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Gary Edwards

Can IBM save OpenOffice.org from itself? - 0 views

www.computerworld.com/...article.do

shared by Gary Edwards on 11 Jan 08 - Cached
  • OpenOffice.org's biggest foe may be Microsoft Office, but critics say the open-source organization has, from its inception, also been one of its application suite's own worst enemies -- a victim of a development culture that differs radically from the open-source norm. Observers now wonder if IBM's entry into OpenOffice.org can make the necessary changes.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 11 Jan 08
       
      good article from Eric Lai of ComputerWorld. Written on the eve of the infamous Barcelona OpenOffice.org developers conference, Eric argues that OOo isn't a real open source community. Instead, OOo is a owned and operated by Sun.
      One of the more important control points Sun insists on is that of commit rights and project managers. Only Sun employees have these rights and can hold these important positions..
      The more important point is made by Marbux (below: ODF is an application specific format designed exactly for OpenOffice. While other applications might partially implement ODF, interoperability and successful ODF document exchange require the OOo code base!
      From Marbux: This is the only article I've found to date where IBM (Heintzman) flat out says IBM wants changes in OOo licensing, more in line with the Eclipse and Apache licenses. See pg. 2. Significant because it feeds the meme that IBM's own ODF-based development goal is proprietary closed source built on the OOo code base, e.g., Symphony, et cet.
      And that has huge signficance once you realize that ODF is not the real standard; the OOo code base is the real ODF standard. Look around the world and you see that ODF adoption decisions by governments are all in reality decisions to go with StarOffice, OOo, or OOo clones. I haven't, for example, seen a single instance where a government decided to ride with KOffice. Why would they, with the interop issues between KOffice and OOo? The fact that OOo's code base is the real ODF standard will figure strongly in the comments. Couple it with Sun's iron-fisted control of the OOo code base, and you have vendor lock-in with a Microsoft partner.
      But with 70 developers committed in China, where developers salaries are inexpensive, IBM will soon be in a position to threaten to fork the OOo code base using proprietary extensions. Is that their real tactic to force changes in licensing and gov
Gary Edwards

The big winner from Apache OpenOffice.org | ITworld - Brian Proffitt - 1 views

www.itworld.com/...ig-winner-apache-openofficeorg

OOo OpenOffice Apache-OpenOffice marbux Brian-Proffitt

shared by Gary Edwards on 04 Jun 11 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 04 Jun 11
     
    Brian is once again writing about OpenOffice and ODF, this time in the aftermath of Oracle's decision to cut OOo loose and turn it over to Apache instead of The Document Foundation.  Good discussion - features a lengthy comment from the mighty Marbux where he vigorusly corrects the river of spin coming out of IBM.  Worth a careful read! excerpt: IBM seems to maneuver itself to any open source project that suits its needs, and for whatever reason they have decided to hitch their wagon to Oracle's star (or vice versa). With this historical context, there is really little surprise in Oracle's decision to go with the Apache Software Foundation, because IBM was probably influencing the decision. My second question doesn't have a definitive answer--yet. But it needs to be answered. It is simply this: how will OpenOffice.org remain relevant to end users?
  • Paul Merrell on 04 Jun 11
     
    I should have added to that comment a stronger warning for the Apache Foundation Board and developers considering joining the IBM-backed Apache OpenOffice.org incubator project in regard to the danger posed by IBM and Oracle's control of the OpenDocument Formats Technical Committee at OASIS, aptly characterized by IBM's Rob Weir: "Those who control the exchange format, can control interoperability and turn it on or off like a water faucet to meet their business objectives." Rob Weir, Those Who Forget Santayana, An Antic Disposition (20 December 2007), http://www.robweir.com/blog/2007/12/those-who-forget-santayana.html What IBM, Oracle, and others can do by manipulating the ODF specification that Apache OOo depends upon is something entirely outside the control of the Apache Foundation. And as history has taught us so well, IBM and Sun exercised that control mercilessly via their co-chairmanship of the ODF TC to block all real interoperability initiatives. That is the very reason that only ODF implementations that share the same code base can interoperate. And if one were tempted to think that IBM and Sun/Oracle would not even consider manipulating the ODF specification to their own commercial advantage, consider the fact that in writing the quoted statement above, Rob Weir was speaking from deep personal experience in in such activities. So beware, both Apache Foundation and LibreOffice developers.
Gary Edwards

