Slashdot Log In
New York Jumps Into Open Formats Fray
Posted by
CowboyNeal
on Fri Jun 08, 2007 12:16 AM
from the time-to-dance dept.
from the time-to-dance dept.
cyrusmack writes "Hot on the heels of the bad news regarding the defeat of all open formats bills, New York has become the latest in an area that has seen a flurry of activity already this year. In the article on InfoWorld, it's pretty clear that this bill is significantly watered down from what other states have attempted to do this year. You can bet Microsoft will be there in force, just as it has been elsewhere."
Related Stories
[+]
Pro-ODF Legislation Loses In Six States 264 comments
ajanp writes "Computerworld discusses the defeat of pro-ODF legislation in the states of California, Florida, Texas, Oregon, and Connecticut which 'would have required state agencies to use freely available and interoperable file formats, such as the Open Document Format for Office Applications, instead of Microsoft Corp.'s proprietary Office formats.' A similar bill in Minnesota was changed to study the issue instead. There was heavy lobbying being done in private on both sides with one problem being 'the jargon-laden disinformation that committee members felt they were being fed by lobbyists for both IBM and Microsoft. Although lobbyists would tell the committee one thing in private, they got cold feet when asked to verify the information publicly, under oath.' However, 'Despite the string of defeats, Marino Marcich, executive director of the Washington-based ODF Alliance, said the legislative fight has only begun.'"
[+]
Technology: New York Decision On ODF Vs. OOXML Approaching 160 comments
christian.einfeldt writes "In August of 2007, the State of New York passed legislation requiring its CIO, Melodie Mayberry-Stewart, to gather information on the advantages and disadvantages of adopting either ODF or OOXML as a document standard, and to report her findings by 15 January 2008. As part of her duties under that legislation, the CIO issued a Request For Public Comment to get feedback on the topic. The deadline for that public comment is 28 December 2007 — so there is still time for the Slashdot crowd to be heard."
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Funny)
Their three weapons are FUD, disinformation, and ruthless efficiency
There four weapons are....
Amongst their weapons are...
Ok, lemme try this again....
Parent
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
One Missing Weapon (Score:5, Interesting)
Cool Stuff that people want.
The rest is all bullshit. Vendor manipulation, marketing, bogus laws are only needed by a company that lacks product. The harder they try, the weaker they look.
The tipping point is here. If Dell makes money selling GNU/Linux desktops, it's all over for M$. If they don't, someone else will. Firefox has proved free software to all the "decision makers" M$ usually courts, and it's only a matter of time before they realize Firefox and much more works better outside the M$ cage.
Parent
Re:One Missing Weapon (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
"Open formats" is a well-defined term. It means what it has always meant: a format that is unencumbered by copyrights or patents, and is sufficiently well documented to permit interoperable, independent implementations.
Of course, Microsoft has been trying to muddy the waters by calling their closed, proprietary format "open".
using this term is one of the best ways we can bring down Microsuck
Well, yes, in the sense that Microsoft's business model is monopolistic and involves closed formats. If Microsoft adopted open formats themselves, then things would be fine.
Ultimately, this may mean more leverage for one or a group of interests--something that is never good for a dye-in-the-wool open source believer.
Adoption of open formats, in the usual meaning of the word, is not just good for open source, it's good for the industry as a whole (except, of course, for Microsoft).
What is bad for everybody other than Microsoft is Microsoft's attempts to confuse people about what an open format is. ODF is an open format, OOXML is a closed, proprietary format.
Open source/format is such a misunderstood term
Well, yes. Quantum mechanics is also such a misunderstood term. Nevertheless, both "open format" and "quantum mechanics" have important, well defined meanings, and the responsibility is on you to understand and use them correctly.
Parent
Re:bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyway, although the above astroturfers are not going to listen it is pretty simple.
