New York Jumps Into Open Formats Fray 184
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."
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....
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Funny)
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.
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It's already happening where I live.
Most of the wholesalers and whitebox distributors here are offering budget computers with Ubuntu installed. They're cheaper and perform better than the Windows equivalents.
Dell can survive without offering a Linux alternative since they pay little or nothing for their Windows licenses, but they risk being swamped by the next wave of boxshifters if they hold back to
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Re:One Missing Weapon (Score:4, Informative)
One Weapon (Score:2)
How is any of this relevant to the State of New York issuing public documents in ODF format?
Because the only impediment is a company that does not have much to offer, other than men in black [slashdot.org] and other smear masters.
Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
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.
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Do you have evidence to support this? I am not aware of any generally accepted definition of "open format" that prevents copyright, and further would not be surprised if copyright were the mechanism by which any given standards body maintains control of the actual open formats. Also, there
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It's both closed and proprietary.
OOXML is a dump into XML of all the data from existing Office formats. It can only be fully implemented by the vendor of MS Office.1 720521698
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200701
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.
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.
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I'm sorry, but why can't we just
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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.
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* 7.1 The Gregorian Calendar
Wow
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Re:open formats win, MS loses (Score:5, Insightful)
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Open source tends to mean that. Open formats means well defined data formats, which is far, far more important. Open formats guarantee interoperability and access to your data. Open source can lead to that as well, but it's a rather indirect route to get there.
Increasingly, it means "using this term is one of the best wa
Re: Dont confuse Open Format with Open Source (Score:3, Informative)
Open Standards, just mean that, Open Standards. Both proprietary software and open software can implement the API and formats. We can not skew the Standar
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.
I wish they would do it for the blind people. (Score:3, Informative)
I bet MS already has ODF compatibility ready to put on their website for download if a bill like this were to pass.
A M$ rep has bragged as much in this very thread [slashdot.org]. If it's true, I wish they would shut up about ODF being harmful to blind people.
I don't see any reason it would not be true. ODF is a sane standard and everyone else has been able to use it.
ODF is a great idea. But it is only a tiny step away from propriatary formats.
The difference between published and non published "standards" is n
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ODF (or OOXML) will remain a niche file-format for a long time to come. Unless applications default out-of-the-box to saving in ODF or OOXML, then not
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At that point the ODF format would achieve good penetration within the government organization.
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.
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.
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
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Why don't they have office for Linux? Then they could compete on the quality of their Operating System. Oh wait, they don't want to do that. What about making Visual Studios work under Linux?
What about opening up their formats so you're not locked into them? Oh wait, they don't want competition on quality, they want you to buy their stuff no matter what. That's not necessarily
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The only reason no one changes from MS office is due to the low pain threshold users have. The equation is thus - as long as the pain of changing does not exceed the painfulness of using office no change will happen.
MS has also been CONVICTED of leveraging it's OS to prevent all new comers from challenging. the pain isn't from any failings of other software options, it's interference from MS.
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The only reason no one changes from MS office is due to the low pain threshold users have.
Saying something 10000000 times does not make it the truth, thought. Then again, sheer volume of people claiming how linux-distro-du-jour is about to replace Windows/OSX as a mainstream desktop OS Real Soon Now seems to show some disconnection from reality in
I could point out some good examples of t
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You could point out examples of the reverse as well. It just points out that they are different products.
In the environments that I've switched, people seem to like OOo better than MS Office with the exception of a few advanced Excel users.
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no, they stay in business because people are familiar with them and have no desire to even comprehend the existence of alternatives.
WTF? so Internet Explorer's abysmal CSS/W3C complience means it is a quality product? XP and other flavors of windows having the administrator account as default as well as oth
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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.
