Swedish Standards Vote on OOXML Declared Invalid, SIS to Abstain
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After considerable suspicion was cast on the reasons why, and the methods how, 23 extra members joined the Swedish international standards body SIS as recently as the day before it was to vote on recommending Microsoft's Office Open XML to the ISO, the SIS has decided to invalidate its "Yes, with comments" vote, and to cast an abstention in next week's ISO proceedings.
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No fast-tracking for you, sonny Google has proved unable to restrain itself from gloating over the ISO (International Organisation for Standardisation) decision not to approve Microsoft's request that the OOXML specification be fast-tracked for approval.â¦
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft Corp. has failed in its attempt to have its Office Open XML document format fast-tracked straight to the status of an international standard by the International Organization for Standardization. The proposal must now be revised to take into account the negative comments made during the voting process. Microsoft expects that a second vote early next year will result in approval, it said Tuesday. A proposal must pass two voting hurdles in order to be approved as an ISO standard: it must win the support of two-thirds of voting national standards bodies that participated in work on the proposal, known as P-members, and also of three-quarters of all voting members. OOXML failed on both counts, according to figures provided by Microsoft, and by other sources with knowledge of the voting process. ISO has not yet officially announced the results. Microsoft could miss out on revenue from the lucrative government market if OOXML is also rejected next year. Some governments, worried that the need for access to electronic archives held in proprietary formats leaves them hostage to their software vendor, have mandated the use of document formats that comply with open international standards. Others are considering such a move, which could put Microsoft at a double disadvantage to open source products such as OpenOffice.org, which not only store files natively in the standardized Open Document Format, but are free.
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Despite an impassioned speech by a group member criticizing its technical merit, Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) document format will receive the United States' "yes" vote before the ISO standards body this weekend.
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(InfoWorld) - A technical committee in India unanimously rejected Microsoft's Office Open XML file format as a standard, ahead of aÂ vote on Sept. 2 by the ISO on whether to approve Open XML as an international standard. However, the rejection may be temporary should Microsoft meet some of the objections to Open XML raised by committee members. The technical committee was set up by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), India's national standards body, which is a founder member of International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and represents India at the international standards organization. "There were a large number of technical objections raised about Open XML, and many of which Microsoft was not able to address at this point," said D.B. Phatak, professor at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Mumbai. One of the objections was that Open XML was not fully compatible with OpenDocument Format (ODF), a rival existing ISO standard, he added. IIT Mumbai is a member of the technical committee. The decision not to back Open XML as a standard was taken after a late evening meeting of the technical committee on Thursday in Delhi. Microsoft and Indian outsourcer Infosys Technologies were in favor of the committee voting "yes" but with qualifying comments, according to informed sources. That option wasn't available for voters. Open XML will be again reconsidered for a standard by the technical committee and BIS after Microsoft makes the required changes to the document format, Phatak said. Microsoft said in a statement that it respected the decision taken by the BIS, but it was important to note that all the BIS members unanimously supportÂ  the need for multiple standards. The company will work with the BIS and the committee members on the comments noted during the ballot resolution process, the statement added. Â
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The defeat of Microsoft&#39;s Open XML proposal before the International Standards Organization is more than a small hiccup in the software giant&#39;s plans to make its document file format a global standard, some analysts now say.
