Corporate IT Sticks With Office Formats
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A poll of more than 50 corporate IT managers shows there&#8217;s little private-sector interest in the Open Document Format, one of the technologies that could free users from Microsoft&#8217;s proprietary format.
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Microsoft Corp. is behind schedule in complying with a court order to document its proprietary communications protocols, according to U.S. authorities monitoring its behavior. It also plans to release the documents in a file format that cannot be annotated, and can only be used with Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser, they said in a report published Friday.
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BOSTON -- A data format used in Microsoft Corp.'s prevalent Office software line has been approved as an international standard _ a move aimed at preserving access to documents created with the package for years to come.
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Officials in New York are nearing decision-making time about which XML-based office document format, ODF or OOXML, that state will use across the IT systems of its agencies as the debate over a universal file format continues.According to the state&#39;s Web site, the public comment period about whether the state should mandate a document format is scheduled to end Dec. 28. At that point officials will review all comments and decide which course of action to take.In August, the state legislature requested that New York Chief Information Officer and Director of the Office for Technology Melodie Mayberry-Stewart gather information and input from people who would be affected about how the state should approach access, creation and maintenance of electronic documents in a way that achieves, among other things, vendor neutrality and interoperability.A document posted to the state Web site outlines questions users should consider when debating whether ODF or OOXML would be a better fit for New York government agencies. They have until 5 p.m. EST on Dec. 28 to make their comments, which should be sent electronically to the state technology office&#39;s Principal Attorney Darlene Van Sickle via e-mail to erecords-study@oft.state.ny.usIn addition to New York, other states, including Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Texas, have eyed mandating one document file format across their IT systems.The debate over whether ODF (Open Document Format for XML) or OOXML (Open XML) should be the universal file format for office documents apparently will remain heated in 2008 after a stormy year for those on both sides.In September,&#160;the International Organization for Standardization rejected an attempt by Microsoft to use another standards body, Ecma International, to fast-track OOXML through the standards process. Complaints poured in that Microsoft placed people sympathetic to its cause in key voting positions toward the end of the process in an attempt to swing the vote in its favor.The next month, a group designed to promote ODF, the OpenDocument Foundation, withdrew support of ODF in favor of CDF (Compound Document Format). As 2007 closes, companies like IBM, Sun, and Google continue to promote ODF, while Microsoft remains the most visible supporter of OOXML.
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ODF fans say, 'we're not simple, we're elegant' Microsoft has made technical information for its older binary Office document formats available for download following pressure from participants in the ongoing, somewhat fiery, standardisation debate.â¦
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The Office of Personnel Management wants to convert its retirement-related documents into electronic form, but it's no small task: There are about 8 million pages to be digitized.
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Did Redmond try to pack standards groups? Microsoft's failed attempt to get its Office Open XML (OOXML) file format adopted by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) could land the software giant in hot water with the European Commission (EC).â¦
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App-free Windows coming to a poor community near you... Software giant Microsoft is to abruptly ditch the use of Office through its popular global community refurbishment scheme.â¦
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Microsoft Office, software for creating documents, spreadsheets and presentations, is seeing its growth slow. Microsoft isn't pleased.
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A Microsoft blog posting from a software engineer apologized for botching up communications around the blocking of old Office, Corel, and Lotus file formats in Office 2003 SP3. Why did anyone think these were security risks?
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A data format used in Microsoft Corp.'s prevalent Office software line has been approved as an international standard &#151; a move aimed at preserving access to documents created with the package for years to come.