GullFOSS: It's our way or the highway. So what if new cool features = Zero Interop? D... - 0 views

blogs.sun.com/...what%27s_up_in_the_writer

california davinci interop iso massachusetts oasis odef odf ooxml opendocument politics xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • When such new features that enhance the interoperability require enhancements to the Open Document file format we will propose the necessary changes to the OASIS Open Document TC. This way not only OpenOffice.org but also Open Document benefits from our efforts. Florian Reuter, who now works for Novell, lists some of the changes we have in mind in his blog . So there are a lot of common ideas how we can improve the interoperability between OpenOffice.org and Microsoft Word documents and I hope we can work together with Florian here.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    The chuckleheads at Sun's StarOffice/OpenOffice Hamburg office respond to Florian's comprehensive lis tof suggestions to greatly improve ODF interoperability. 
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Make no mistake about it. Microsoft is absolutely right about three things: .... Compatibility with existing file formats is not an ODF concern. .... Sun controls the OASIS ODF TC. .... Sun makes certain that ODF is bound tightly to the OpenOffice feature set. Sun's view of interoperability is that of a one way street. Documents can be converted into ODF-OOo/SO, but they are guaranteed to break during any kind of document routing or round tripping. This is also the reason why the Sun "external" plugin for MSOffice fails. One way conversion simply isn't enough to crack the hold MSOffice has on critical day to day business processes. The only way to that is with a conversion process able to maintain high level fidelity while round tripping. As the EU IDABC has figured out, the ODF-OOo/SO specification is loaded with interoperability break points. That's why they are turning to ODEF, which can be seen as a version of ODF that is truly application independent and optimized for interoperability. ~ge~
Paul Merrell

GullFOSS - 0 views

blogs.sun.com/...etter_odf_support_in_microsoft

shared by Paul Merrell on 15 May 09 - Cached
  • I normally don't post my ODF Plugin news and information on GullFOSS, but so many people complain (everywhere, including in OOo mailing lists) about the bad ODF support in Microsoft Office 2007 SP2, that I thought it might be a good idea to post some information about the ODF Plugin here... The Sun ODF Plugin for Microsoft Office, which is based on OpenOffice.org, adds support for ODF to Microsoft Office 2000 and newer versions. So you don't have to use the very latest Microsoft Office 2007 SP2 version (in case you really need Microsoft Office for some reason) , where ODF support is insufficient anyway.
  • Paul Merrell on 15 May 09
     
    Like IBM, Sun bad mouths Microsoft ODF support rather than repairing the relevant defects in the ODF specification. This despite no one yet having come forward with an example of non-conformance that withstands scrutiny. So what should have been bug reports filed against the specification is instead wielded as an advertising weapon against competitors. This is simply more "OOo defines what is valid ODF" horse puckey.
Gary Edwards

Study Shows Office Alternatives Failing to Sway Microsoft Users -- Microsoft Certified ... - 0 views

mcpmag.com/...g-to-sway-microsoft-users.aspx

forrester web-productivity-platform cloud-productivity workgroup-productivity MSOffice-productivity

shared by Gary Edwards on 16 May 11 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 16 May 11
     
    Interesting report from Forrester on Desktop Productivity.  It seems everyone is asking about alternatives to MSOffice, but coming away empty handed.  Sounds like everyone would like to drop MSOffice, but find the alternatives wanting.  IMHO, the Web based alternatives are long on collaboration but short on productivity.   Compound Documents, Reports and Forms are the fuel that powers legacy workgroup productivity environments.  Web Productivity platforms have a long way to go before they can provide effective, worker facing authoring systems capable of replacing binding and messaging internals such as OLE, ODBC, MAPI, ActiveX, COM and DCOM.   There also seems to be considerable confusion about the difference between Web based authoring alternatives to MSOffice, and Web based Productivity Platforms.  MSOffice is the authoring system for desktop/WorkGroup productivity environments.  But having this authoring system wouldn't mean much if not for the workgroup connectivity and exchange platform behind it that makes highly productive digital business processes and systems possible. Linked Data, messaging, collaboration, and connectivity API's and HTML+ (HTML5, CSS3, JSON, Canvas/SVG, JavaScript) are  showing up everywhere.  But they are not exclusive to Web based authoring systems.  Any desktop authoring system should be able to take advantage of the emerging productivity platform.   So what's the problem with OpenOffice, Symphony, Zoho and gDocs?  OOo and Symphony can't speak language of the Web; HTML+.  Browser based Zoho and gDocs lack the completeness of a Web productivity environment capable of hosting the business processes currently bound to the Windows WorkGroup productivity environment.  There is no indication that the experts at Forrester understand what should be obvious.   excerpt: According to a new Forrester Research report, IT orgs are still choosing Microsoft Office over its competitors.   Two factors appear to be stumbling bloc
Gary Edwards