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Chicken hawk Microsoft is crying foul against IBM in its campaign for fast-track approval of XML Office file formats as an international standard.â¦
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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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The Open Document Format saw a marked uptick in use last year across the globe, according to the ODF Alliance&#39;s 2007 report.Twelve countries and six regional governments have adopted &quot;pro-ODF policies,&quot; according to the group, composed of companies and organizations that advocate for the format. The latest countries are the Netherlands and South Africa, which require government agencies to use the format. Also, more than 40 applications now support ODF, and the Alliance&#39;s membership ranks are set to rise above 500, according to the report.&quot;Considering where we started when we launched the alliance back in 2006, the developments in 2007 are amazing in terms of the progress that has been made,&quot; said Marino Marcich, managing director of the group.&quot;It&#39;s one thing to recognize ODF as a matter of policy in an enterprise architecture framework and another to mandate its use,&quot; he added. &quot;Proprietary formats in the public sphere are going out of style and becoming unacceptable globally.&quot;The ODF Alliance&#39;s report marks another chapter in the long-brewing debate over Microsoft&#39;s Office Open XML document format and ODF, which is supported by the likes of Sun Microsystems&#39; StarOffice application suite and Google&#39;s hosted productivity software.OOXML is the native file format in Microsoft Office 2007, and&#160;Microsoft is attempting to get it recognized as a standard. ODF advocates have lambasted OOXML, calling it far too proprietary to warrant such a stamp of approval.Marcich echoed that charge. &quot;Microsoft certainly has the right to advance its proprietary format,&quot; he said. &quot;What it doesn&#39;t have the right to do is call OOXML open and interoperable. ... We&#39;d love it if Microsoft supported ODF in its products natively.&quot;Despite the prevalence of Office software, ODF nonetheless has a chance to thrive, Marcich argued.Today, he noted, Microsoft&#39;s&#160;DOC format, not OOXML, is still dominant. &quot;If the question is &#39;what is the future,&#39; clearly ODF has the lead right now,&quot; he said.OOXML cannot supplant&#160;DOC until the majority of organizations and users upgrade to Office 2007, he noted, a process that will not occur imminently.&quot;We have a window here where governments have time to make a decision as to upgrading,&quot; he said. &quot;I think 2008 will be a critical year as to which format will emerge as the format of the future.&quot;Another ODF advocate, Andy Updegrove, also expressed pleasure over ODF&#39;s adoption to date and optimism about its future. &quot;The tipping point has been passed. I don&#39;t think it will lead to a deluge, but progress will continue,&quot; said Updegrove, an attorney with Gesmer Updegrove in Boston. Updegrove serves as legal counsel to technology companies as well as standards bodies, including OASIS, and closely tracks the ODF-OOXML saga on his blog.Updegrove predicted that 2008 will be &quot;a tough year for Office,&quot; pointing beyond ODF and OOXML to broader trends in computer usage. &quot;The monolithic idea of an office suite is really eroding, and the younger you are, the more meaningless it becomes,&quot; he said.Microsoft did not respond to a request for comment Friday.Another win for ODF in the United States could come soon. New York officials are expected to decide which format the state will use in its systems. The public comment period for the matter had originally been scheduled to end on Dec. 28, but an updated document on the state&#39;s Web site indicates that the period has been extended to Jan. 18.
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UPDATED - In what could be Microsoft's most symbolic victory to date in the battle to legitimize the principal formats used by its Office applications, the State of Massachusetts officially declared Office Open XML -- the new standard format set in Office 2007 -- "another standardized XML-based file format specification suitable for office applications."
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Bill would require state agencies to adopt ODF as a standard and exclude the use of proprietary file formats.
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The companyâs Office Open XML document fails to meet two criteria for a standards designation.
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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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The International PHP Magazine has posted the results from their latest poll conducted over the week. This time they asked developers what they looked for in a framework.   The options this time were:  An O-O MVC structure ORM / Active Record Good Controller Structure Ajax Interoperability Ability to Incorporate Testing Open Source/Free License Security Good Helpers Scaffolding  With the first option "an OO MVC structure" leading the pack with almost twenty percent. Next in line was (in order of votes): having an Open Source/fre license, bundled with good helpers, good security, and a good controller structure.   Be sure to check out their latest poll too. It asks about security architectures and what developers out there think they should contain.
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A California judge says Diebold Election Systems broke the law when it threatened students for posting internal company memos on the web. Advocates say this is a precedent-setting victory for free speech on the web, and a warning to litigious companies. By Kim Zetter.