According to Sun's CEO [sun.com], pretty much the same seems to be happening with Office suites as happened with Linux on the server OS market. More and more students are using OOo and many of them will be making decisions about which software to deploy in corporations in years to come and MS Office won't always be the neurologically hard-wired default choice like it is today. Whether this will lead to OOo becoming the threat to MS Office, that Linux is to Windows 2003/Vista Server is another story but the presence
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Please enlighten me as to what a "Ford Yarius" is, exactly. Toyota makes a "Yaris" - is that what you meant to reference? And small economy cars might be viewed as a "crappy toy car" by those who enjoy the luxury of large SUVs and sedans that are just as tank-like as the SUVs, but some people simple cannot afford or do not care to have the luxuries of those types of cars.
As for your argument, the truth is that "quality assurance" and "Microsoft" simply don't go together. More often than not, Microsoft
Then why is msft scared to death of open formats? (Score:2)
Also, I think Toyota, not Ford, makes the Yaris.
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But Microsoft's format is known as the "Office Open XML" format... and they're trying to get is ISO certified.... and cronies like Corel and Novell to support it... so they can claim it has 'broad-based' support from other software vendors as well.Besides I believe the OOXML spec is about 7,000 pages long, and has nuggets like "Windows 95 support" inside it, which no one else can figure out.
The ODF spec isn't very compact either... 4,000 pages; but it has broader support from lo
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That is the funny thing. They all use it and keep their premire products on windows rather than doing better on Linux, so ppl have no reason to leave it. Once the premire products on Linux, then you will see a slow trickle explode.
I see that you do not read or live history (Score:2)
Now, we are seeing the EXACT same situation for Linux vs. MS. MS, unlike you, learned from the
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.
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Speak for yourself. The code I write is quite valuable to me.
Re:It doesn't matter... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Unless of course they are being paid by corporate entities like IBM, Sun, or the Moz Foundation. When Big Daddy opens his wallet, Big Daddy expects results.
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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
... really (Score:3, Insightful)
As software openness becomes a mainstream issue, the political types _will have_ to form an opinion about, and that is good, because at least some of them will start paying attention and hopefully reading online.
The discussions mean more interest and wider coverage of the topic, and more awareness -- in the politico circles as well as the general public.
What is hitting the general public now is the first level of awareness -- they start to realize that there is this iss
Doesn't matter.... (Score:3, Insightful)
What's really going on is that they've spotted that simply mentioning "open source" makes Steve Ballmer fly in from wherever he happens to be at the time and offer them a "more competitive pricing structure".
Office is 90% profit so there's quite a bit of wiggle room.
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Betzold and other politicians quickly felt overwhelmed by the technical jargon presented by each side. "I wouldn't know an open document format if it bit me on the butt,"
To me, that says "Nobody's bothered to explain this to me in clear English".
Yet most of the things we might want politicians to get involved with can be easily explained in clear English. "Open document format - the method th
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2. Yes, open format document is easy to spot -- if you get it into your email box regardless of the OS, and can open it with tools from several different vendors without trouble, it is probably open. Sorta like PDF or ODF.
3. There are a lot of good explanations on the web about it, try your favourite search engine
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No, that's just the best you have chosen to find yet.
Others have documented plenty of flaws and contradictions within the OOXML spec, including here http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog/artic l e.php?story=20070117145745854 [consortiuminfo.org].
If you choose to ignore the evidence, that's up to you. It doesn't change anything else though.
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No, it's absolutely clear that Microsoft wants the opposite of free formats.
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You're missing the point. ODF doesn't require legislation to be successful as a format for those who are motivated to use an open format. Legislation is required to ensure that documents issued by governments use open formats such as ODF. In the absence of such legislation, we will continue to see governments produce documents in closed formats such as Microsoft's.
The crucial difference between ODF and OOXML is not one licensing. The problem is that ODF is truly open, while OOXML references a number of
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because when you have a company convicted of monopoly in many areas it doesnt make sense to confine our government to use just MS's software because they are comfortable using it and ignorant of any choice. they have shown themselves to consistently ignore other options regardless of the benefits so if legislating them to consider alternatives improves things then why not?
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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.
Bogus "Sides" (Score:2)
From the InfoWorld article:
They left out KDE, Gnome, Correl .... and the rest of the world. How can anyone see this as anything but M$ pushing it's next format despite unified opposition from everyone else in t
Why should they shut up? (Score:2)
Perhaps this time round IBM will keep its mouth shut and the government will be able to see this isn't a battle for commercial gain ...