ODF1.2 Interoperability Proposal - 0 views

www.oasis-open.org/...msg00048.html

california compatibility davinci interoperability iso massachusetts oasis odf officeopenxml ooxml opendocument openxml plugin xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • 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
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      This message was submitted to the ODF-OOo/SO OASIS TC the day Florian joined Novell. His Novell contract allowed him to continue his work as the OpenDcoument Foundation's CTO. Take note of the response from Sun's Michael Brauer. It's a classic. The link is at the bottom of the page. ~ge~
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Part of the sad but enduring "History of Failed ODF Interoperability Attempts".  This particular message is dated November 20th, 2006. 

    The OpenDocument Foundation was notified a week earlier that the "benefactor" ODF Community group Louis Gutierrez had asked IBM and Oracle to put together in Massachusetts had failed.  This was the group Louis formed around the da Vinci plugin and our InfoSet APi. 

    Florian has been hired by Novell, and his first day on the job he finds out about the IBM - Novell deal with Microsoft.  Now he has write the MOOXML plugin for OpenOffice using the MS-CleverAge Translator Project work.  So he writes this message to the ODF TC [office] list. 

    The interoperability enhancements Florian suggests are based on the <interoperability eXtensions> submitted in August to the ODF Metadata SC for consideration.

    The first element in this list tha tFlorian chose to tackle related to "Lists".  He called it the "LIst Override Proposal".  This became the now infamous "List Enhancement Proposal War" that resulted in Sun having OASIS boot out the Foundation.

    Such is life in big vendor ODF'dom

    ~ge~

Gary Edwards

LOL :: Microsoft's Jean Paoli on the XML document debate - 0 views

www.itwriting.com/blog

cdf microsoft mooxml odf odf-ix officeopenxml opendocument paoli

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • What’s distinctive about the goals of OOXML? Primarily, to have full fidelity with pre-existing binary documents created in Microsoft Office. “What people want is to make sure that their billions of important documents can be saved in a format where they don’t lose any information. As a design goal, we said that those formats have to represent all the information that enables high-fidelity migration from the binary formats”, says Paoli. He mentions work with institutions including the British Library and the US Library of Congress, concerned to preserve the information in their electronic archive. I asked Paoli if such users could get equally good fidelity by converting their documents to ODF. “Absolutely not,” he says. “I am very clear on that. Those two formats are done for different reasons.” What can go wrong? Paoli gives as an example the myriad ways borders can be drawn round tables in Microsoft Office and all its legacy versions. “There are 100 ways to draw the lines around a table,” he says. “The Open XML format has them all, but ODF which has not been designed for backward compatibility, does not have them. It’s really the tip of the iceberg. So if someone translates a binary document with a table to ODF, you will lose the framing details. That is just a very small example.”
  • “Open Document Format and Office Open XML have very different goals”, says Paoli, responding to the claim that the world needs only one standard XML format for office documents. “Both of them are formats for documents … both are good.”
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      The door should have been slammed shut on OOXML near five years ago when, on December 14th, 2006, at the very first OASIS ODF TC meeting, Stellent's Phil Boutros proposed that the charter include, "compatibility with existing file formats and interoperability with existing applications" as a priority objective.
  • I put it to Paoli that OOXML is hard to implement because of all its legacy support, some of which is currently not well documented. “I don’t believe that at all. It’s actually the opposite,” he says. He make the point that third parties like Corel, which have previously implemented support for binary formats like .doc and .xls, should find it easy to transition to OOXML. “We believe Open XML adoption by vendors like Corel will be very easy because they have already been doing 90% of the work, doing the binary formats. The features are already there.”
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      WordPerfect does an excellent import of MSWord .doc documents. But there is no conversion! It's a read only rendering. Once you start editing the document in WP, all kinds of funny things happen, and the perfect fidelity melts away like the wicked witch of west in a bucket full of water.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Another benefit Paoli claims for OOXML is performance. “A lot of things are designed differently because we believe it will work faster. The spreadsheet format has been designed for very big spreadsheets because we know our users, especially in the finance industry, use very large spreadsheets.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      Wrong. The da Vinci plug-in prototype we demonstrated to Massachusetts on June 19th, 2006 proved that there is little or no difference in spreadsheet performance between a OOXML file, and an ODF file.