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Rather than stacking the vote, Microsoft simply wanted to allow interested organizations to participate in the Open XML standardization process, unlike other rival efforts, a company executive said Wednesday.Critics and supporters of the competing ODF (Open Document Format) have accused Microsoft of stacking votes, particularly a preliminary vote late last year in the International Organization for Standardization regarding standardization of the Open XML format.&quot;We have a very different perspective&quot; on how that process occurred, said Tom Robertson, general manager of Microsoft&#39;s corporate interoperability and standards group, speaking to a group of journalists from around the world in Kirkland, Wash. &quot;There was an increase in participation both from ODF proponents trying to stop this and people who wanted to see it to promote choice,&quot; he said. That meant that more than the &quot;old guard&quot; -- companies such as IBM that typically participate in such processes -- became involved, he said.Microsoft wanted to involve anyone who has a stake in interoperability, including governments, technology companies, academics, and enterprises, he said. &quot;This cannot be a closed-door process,&quot; he said. &quot;Should those who are impacted by this decision have a seat at the table? Absolutely. Should it be restricted to Open XML advocates? No, it shouldn&#39;t be.&quot;Microsoft also defended&#160;its choice of Ecma to initially standardize the technology, rather than another standards body. &quot;It is one of the leaders in standardization in the IT space for decades,&quot; Robertson said.All but one member -- IBM -- of the Ecma general assembly voted to adopt the standard. The general assembly also voted to pass it on to ISO, a worldwide standardization body, for ratification.Despite that progress, critics wonder why Microsoft built the technology in the first place when there was&#160;already an existing open file format, ODF.&quot;It starts with our customers,&quot; Robertson said. &quot;Many say that ODF doesn&#39;t meet their needs.&quot;As an example, the ODF group initially decided not to support spreadsheet formulas, said Gray Knowlton, group product manager for Microsoft Office. &quot;When we look at customers of Excel, we can&#39;t give them a standard that doesn&#39;t recognize spreadsheet formulas,&quot; he said. However, he also noted that ODF later reversed that decision to support spreadsheet formulas.Microsoft is hopeful that Open XML will pass an upcoming ISO vote, but if it doesn&#39;t, it won&#39;t be the end of Open XML, the executives said. &quot;It&#39;s already an open standard and already available to the community,&quot; said Robertson. &quot;The issue here in the ratification is: Does the global community want a voice in the evolution of Open XML going forward.&quot;Also, if individual governments mandate the use of ODF instead of Open XML, Microsoft would adapt, Knowlton said. The company would then implement the missing functionality that ODF doesn&#39;t support. However, those extensions would be custom-designed and outside of the standard, which is counter to the idea of an open document standard, Knowlton said. &quot;Disastrous? No. But definitely not preferable,&quot; he said.
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(InfoWorld) - It may be Valentine's Day but there are no love letters being exchanged between duelling electronic document formats, ODF (OpenDocument Format) and Open XML. Instead, Microsoft, the backer of Open XML, took a public swing at ODF supporter IBM. Microsoft posted an open letter on its Web site Wednesday titled "Interoperability, Choice, and Open XML," signed by two of its general managers -- Tom Robertson, who handles interoperability and standards, and Jean Paoli, responsible for interoperability and XML architecture. In the letter, Microsoft claimed that IBM is attempting to slow down the approval process by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) to recognize Open XML as an international standard. IBM declined to comment publicly on the letter, but a spokesman said the company had previously addressed many of the issues raised by Microsoft. In May, ISO approved ODF as an international standard and is currently considering whether to award the same recognition to Open XML. ODF has the backing of such companiesÂ as IBM, Google, Novell, Sun, and open-source players. Open XML is the default file format for Microsoft's Office 2007 desktop applications suite. What has yet to become clear is which document format users will favor -- ODF or Open XML -- or whether they'd adopt a mix of the two. Some vendors, such as Corel, have already announced they're adopting a neutral approach and will support both formats in their software. IT users and governments around the world are expressing interest in open-standard document formats to help ensure continued access to archived information and also free them from having to use Microsoft's Office software. In December, standards body ECMA International voted 20 to 1 to approve Open XML as a global standard and submitted the format to ISO for its approval. The dissenting vote came from IBM, according to Microsoft. "IBM has declared victory in blocking Open XML," the Microsoft letter alleges, claiming that IBM is holding up the standards process in a "blatant attempt" to limit choice in the marketplace designed to favor the vendor's Lotus Notes groupware, which doesn't support Open XML. Microsoft and IBM are the two leading desktop collaboration software vendors with IBM's Notes pitted against Microsoft's Outlook and Exchange software. Microsoft is fearful that ODF may become the de facto electronic document format by default simply because it was first to achieve ISO recognition as an international standard, the letter stated. "In XML-based file formats, which can easily interoperate through translators and be implemented side by side in productivity software, this exclusivity makes no sense -- except to those who lack confidence in their ability to compete in the marketplace on the technical merits of their alternative standard," the letter continued. "This campaign to limit choice and force their single standard on consumers should be resisted." The timing of the release of Microsoft's letter is interesting given that it comes a day after the Oasis standards body announced its approval of a new version of the ODF standard, OpenDocument 1.1. The changes in ODF 1.1 are designed to address concerns voiced by advocacy groups that the previous release didn't meet the needs of people with disabilities. The level of accessibility support provided in ODF 1.1 is now on a par or exceeds that available in other file formats. Â