All those OOXML importers you say "prove it is an open standard" are simply programmers applying their previous work in reverse-engineerning
Any claim that it is an "open standard" is blatently false. There are commands in it like "work like Word 95", yet the standard does not include the source code to Word 95. Well, you say, just ignore that command, it's a minor detail, right? But that is exactly why those office documents come out mangled. It is in fact exactly the same as
You can continue to spew your lies. You will probably win. But this is one of the sickest things I have seen coming out of Microsoft ever and you can bet that you are making enemies that you never had before. Slashdot is a big cesspool of crazy zealots, but when you see Microsoft doing such a blatent, desperate ploy to save their monopoly, and the absolute insane direct lying in their posts here, I start to agree with slashdot.
Parent
Re:bullshit (Score:4, Interesting)
Yep, and the GPL3 stories seem to draw a lot of flies as well. http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/07/149 240 [slashdot.org]
Makes you think the FSF might be on the right track after all.
Parent
Re:bullshit (Score:5, Informative)
I provided you with a link to explanations clearer and more concise than anything I could include here.
I'm aware you're not prepared to look at evidence which would conflict with your view, but for the convenience of other readers, I've posted the headers to the Groklaw articles which contain the complete explanations.
* 7.1 The Gregorian Calendar
* 7.2 ISO 8601 (Representation of dates and times)
* 7.3 ISO 639 (Codes for the Representation of Names and Languages)
* 7.4 ISO/IEC 8632 (Computer Graphics Metafile)
* 7.5 ISO/IEC 26300:2006 (OpenDocument Format for Office Applications)
* 7.6 W3C SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics)
* 7.7 W3C MathML (Mathematical Markup Language)
* 7.8 ISO/IEC 10118-3, W3C XML-ENC, and other cryptographic hash standards
* 7.9 W3C SMIL (Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language)
# 8 Ecma 376 is immature and inconsistent
* 8.1 Fabricates units of measurement
* 8.2 Internal inconsistencies: the w:sz element
* 8.3 Internal inconsistencies and omissions: ST_Border
* 8.4 Confusing and inconsistent definitions of lengths of hexadecimal numbers
* 8.5 Unspecified terms: plain text
* 8.6 Poor names and inconsistent naming conventions for elements and attributes
* 8.7 Inflexible notation for percentages
* 8.8 Inappropriate non-document settings (application settings)
* 8.9 Non-XML formatting codes
* 8.10 Inflexible numbering format
* 8.11 Uses a Microsoft-specific namespace
# 9 Ecma 376 uses bitmasks, inhibiting extensibility and use of standard XML tools
* 9.1 Background: bitmasks
* 9.2 Bitmasks in Ecma 376
* 9.3 Bitmasks are not extensible
* 9.4 Bitmasks cause significant validation problems
* 9.5 Bitmasks defeat XSLT manipulation
* 9.6 Bitmasks conflict with the Ecma TC45 charter
# 10 Ecma 376 relies on undisclosed information
* 10.1 Undisclosed proprietary specifications
* 10.2 Cloning the behaviour of proprietary applications
* 10.3 Relies on application-defined behaviors
# 11 Ecma 376 cannot be adequately evaluated within the 30-day evaluation period
* 11.1 Ecma 376 has not met the stability requirement
# 12 Ecma 376 cannot be reasonably implemented by other vendors
* 12.1 Ecma 376 requires implementation of undisclosed specifications
* 12.2 The "compatibility with legacy formats" can only be implemented by Microsoft
* 12.3 Patent rights to implement the Ecma 376 specification have not been granted
o 12.3.1 The Microsoft covenants not to sue grant no rights
o 12.3.2 Microsoft licensing documents are ambiguous
+ 12.3.2.1 The Microsoft Open Specification Promise is ambiguous
+ 12.3.2.2 The Microsoft Covenant Not to Sue is irrelevant and ambiguous in any event
* 12.4 End-User License Agreements (EULAs) may forbid full implementation
Anyone wishing to understand the full risks of implementing OOXML in their own software should read the Groklaw page very carefully.
Parent
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:4, Insightful)
ODF is a great idea. But it is only a tiny step away from propriatary formats.
Parent
Mod Lying Parent Down (Score:4, Interesting)
Plus since 99.9% of the rest of the world still uses
What is so evil about this well-crafted statement is it manipulates the reader by doing the "everyone uses it" argument. When your Mom said, "If everyone you knew wanted to jump off a cliff, then I suppose you would jump too." when you wanted to do something justified by referring to your friend's activities. Maintaining closed standards is harmful, like jumping off a cliff.
