[Wylug-discuss] 'Pathetic' FLOSS Advocacy - Put it to the test?

[Dave Fisher]

On Thu, Jan 25, 2007 at 05:07:43PM +0000, Mike Goodman wrote:
> Cutting it to the quick, am I to understand this relates to the Open
> Document Format? 

Only indirectly.  

ODF is already an ISO standard, and is independent of Open Office, hence
the ability of any office suite/application (e.g. Corel Word Perfect,
Abiword, Kword, or Even Microsoft Office) to use it as a format.

OOXML is Microsoft's attempt to create a second, competing, ISO standard
for office document formats.  It contains, in essence, the usual MS
Office formats expressed as XML. The XML is written is such a way as to
make it practically impossible to use the full set of formatting
features in anything other than MS Office.

Microsoft clearly aren't interested in creating a genuinely 'Open' XML
standard.

What they need is something that can be sold as if it were one.

You see, Microsoft's  problem is that the universal character of their
services, practically requires governments to exchange data in Open
Standards.

If OOXML isn't accepted as a standard, MS-Office will swiftly decline in
all government institutions and all large corporations who intimately
engage with them.

If OOXML is modified so that it becomes truly Open, it becomes possible
for organisations to change their Office software supplier without a
negative effect on their data ... you can see how much Microsoft would
like that idea (not).

Dave