      In fact, ODF version of the extremely large test file beat the OOXML load by 12 seconds.

      Where the performance difference comes in is at the application level. MS Excel can load a OOXML version of a large spreadsheet faster than OpenOffice can load an ODF version of that same spreadsheet.

      If you eliminate the application differential, and load the OOXML file and the ODF version of that same spreadsheet into a plug-in enabled Excel, the performance differences are negligible.

      The reason for this is that the OOXML plug-in for Excel has a conversion overhead identical to the da Vinci plug-in for Excel. It has nothing to do with the file format, and everythign to do with the application.

      ~ge~
  • Paoli points to the conversion errors as evidence of how poorly ODF can represent legacy Office documents. My hunch is that this has more to do with the poor quality of the converter.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      Note that these OASIS ODF TC November 20th iX "interoperability enhancement" suggestions were submitted by Novell as part of their effort to perfect a OOXML plug-in for OpenOffice!!!!

      "Lists" were th first of these iX items to be submitted as formal proposal. And Sun fought that list proposal viciously for the next four months. The donnybrook resulted i a total breakdown of the ODF consensus process. But, it ensured that never again would anyone be stupid enough to challenge Sun's authority and control of the OASIS ODF TC.

      Sun made it clear that they would viciously oppose any other efforts to establish interoperability with existing Microsoft documents, applications, processes effort.

      Point taken.

      ~ge~
  • the idea that Sun is preparing a reference implementation of OOXML is laughable.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      Sorry Tim. It's true. Sun and Novell are working together to develop native OOXML file support in OpenOffice. You can find this clearly stated in the Gullfoss Planet OpenOffice blogs.

      The funny thing is that Sun will have to implement and support the November 20th iX enhancements submitted by Novell!! (Or, the interoperability frameworks also submitted by Novell in February of 2007). There is simply no other way for OpenOffice to implement OOXML with the needed fidelity.

      ~ge~
  • One of new scenarios enabled by the “custom xml parts” (again, if you read their blogs, you must have heard of this stuff) is the ability to bind xml sources and a control+layout so that it enables the equivalent of data queries (we’ve had in Excel for many years already), just with a source which is part of the package, contrary to the typical external data source connection. Well this stuff, besides the declaration (which includes, big surprise, GUIDs and stuff like that) requires the actual Office 2007 run-time to work. So whenever MS says this stuff is interoperable, they cannot mean you can take this stuff away in another application. Because you can’t. This binding is more or less the same than the embedding of VBA macros. It’s all application-specific, and only Microsoft’s own suite knows how to instantiate this stuff.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      Stephan whacks this one out of the park! Smart Documents will replace VBa scripts, macros and OLE functionality going forward. It's also the data binding - workflow and metadata model of the future. And it's all proprietary!

      It's the combination of OOXML plus the MSOffice- Vista Stack specific Smart Documents that will lock end users into the Vista Stack for years to come.

      Watch out Google!

      ~ge~
  • Has Microsoft published the .doc spec publicly? Then why should ODF worry about the past? It’s not ODF’s concern to worry about Microsoft’s past formats. (Understand that the .doc format alone changed six times in the last eight versions of Office!) That’s Microsoft’s legacy problem, not ODF’s.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      There really is no need to access the secret binary blueprints. The ACME 376 plug-in demonstration proves this conclusively. The only thing the ACME 376 demo lacks is that we didn't throw the switch on the magic key to release all VBa scripts, macros and OLE bindings to ACME. But that can be done if someone is serious about converting the whole shebang of documents, applications and processes.

      The real problem is that although ACME 376 proves we can hit the high fidelity required, it is impossible to effectively capture that fidelity in ODF without the iX interoperability enhancements. The world expects ODF interoperability. But as long as Sun opposes iX, we can't pipe from ACME 376 to ODF.

