO simply was not designed to deal with it. The fast track process was abused to prevent a reasonable response, and the short deadlines are being used to the same effect in this protest phase.
It was a deliberate, calculated attack on an unprepared target.
And ISO is not alone - look at all the governments and departments MS has bought or influenced over the years.
Whether ISO can recover from this is questionable now. Responding correctly will be hard because the committees are still stacked with Microsoft reps. They're like a rooted box - untrustworthy without some extensive malware cleaning.
If this is evidence for anything, it's that Microsoft is out of control and must be split up.
Slashdot Mirror
No, what this needs is a promise that this API will be synced to ODF as well as Office XML/OOXML
This is Microsoft's first attack on ODF on their platform. They were forced to grudgingly support the format in Office, now they are attempting to marginalise it by building an infrastructure around Office XML/OOXML.
The end result will be that customers already locked in to Microsoft with tools like .NET and Sharepoint will only be able to interoperate with Office XML/OOXML, not ODF. Anyone wishing to interoperate with them will be forced to make the same decision
This is an attack on ODF, an attempt to turn it into an orphan format. It will be half-heartedly supported in Office to appease regulators, but unsupported through the rest of the MS ecosystem.
Obviously.
And when a competitor offers a product cheaper, and you have a very large profit margin, your response in a competitive environment is either to reduce your price to that of your competitor, or to improve your product to make it attractive at the price you wish to charge.
Microsoft doesn't have that competition, which is why they can charge high prices for mediocre products.
In a free market, the price of a product is an agreed value negotiated by both buyer and seller.
In a monopoly, the seller is able to set the price much higher that the true market value. That's why they're called "monopoly rents"
Microsoft has an estimated 87% profit margin on each Windows sale. Typical profit margins in open industries range around 15%. Since most of Microsoft's profits come from OEM sales at around $50/license, I'd say the OP's offer of $35/license would be generous in a free market.
This is borne out by the cost of similar products ($0) which are available to buyers who aren't locked into the monopoly by proprietary formats.
No they don't work.
Agencies require MS compatible formats so they can redact your contact information and add their own branding.
Actually, systems that do that are already very common in industry and railways. It may not be welcomed by the driving public, but there's plenty of other applications.
In fact, I'd be very surprised if automation and controller companies like Sick didn't already have off-the-shelf solutions.
Individual teeth on professional chainsaws are very sharp. You can easily cut yourself on them.
There are fabrics that can withstand a running chainsaw, and they are in common use.
Likewise, stab or cut-resistant Vectran fabric is now relatively common. I've worn turn-out gear which is designed to resist that sort of damage, and while it's expensive, it isn't prohibitively so.
BMW drivers do.
They're all dicks.
There are already plenty of fabrics which are resistant to casual slashes, and some in the pipeline which are even more durable.
Vandals can already do a significant amount of damage to a painted metal car body with a knife or even a coin. If the repair costs of the fabric are competitive with metal, it might even reduce costs over the life of the vehicle.
Why not?
You've been punishing people with far less evidence of criminal intent.
Red Rings are a feature of most people's interactions with Microsoft.
The concept is normally "borrowed" from someone else.
It's only the implementation that's their own.
It's not a new interpolation algorithm.
It's a live version of the The shift-and-add method or image-stacking technique used by astronomers for decades. It's just that now computer hardware is fast enough do it seamlessly.
Basically, the zoom is made from hundreds of still photographs taken from different vantage points. There was something similar being done with tourist destinations, if I remember correctly.
It's an interesting toy, but the practical applications are limited by the lengthy production process.
You don't think computers connected to a nuclear power plant's control system should be fully patched?
Think of it as a first step towards an open competitor to Sharepoint.
Google can't detain me if they find something in my files they don't like.
Full story.
Try using the tool before you slag it.
Kivio is better and easier than Visio for 99% of the users who typically work with flowcharting software. I used the term "approach" because it's functionality doesn't precisely overlap that of Visio.
No, there are FOSS alternatives that approach Visio functionality, so there's obviously demand.
This is another example of Microsoft's ubiquitous format lockin.
There are projects to reverse-engineer the VSD/VSS file formats, but it's complicated, and there are a number of closed sub-formats being used as well.
"it is dissapointing from my point of view!"
...
...
...
I'm not surprised. Check out the kernel it's running on.
guest@goosh.org:/web> uname -r
1) uname
The uname() function shall return a string naming the current system in the character array sysname. Similarly, nodename shall contain the name of this node
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/uname.html
2) uname 1
http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=uname&sektion=1
3) uname function.
uname is NOT in the ANSII library but is handy for getting system information. It will return handy things like:. System type (name). Host name (Nodename).
http://www.space.unibe.ch/comp_doc/c_manual/C/FUNCTIONS/uname.html
4) Unix man pages: uname (2)
UNAME(2) Linux Programmer's Manual UNAME(2) NAME uname - get name and information about current kernel SYNOPSIS #include int uname(struct
http://www.rt.com/man/uname.2.html
This statement is misleading. Every file written by OpenOffice.org, KOffice or IBM Symmphony (to use common examples) is ODF compliant. The file may not require every tag in the full specification to describe the contents each application is capable of writing, but it will comply with the standard. In other words, each application is fully compliant with the subset of the standard mandated by the application's content creation role.
By contrast, MS Office does NOT write compliant OOXML files at all
It was, but it's even more important that people realise the problem is Microsoft, not ISO.
As long as they are allowed to continue wielding the amount of power they do today, they will corrupt ANY standards body. It's simply not possible to design a consultative standards body that's immune to the type of panel and committee stacking we've seen from Microsoft on this issue.
Yes, ISO is now badly damaged, and that's a tragedy all of it's own, because ISO was a body of great value to the whole world. Now the world needs to be looking at clipping the wings of the predator that did the damage, not at sinking the boot into a crippled ISO.
No?
I don't understand this "blame the victim" mentality that's pervasive in Slashdot discussions on this.
Microsoft deliberately subverted ECMA, a number of national standards bodies as well as ISO itself. The influence they brought to bear was unprecedented, and ISO simply was not designed to deal with it. The fast track process was abused to prevent a reasonable response, and the short deadlines are being used to the same effect in this protest phase.
It was a deliberate, calculated attack on an unprepared target.
And ISO is not alone - look at all the governments and departments MS has bought or influenced over the years.
Whether ISO can recover from this is questionable now. Responding correctly will be hard because the committees are still stacked with Microsoft reps. They're like a rooted box - untrustworthy without some extensive malware cleaning.
If this is evidence for anything, it's that Microsoft is out of control and must be split up.
Good for crumb collection too, if you lick your fingers.