What exactly did the IBM representative not follow though on? Unless you know, you should not repeat the smear. M$ is well known for lying with and without oath, but most of us expect more from IBM.
In any case, IBM and everyone besides M$ should come to the aid of ODF. Legislators want to see professionals who can talk about money more than they want to see idealis
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Well if you had bothered to look it up IBM were caught lying about the ODF project in Massachusetts.
" That undermined the credibility of each side, but it particularly damaged the position of ODF proponents. After Wyne testified publicly that in Massachusetts, only a handful of computers had thus far been con
That's not a contradiction. (Score:2)
That the roll out is going well is not a lie. Despite heavy interference from M$, it was right on schedule six months ago and the roll out was supposed to start only five months ago [consortiuminfo.org]. Given the resignation of the CIO due to a smear and M$'s attempt to restructure their entire IT system, it's a miracle they are able to keep to their plans at all. It's the planning that takes time - roll outs happen in a week, even in the deadly inefficient world of Windoze.
Oh yeah, let's not forget the blind people FUD [odfalliance.org],
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The differences between the licensing of OpenXML and ODF is really about hair splitting about the only differences I can discern are, one was written by Microsoft and the other by Sun.
At the moment I would say Microsoft is almost looking like the party that is playing the most fairly. Read this...
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/may0 7/05-20UOFODFPR.mspx?rss_fdn=Pre [microsoft.com]
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where is the corresponding support for OpenXML in OpenOffice and Google's online Office suite?
Since when have the complete specifications been made avail
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http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/12/04/HNnovell openxml_1.html [infoworld.com]
Novell is supplying openxml support for OpenOffice.
Datavis already seems to provide support for OpenXML
http://www.dataviz.com/ [dataviz.com]
So I guess some people have managed to decipher Microsoft's documentation.
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That's being a bit deceptive.
Novell is a Microsoft technology partner and has access to Microsoft's documentation. Dataviz is a Gold Certified partner to Microsoft and in any event, provides file conversion software for PDAs and only needs to implement a small subset of the document formats.
Why be disingenuous? Don't you have a valid argument to present?
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I think it is your argument that is disingenuous and lacks all validity. You're in denial that Microsoft could possibly open up it's Office formats in the same way that Sun has done with Star Office. This is exactly what they have done.
Docx documents are simply zip files containing simple xml files, it's not even half as complicated as people are implying. Creating docx documents is actually quite simple...
http:/ [msdn.com]
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It's been discussed ad nauseum here and in thousands of other forums all over the web. They're forming a joint research facility, for christ's sake! Would they need to do that if they were only relying on public information?
it's not even half as complicated as people are implying.
It doesn't matter how complicated or otherwise it is. Nobody can implement the specification without emulating Microsoft products. B
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You mistakenly present the situation as symmetric. It isn't. We only need one document standard, and we already have it. ODF is already an ISO standard and implemented by numerous products from a variety of sources. OOXML, on the other hand, is a Johnnie-come-lately, and is not a standard in any real sense. It is not an ISO standard and is not in use by anyone other than Microsoft. Furthermore, since it is not truly open, it simply doesn't meet the criteria. Thus, if Microsoft decides that it wants to join
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It simply isn't true that this is just a commercial dispute between Sun and Microsoft. ODF was developed by the Open Document Foundation based on work by Sun and standardized by OASIS. The members of the OASIS technical committee are listed here [oasis-open.org]. You'll notice that they include not only people from Sun, IBM, and the Open Document Foundation, but representatives from Adobe, Novell, Duke University, the Royal National Institute for the Blind, Intel, Ars Aperta, and others.
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.
M$ Customer Care at it's Finest. (Score:2)
Cost us what? Cause /. pseudo-geeks to stop buying our stuff? You freaks don't know anything. If you were actually the target market, then maybe someone would care.
If you don't care, why are you here?
Anyone here own a f500 corporation?