      ~ge~
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Tim Anderson interviews Microsoft's Jean Paoli about MOOXML and ODF.    Jean Paoli of course has the predictable set of answers.  But Tim anderson provides us with some interesting insights and comments of his own.  There is also a gem of a comment from Stephane Rodriquez, the reknown spreadsheet expert.

    The bottom line for Microsoft has not changed.  MOOXML exists because of the need for an XML file format compatible with the legacy of existing MSOffic ebinary documents.  He claims that ODF is not compatible, and offers the "page borders" issue as an example.

    Page borders?  What's that got to do with the ODF file format?   These are application specific, application bound proprietary graphics that can not be ported to any other application - like OpenOffice.  The reason has nothign whatsoever to do with ODF and everything to do with the fact that the page border library is bound to MSOffice and not available to other applications like OpenOffice. 

    So here is an application specific feature tha tJean Paoli claims can not be expressed in ODF, but can in MOOXML.  But when are running the da Vinci ODF plugin in MSWord, there is no problem whatsoever in capturing the page borders in ODF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  No problem!!!!!!!!!!

    The problem is opening up that same da Vinci MSWord document in OpenOffice.  That's where the page borders are dropped.  The issue is based entirely on the fact that OpenOffice is unable to render these MSWord specific graphics bound to an MSOffice only library.

    If however we take that same page border loaded da Vinci MSWord document, and send it half way across the world to another MSWord desktop running da Vinci, the da Vinci plugin easily loads the ODF document into MSWord where it is perfectly rendered, page borders and all!!!!!!!!

    Now i will admit that this is one very difficult issue to understand.  If not f
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Great interview. Tim can obviously run circles around poor Jean Paoli.
Gary Edwards

Microsoft playing three card monte with XML conversion, with Sun as the "outside man" w... - 0 views

blogs.zdnet.com/open-source

backwards-compatibility iso microsoft odf ooxml xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • In a highly informative post to his Open Stack blog Wednesday, Edwards explains how three key features are necessary for organizations to convert to open formats. These are: Conversion Fidelity - the billions of binaries problem Round Trip Fidelity - the MSOffice bound business processes, line of business integrated apps, and assistive technology type add-ons Application Interop - the cross platform, inter application, cross information domain problem
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Dana Blankenhorn posted this article back in March of 2007.  It was right at the time when the OASIS ODF TC and Metadata XML/RDF SC (Sub Committee) were going at it hammer and tong concerning three very important file format characteristics needed to fulfill a real world interoperability expectation:

    .... Compatibility - file format level interop -
    :::  backwards compatibility / compatibility with existing file formats, including the legacy of billions of binary Microsoft documents

    ....... Interoperability - application level interop-
    ::::::  application interoperability including interop with all Microsoft applications

Gary Edwards

Game Over! Latest Draft of Mass. ETRM Includes OOXML - 0 views

www.consortiuminfo.org/...article.php

davinci iso massachusetts microsoft odf officeopenxml ooxml opendocument xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • this new draft includes Microsoft's OOXML formats as an acceptable "open format."&nbsp;
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Game Over?  Probably.  I've been expecting Massachusetts to publicly revise the ODF mandate to include OOXML ever since Louis Gutierrez resigned in early October of 2006.  That was as clear a signal that ODF had failed in Massachusetts as anyone needed.

    The only surprise is that it took the new CIO, Beth Pepoli so long to make the announcement that OOXML would be recognized as an officially recognized open XML file format going forward.

    Andy UpDegrove of course does his best to downplay the significance of this announcement.  But how can this not be the deathnell for ODF? 

    The failure of ODF in Massachusetts has resulted in a world wide recognition that it is impossible to implement ODF. 

    This is exactly what happened to ODF mandate legislature in California.  The CIO's in California uniformly rejected both ODF legislation and Sun's hapless effort to set up an ODF Pilot Study based on what had happened in Massachusetts.  If Mass couldn't implement ODF, than they saw no reason for them to try.

    And it does come down to "implementation". 

    Most people think the implementation of ODF is as easy as downloading OepnOffice and converting your legacy docuemnts to ODF as they are used.  Simply fix the artifacts of conversion in process, and never look back.  OOo is free.  So what's not to like?

