Microsoft's Open XML Project A Short-Term Fix

TechPro writes "In an interview with eWeek the managing director of the ODF Alliance (Marino Marcich) was pretty dismissive of Microsoft's Open XML Translator project. While the move was a recognition of the ODF Format's acceptance by government's around the world, the installable software plug-ins that would be created under the project were really 'only a bridge, a stopgap measure that will probably not be acceptable to government's around the world over the long term. Plug-ins simply don't give the benefits of open file formats and standards,' he said."

I don't understand how it is different.

[khasim]

From TFA:

Converters and plug-ins are not solutions to the problem as governments across the globe want access to their vital records and data and are looking to separate the document from the application, which plug-in technologies do not do, and which would open the market up to greater innovation and more product and price competition, he said.

I don't understand the problem. If it's a plug-in, and it reads and writes to the ODF standard, where is the problem?

The only thing I can think of is if people worry about a Microsoft "upgrade" breaking this plug-in. And then having to wait for the patch to the plug-in.

The translators would also not be perfect, Jean Paoli, general manager for interoperability and XML architecture at Microsoft, told eWEEK, as "OpenXML and ODF are very different formats and some hard decisions are going to have to be made when translating from one format to another, like where we have OpenXML features that are not supported in ODF."

Excuse me, but, fuck "translating". This isn't about "translating". This is about being able to read ODF files and save your work to the ODF format.

"Translating" only comes into play when you're talking about:
a. Converting all your previous work to a new format.

b. When some people you are communicating with are restricted to the .docX format and you use the ODF format. But that's not a problem if the ODF format is the standard format.

c. And Microsoft's "Open" XML format will only be available in their NEXT release so it won't affect anyone who is still using their current or a previous release.

Am I missing something, somewhere?

Microsoft's claims seem to center around an organization upgrading to the next release of MS Office and then migrating to the ODF format.

While I see most situations as an organization migrating to the ODF format from an existing installation of MS Office 2000 or previous.

MODF

[stocke2]

how long till they embrace and extend? Microsoft Open Document Format ODF with extensions, you can open ODF documents, but once you do microsoft starts "updating them" with MS only extensions, making MS documents all but unreadable in other word processors, and once an ODF file is opened in MS office it is modified so no longer conforms to ODF. They would surely claim, hey we support ODF see, everyone else is just not smart enough to offer you the extra stuff we put in, aren't we the greatest? 1. take someone elses great idea 2. break ...mmmmm extend it so it only works with MS windows 3. claim everyone else is broken 4. profit!

Re:I don't understand how it is different.

[Zeinfeld]

The response from the ODF spokesperson was hardly what I would hope to see from an organization that was genuinely seeking to promote an open standard as opposed to being a way to sabotage a competitor.

If you have a genuine interest in ODF then the Microsoft news should be wellcomed. It will mean that there is a way for Office users to generate documents in a format that can be easily read by applications that comply with the ODF standard. I will probably get the plug in so that I can send editable documents to Linux users.

The ODF standard is far too new to be considered as a government mandate. UNIX was around for a decade before POSIX was mooted and then there was another decade before there was a requirement to support POSIX.

If there is a government mandate for a particular format then one would expect that Microsoft would provide a supported version of the plug in. At this point though there is no proven market for ODF and one can hardly expect Microsoft to commit to building the ODF market.

A much better way to deal with the news would have been to have hailed the step as an endorsement of ODF and glossed over the limited nature of the support on offer. As it is the article does more to highlight the contentious nature of ODF, the belief that Microsoft continues to be hostile to it and the beleif that the whole point of ODF is simply to attack Microsoft.

That might be an accurate description of the actual situation but that is hardly one that I would want to spend company time encouraging journalists to publicize.

Re:short term - but does it matter?

[fastgood]

Proprietary formats have kept them in business for many years -- why change now?

More money. Microsoft's driving force. Change gets folks to upgrade that Office Suite cash cow.

People bought Office95 and ran it for 3 years on one machine, and then put it on the replacment for that computer for another 3 years. Same with Office '97 and Office 2000 lasting for six years ... and $149 for Small Office Edition works out to be less than fifty cents a week for Microsoft.

Time to change document creation -- to a new distribution model like the antivirus publishers did.

Re:Java Redux

[CaymanIslandCarpedie]

The real problem for MS here is going to be OpenOffice. OpenOffice has already broken from the ODF spec to accomplish some things. If MS follows the ODF spec people will scream about it not working 100% with OpenOffice. If They break from the spec to support ODF, people will scream about "embrace and extend". Its pretty much lose-lose, but to you original point its OpenOffice that did the embrace and extend in this case and now MS has to decide how to deal with it.

Re:Java Redux

[Jesus_666]

OpenOffice has already broken from the ODF spec to accomplish some things.

Interesting. Care to elaborate/give a link?

Re:Emphasis on 'Short Term'

[KingMotley]

Perhaps you just like saying things without really understanding what it is you said, but...

Windows has a kernel, and IE, GUI, command shell, filesystem browser, etc aren't part of it. Infact the Win32 API isn't even part of it. If you weren't aware, the windows kernel even has 2 other subsystems shipped for it (Posix, OS/2 1.1). Feel free to google to learn more.

I'm not aware of that...

[Eric Damron]

In what way has ODF been extended by Open Office? A link would be nice...