Well, you don't either, so you had better quit while you are behind. You never know who's reading. When enough people report back to the boss or the boss reads enough of the wrong words, it's the other company's interest that rules the day and M$ is out the door li
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)
Bill #A08961 (Score:2, Informative)
Still, it's better than nothing. So all you registered voters in New York, consider writing your state assemblymen and senators.
NYS Assembly Members [state.ny.us]
NYS Senate Members [state.ny.us]
Not as easy a target for Microsoft (Score:2)
It seems to me that this bill is about establishing the principles used to decide what formats to use. It does not try to mandate some specific format so there is no "that one is no good" argument that Microsoft (or anyone else) can use. "We are being unfairly excluded" does not fly either - the state is just working out what it needs from a document format.
The question of whether or not Microsoft products meet the needs is for later.
"You should not be thinking about your real needs, you should just buy o
Thems is Fightin' Words! (Score:2)
When you are with a bunch of the government sales people, uttering that phrase would make you look like a complete ass hass.
weird society (Score:2)
Shouldn't there be an instant "sorry, we're not listening to you, you are too much involved to be a reliable source" rejection? Yes, I know lobbying doesn't work that way. I'm wondering what this says about our society. Something like truth being less important th
Eternal source of campaign money! (Score:3, Interesting)
Slightly off-topic... (Score:4, Interesting)
lobby listing (Score:2)
it would be nice to see who isn't on the take next time i vote.
Marketplace competition (Score:2)
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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.
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http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/12/04/HNnovell openxml_1.html [infoworld.com]
http://www.dataviz.com/ [dataviz.com]
OpenXML has/is being implemented by 3rd parties.
So you're saying you know for a fact that there are no patents covering anything in the ODF standard? If so why did Sun produce a convenant not to sue ODF developers?
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Wrong. Third parties are implementing parts of OOXML and trying to do the best they can, but nobody other than Microsoft can ever create a complete implementation because the behavior of OOXML is defined in terms of Microsoft software. The situation isn't much different from current Microsoft Office formats: others try to support them as best they can, but nobody has been able to create a fully interoperable implementation.
So you're saying you know for a fac
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But the facts are clear nevertheless: OOXML ("Microsoft OpenXML") is not an open format, while ODF is. That's all there's to it.
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I've actually looked at OpenXML, read the licensing and have some development experience with it.
How much time have you spent looking at OpenXML before coming to your
That's all there's to it
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Actually, this is not true. A striking example is the fact that Microsoft Word 2007 uses an equation editor that generates Microsoft's own new equation description language which is not compatible with MathML and cannot be translated into ODF or even into other Microsoft formats except as graphics. As a result, Science magazine is refusing to accept manu
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http://blogs.msdn.com/brian_jones/archive/2006/10/ 12/comparison-of-openxml-math-and-mathml.aspx [msdn.com]
You can get MathML out of Office docx documents quite easily using XSL transforms...
http://dpcarlisle.blogspot.com/2007/04/xhtml-and-m athml-from-office-20007.html [blogspot.com]
ODF equivalent to OpenXML .. ? (Score:2)
Actually OpenDocument was developed by OASIS and published as an ISO standard. As such Sun, or any other single company don't own it. Microsofts covenant only promises not to sue for certain parts of the covered specification [microsoft.com] that are convienently not defined in the license. Why it's split up into chunks like this is curious.
"So basically it seems that the licensing issues surrounding ODF and OpenXML are pretty much equivalent"
Essencial
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OpenXML is definitely a response to ODF.
They day Microsoft sues a company for implementing OpenXML is the day OpenXML becomes completely irrelevant to anybody wanting their data in free, flexible, open formats. It would put ODF and packages implementing it back on the table as the only option available to these institutions. It's simply not going to happen.
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"The battle we are fighting is over who controls [edge-op.org] the next generation applications and system architecture, APIs and services"
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Having seen how this works, MS is now afraid that the same thing will happen in the market that MS Office currently dominates. How much share does a competitor need to break Microsoft's grip? 10%? 5%? 3%? Nobody knows and Microsoft i