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(InfoWorld) - You might think the steady defeat of bills in several U.S. states to mandate the use of free interoperable file formats might dampen the spirits of IBM, one of the prime supporters ofÂ ODF (OpenDocument Format). Far from it, said IBM's Bob Sutor, who sees the recent news as par for the course in the evolution of any open standard. Last week, California became the latest U.S. state to stall or shelve proposed legislation to require its agencies to adopt open file formats like ODF instead of Microsoft's proprietary Office formats. Similar bills in Connecticut, Florida, Texas, and Oregon have met with the same fate, while Minnesota only passed legislation after it was changed from a mandate to use an open format to a call for the state's IT department to investigate the issue. Massachusetts, the first and so far only, U.S. state with a policy on using open formats, shifted that position somewhat last year to order the adoption of plug-ins to enable Office users to create and save files in ODF. In an interview earlier this week, Sutor, vice president of standards and open source at IBM, talked about ODF and Microsoft's rival Office Open XML document standard. IDGNS: What's your take on the defeat of legislation in several U.S. statesÂ that would've mandated the use of open document formats? Is it a setback for the adoption of ODF? Sutor: We've seen this before around open standards. Take the Web itself. It went mainstream in about 1994 to 1995. If you trace it back, the Web was starting in the late 1980s. It takes most technology standards between 5 to 10 years to become established. They start in committees, come into their own, and then commercial interests come in. Web services kicked off in 2000, and we saw SOAÂ in 2004 to 2005. Now, no one doubts that SOA is big business. In the same way, if you look back at ODF, you can go back to 2003 or 2005. It's still very, very early. We wouldn't have thought it possible in 2005 that in 2007 there would even be any legislative considering of ODF. It's great that people are even talking about this in the first place. It's extremely early. Legislative committee talks take time. One year, a member proposes something, they meet that year on it, and the next meeting isn't until the next year. In some states like Texas they only meet every other year. I certainly expect the legislation to come back with a vengeance in the next sessions. Also, government IT policy makers aren't waiting for legislation, they're making active decisions. Changes are under way. Minnesota's bill will give a strong lead to other states. IDGNS: Where do you think ODF is at in terms of your prediction of five to 10 years for a standard to establish itself? Sutor: We're at about year three or four. IDGNS: It seems as though IBM and Microsoft are pitted against each other with ODF versus Microsoft's OpenXML. Sutor: The only one talking about a feud between Microsoft and IBM is Microsoft. On the ODF side, it's not just us, but we're a such a big company, we're going to say something. There's nothing whatsoever about ODF that particularly enables IBM. OpenOffice [an open-source office rival to Microsoft's Office] benefits; that's not our baby, we don't control it. We've put ourselves in a position where [with ODF] there are all the potential benefits of open source. It's interchangeability along with interoperability so if someone doesn't want to use someone's software, they can choose to use something else. I absolutely don't see this as a feud for Microsoft and IBM. We provide chips for the Xbox, we have a large, if not the biggest, services business around .Net. There's no feud. ODF is in the Oasis [standards body]. Microsoft is on the board of directors of Oasis and has steadfastly refused to participate in ODF. We're happy for them to join and would welcome them with open arms. IDGNS: Some potential users would like to see one single standard, a combination of ODF and OpenXML. Could that ever be a possibility? Sutor: It's more a difference in technology. Microsoft XML technology is simply not good XML. Look at the English language. It's a bunch of letters, words, and grammar, and you can use the rules to form sentences. That's similar to XML. You can sit down to write a novel, and so can I. I might write the worst novel, and you write the best. Just using XML doesn't guarantee quality in the same way that using English doesn't guarantee great novels. Microsoft's XML doesn't take into account modern design and steadfastly ignores other XML standards. I have a sneaking suspicion that OpenXML isn't the last format we'll hear from Microsoft. It's totally a personal thing, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a new XML from Microsoft in a few years and one with an architecture a lot like ODF. I could then see a natural convergence which could bring the two together.
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Microsoft can change.  Just give it a few more decades.
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Officials at Corel are still trying to figure out why Microsoft is blocking older file formats in Office 2003 SP3 as a security move. Among the files blocked: .cdr files from Corel.
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PC Magazine - Microsoft's Office team downplayed the threat from Google's Web-based word processing and spreadsheet applications, saying they are unlikely to appeal to corporate customers.
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This manufacturing company replaces a lot of large, high-speed printers in the factory and decides to lease instead of buy. One key requirement: They must be PostScript compatible.
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You'll still have to validate your Office program, however.