    Well, the problem is that the world has fifteen plus years of building business processes, line of business integrated applications and other client/server integration on top of the MSOffice application suite.  These business processes are bound hard to MSOffice.

    So the barrier for OpenOffice and ODF is twofold.  Any implementation of ODF must overcome both the binary documents conversion barrier, and, the MSOffice bound business process barrier.

    The cost and disruption of a <font
Gary Edwards

Is It Game Over? - ODF Advocate Andy UpDegrove is Worried. Very Worried - 0 views

www.consortiuminfo.org/...article.php

iso oasis odf officeopenxml ooxml opendocument xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • This seems to me to be a turning point for the creation of global standards.&nbsp;Microsoft was invited to be part of the original ODF Technical Committee in OASIS, and chose to stand aside.&nbsp;That committee tried to do its best to make the standard work well with Office, but was naturally limited in that endeavor by Microsoft's unwillingness to cooperate.&nbsp;This, of course, made it easier for Microsoft to later claim a need for OOXML to be adopted as a standard, in order to "better serve its customers."&nbsp;The refusal by an incumbent to participate in an open standards process is certainly its right, but it is hardly conduct that should be rewarded by a global standards body charged with watching out for the best interests of all.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Andy UpDegrove takes on the issue of Microsoft submitting their proprietary "XML alternative to PDF" proposal to Ecma for consideration as an international standard.  MS XML-PDF will compliment ECMA 376 (OOXML - OfficeOpenXML) which is scheduled for ISO vote in September of 2007.  Just a bit over 60 days from today.

    Andy points out some interesting things; such as the "Charter" similarities between MS XML-PDF and MS OOXML submisssions to Ecma:

    MS XML-PDF Scope: The goal of the Technical Committee is to produce a formal standard for office productivity applications within the Ecma International standards process which is fully compatible with the Office Open XML Formats. The aim is to enable the implementation of the Office Open XML Formats by a wide set of tools and platforms in order to foster interoperability across office productivity applications and with line-of-business systems. The Technical Committee will also be responsible for the ongoing maintenance and evolution of the standard.   Programme of Work: Produce a formal standard for an XML-based electronic paper format and XML-based page description language which is consistent with existing implementations of the format called the XML Paper Specification,…[in each case, emphasis added]

    If that sounds familiar, it should, because it echoes the absolute directive of the original OOXML technical committee charter, wh
Gary Edwards

Once More unto the Breach: Office Open XML Conformance (A Lesson in Claiming Standards ... - 0 views

stephesblog.blogs.com/...office-open-xml.html

cdf msxml odf officeopenxml ooxml opendocument

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      Presentation fidelity and round tripping? Looks like someone has been attention to what happened in Massachusetts.
  • As far as I can tell in the Massachusetts poster-child case, ODF has simply come to mean whatever OpenOffice.org does
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      Keep in mind orchmid that it is the OpenOffice code base that ODF is bound to. There are many instances of the OOo code base pushed by various vendors. Sun provides OpenOffice.org and StarOffice versions of the code base. Novell Open Office is the same code base. Same with Red Hat Office and IBM WorkPlace. Outside this common code base, ODF has near ZERO interoperability.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    unfortunately the MS argument that support for OOXML equals "conformance" is also the same argument used by OpenDocument supporters to prove multi vendor, multi platform, multi application support.

Gary Edwards

Sun Sets Application Specific Limits on ODF Metadata - 0 views

sw.openoffice.org/...ReadMsg

interoperability iso linux odf officeopenxml ooxml opendocument patents xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • Fine; I hope that you also will specify the citation metadata then. Using unspecified metadata for *relevant* parts of the document in OOo can be the starting signal to kill ODF. I'm not sure if citation data is a "relevant part of the document" but without further investigation I assume it to be that.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    The battle to break ODF away from being limited to only those features supported by Sun's OpenOffice/StarOffice continues.  This eMail thread sets the stage for the upcoming presentation of the metadata proposal to the ODF mainline TC.

    SEction 1.4.3 of the metadata proposal is a list of existign ODF elements that developers can apply RDF to.  And the reason given fo rwhy the list is so constrained?  Svante Schubert, co-editor and Sun employee has claimed on more than a few occassions that the reason for limiting the lis tis that Sun will only support RDF on those particular ODF elements in OpenOffice/StarOffice.  Therefore, everyone is similarly limited!

