A week or so ago, I published a podcast at IT Conversation with Scott Mace interviewing Gary Edwards about OpenDocument. Edwards is the president of the OpenDocument Foundation. OpenDocument Foundation is a non-profit that works to promote the OpenDocument file format–an XML file format for office documents.

There’s no question that businesses want an XML-based file format for office data. The question, naturally, is which XML-based file format. Microsoft has it’s own XML-based file format called OpenXML.

• 
  
  ODEF Strategies: Examples from European Administration
  
  


• 
  
  Practical Experiences with the implementation of ODEF
  
  


• 
  
  Report on ODEF-Standardisation activities
  
  


• 
  
   4 parallel sessions with participants 
  
  


• 
  
   A panel discussion with stakeholders 

Subject: Suggested ODF1.2 items

• From: "Florian Reuter" <freuter@novell.com>


• To: <office@lists.oasis-open.org>


• Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 17:03:24 +0100

Suggested enhancement for OpenDocument V1.2

Microsoft trounces pro-ODF forces in state battles over open document formats

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June 03, 2007
(Computerworld)

Keeping it private

The other problem, Mathers said, was 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. "Suddenly, nobody wanted to sign witness affirmation forms and testify," he said.

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 converted over to using ODF, IBM declined to dispute her claims, Mathers said -- despite having earlier given "gleaming" reports on the progress of ODF in Massachusetts. "That's when I really started to question the whole bill," he said.