The truth is everyone doesn't use it. Look at the standard document format in the American legal system. Most documents published on the web are in PDF and there's a Free (as in speech) pdf generator for every platform. Even windows. http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/ [sourceforge.net]
ODF is a great idea. But it is only a tiny step away from propriatary formats.
This statement is materially false. No patent encumbrances, no license encumbrances, no distribution encumbrances, and an API that a programmer can _actually_ use. versus Microsoft's API which should win an award for documents that say nothing.
Microsoft harms everyone who uses a computer by defending their closed document formats. Congratulations, you've blown the truthiness meter up.
Parent
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
No one would ever use MS Office, or Visual Studio, or Windows, if there wasn't sufficient quality therein to justify the expense of staying. There are huge flaws and gaping shortcomings, to be sure, but somehow MS still manages to have enough quality over the free alerternatives that they stay in business.
If you think otherwise, I offer that you may not understand exactly what "quality product" means. A Ford Yarius might be a crappy toy car, but it's weird and efficient enough that it fits an exact niche big enough to earn a profit -- it is a quality product.
Parent
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
We deploy MSO and it borks up big time, it's all good cause, well I don't really know why, seems management have all the forgiveness for MS products but not for any others
Parent
It doesn't matter... (Score:5, Insightful)
However, in the long run, Free software will win out since eventually more people will understand that software itself has no intrinsic value. The value lies in service and support and Free software tends to have lower support costs, since it is usually designed better.
Re:It doesn't matter... (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
ya.. (Score:5, Insightful)
so you have a situation where Microsoft being public relations geniuses are believed by the politicians who in all likeliness dont have much experience outside MS's products. the old it's good enough for us because we're familiar with it still applies as disturbing as that is
Bias Showing (Score:5, Informative)
From Computer World: [computerworld.com]
That undermined the credibility of each side, but it particularly damaged the position of ODF proponents.
Just once (Score:5, Insightful)
The advantage of using Microsoft is in economies of scale, and network effects. The same advantage will make open formats spread very quickly once established in one state to other states.
Microsoft is very afraid. They should be. Office is one of their few products that has the distinction of actually turning a profit. A move to open formats would force them to compete on price, support, and features, something that they haven't had to do for a very long time.
That's why M$ Sucks. (Score:5, Informative)
What, do you think Office is incapable of supporting ODF or something? That can be changed quite fast. I work on the Live Meeting team, and we are constantly working on communication/productivity tools...
Great, we all know that M$ could use ODF. The standard is complete and easy enough to implement that everyone else has already done it.
The problem is that your company would rather waste money on their own special format and propaganda so they can keep their little format franchise. Where was your bragging in Mass. when M$ was complaining that ODF would hurt blind people? If ODF is so easy to implement, was it really worth smearing Peter Quinn's out of job and reputation? It's this kind of arrogance that will cost M$ everything. People remember what you do.
Parent
States' rights (Score:5, Insightful)
State: Hi I like open formats because they're an open standard, owned by the world community. They're less risky, more durable, and extensible. And open.
Lobbyist: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa... whoa... whoa there buddy. You don't know what you're talking about. Microsoft Office format documents are used by 90% of the corporate world. Plus, Microsoft is huge. And has lots of money.
State: Who are you?
Lobbyist: Hi I'm Microsoft.
State: Oh, hi. Can I have some money?
Lobbyist: Sure
State: I like Microsoft Office.
What Microsoft wants to happen (Score:4, Funny)
Slightly off-topic... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Fair Enough? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the difference between Microsoft's OOXML and ODF is that ODF can be implemented fully and interoperably by third parties, while OOXML cannot. That's not a legal question or a licensing question, it's a question of bad specification of OOXML. That's why ODF is an open format, while OOXML is a closed, proprietary format.
In addition, Microsoft has applied for a patent on OOXML, while there is no patent pending on ODF. That means that there is good reason to believe that OOXML is, in fact, a restricted format.
Parent