    I kid you not. 
    ~ge~

Gary Edwards

Between a rock and a hard place: ODF & CIO's - Where's the Love? - 0 views

www.consortiuminfo.org/...article.php

cio government microsoft oasis odf officeopenxml ooxml opendocument openxml

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • So I'm disappointed.&nbsp;And not just on behalf of open documents, but on behalf of the CIOs of this country, who are now caught between a rock and a hard place, without a paddle to defend themselves with if they won't to do anything new, innovative and necessary, if a major vendor's ox might be gored in consequence. After the impressive lobbying assault mounted over the past six months against open document format legislation, I expect you won't be hearing of many state IT departments taking the baton back from their legislators.&nbsp; &nbsp; And who can blame them?&nbsp;If they tried, it wouldn't be likely to be anything as harmless as an open document format that would bite them in the butt.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Andy Updegrove weighs in on the wave of ODF legislative failures first decribed by Eric Lai and Gregg Keizer compiled the grim data in a story they posted at ComputerWorld last week titled  Microsoft trounces pro-ODF forces in state battles over open document formats.


    Andy believes that it is the failure of state legislators to do their job that accounts for these failures.  He provides three reasons for this being a a failure of legislative duty.  The most interesting of which is claim that legislators should be protecting CIO's from the ravages of aggressve vendors. 


    The sad truth is that state CIO's are not going to put their careers on the line for a file format after what happened in Massachusetts.


    Andy puts it this way, "
      

    And second, in a situation like this, it is a cop out for legislatures to claim that they should defer to their IT departments to make decisions on open formats.  You don't have to have that good a memory to recall why these bills were introduced in the first place: not because state IT departments aren't a good place to make such decisions, but because successive State CIOs in Massachusetts had been so roughly handled in trying to make these very decisions that no state CIO in his or her right mind was likely to volunteer to be the next sacrificial victim.
    As both Peter Quinn and Louis Gutierrez both found out, trying to make responsible standards-related decisions whe
Gary Edwards

But can they implement ODF? South African Government Adopts ODF (and not OOXML) - 0 views

www.consortiuminfo.org/...article.php

cdf ms-ooxml odf opendocument

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • That said, it goes on to acknowledge that “there are standards which we are obliged to adopt for pragmatic reasons which do not necessarily fully conform to being open in all respects.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    So, South Africa was watching closely the failed effort in Massachusetts to implement ODF?  And now they are determined to make it work? Good thing they left themselves a "pragmatic" out; "there are standards which we are obliged to adopt for pragmatic reasons which do not necessarily fully conform to being open in all respects."

    Massachusetts spent a full year on an ODF implementation Pilot Study only to come to the inescapable conclusion that they couldn't implement ODF without a high fidelity "round trip" capable ODF plug-in for MSOffice.  In May of 2006, Pilot Study in hand, Massachusetts issued their now infamous RFi, "the Request for Information" concerning the feasibility of an ODF plug-in clone of the MS-OOXML Compatibility Pack plug-in for MSOffice applications. At the time there was much gnashing of teeth and grinding of knuckles in the ODf Community, but the facts were clear. The lead dog hauling the ODf legislative mandate sleigh could not make it without ODf interoperability with MSOffice. Meaning, the rip out and replace of MSOffice was no longer an option. For Massachusetts to successfully implement ODf, there had to be a high level of ODf compatibility with existing MS documents, and ODf application interoperability with existing MS applications. Although ODf was not designed to meet these requirements, the challenge could not have been any more clear. Changes in ODf would have to be made. So what happened?

    Over a year later,
Gary Edwards

An Antic Disposition: Cracks in the Foundation - IBM takes over ODF - 0 views

www.robweir.com/...cracks-in-foundation.html

foundation ibm odf odf-civil-war opendocument weir

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • You must admire their tenacity. Gary Edwards and the pseudonymous "Marbux". The mythology of Silicon Valley is filled with stories of two guys and a garage founding great enterprises. And here we have two guys, and through blogs, interviews, and constant attendance at conferences, they have become some of the most-heard voices on ODF. Maybe it is partly due to the power of the name? The "OpenDocument Foundation" sounds so official. Although it has no official role in the ODF standard, this name opens doors. The ODF Alliance , the ODF Fellowship, the OASIS ODF TC, ODF Adoption TC (and many other groups without "ODF" in their name) have done far more to promote and improve ODF, yet the OpenDocument Foundation, Inc. seems to score the panel invites. Not bad for two guys without a garage.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    An eMail went out today, October 24th, 2007, nominating IBM's Rob "Show me your garage!" Weir to be the new Co Chairman of OASIS ODF TC.  So it's looks like it's true; IBM is moving to take over ODF and OpenOffice.

    Not that that's bad.  In the long run this is perhaps the best thing that ever happened to ODF and OpenOffice.  There is no way IBM's Lotus Notes business plan for ODF-OOo could be any worse than Sun's plan has turned out to be. 

    ~ge~

Gary Edwards

IBM In Denial Over Lotus Notes - Forbes.com - 0 views

www.forbes.com/...cz_dl_0406notes.html

exchange ibm lotus microsoft

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • The marketing folks in IBM's Lotus division are starting to sound like the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, who insists he's winning a fight even as he loses both arms and legs: "'Tis but a scratch," the Black Knight declares after one arm is lopped off. "Just a flesh wound," he says after losing the other. "I'm invincible!" The same goes for IBM's (nyse: IBM - news - people ) Lotus, which keeps declaring victory even as Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) carves it up.
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    Want to know the real reason why IBM and Microsoft are going at it hammer and tong over document formats?  Here it is.  Lotus Notes is getting clobbered by the Exchange/SharePoint juggernaut. 

    The article is old, but the point is well taken.  Today the Exchange/SharePoint juggernaut i sover 65% marketshare.  IBM is struggling to protect the Lotus Stack against an impossible foe.

    The thing is, Microsoft E/S will ALWAYS have better integration with the MSOffice - Outlook desktop monopoly base (550 M and counting).  Most of this "integration" is due to the high fidelity exchange of documents in Microsoft's proprietary XML mode known as MS-OOXML.   Forget the charade that MS-OOXML is an open standard called Ecma 376.  MSOffice and infamous XML Compatibility Pack Plug-in do not implement Ecma 376.  The Pack implements MS-OOXML.

    One key differnece between MS-OOXML and Ecma 376 us that MS-OOXML is infused with the Smart Tags components.  These are for metadata, data binding, data extraction, workflow, intelligent routing and on demand re purposing of docuemnt components.  In effect, MS-OOXML :: Smart Tags combines with proprietary .NET Libraries, XAML and soon enough Silverlight to replace the entire span of W3C Open Internet Technologies. 

    Can you say "HTML"?

    Okay, so why does this matter to IBM and the future of Lotus Notes?

    The end game of the document format wars is that of a stack model that converges desktop, server, devices and web information systems.  The MS Stack uses MS-OOXML as the primary transport of accelerated content/data/multi media streams running across the MS Stack of desktop, server, device and web application systems.  It's the one point of extreme interoperability.

    It's also a barrier that no non MS applicatio or service can penetrate or interoperate with except on terms Microsoft dictates. 
Gary Edwards

Novell adds fuel to the fire in OOXML feud - News - Builder AU - 0 views

www.builderau.com.au/...0,339028227,339284338,00.htm

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - Cached
  • Microsoft has created its own proprietary document format, Office Open XML (OOXML), as a rival to the community-developed OpenDocument Format (ODF). OOXML is used in Microsoft's latest applications suite, Office 2007. Despite some efforts by the two camps, ODF and OOXML are, for the most part, not interoperable, meaning documents that are created in one format cannot be successfully read by applications based on the other format. According to Novell's vice president of developer platforms, Miguel de Icaza, the situation won't change in the foreseeable future. Want to know more? For all the latest news, analysis and opinion on open source, click here "There's no end in sight to the ongoing disputes between the two camps," said de Icaza, speaking at XML 2007, a Microsoft-sponsored event, on Tuesday. "In 2006, there was lots of FUD [fear, uncertainty and doubt] about the problems behind OOXML and it went downhill from there," Icaza said. "Neither group is willing to make the big changes required for real compatibility," de Icaza added.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
       
      What efforts are you talking about? The last time any effort was made to accomodate interoperability was in 2003 with the establishment of the ODF "Compatibilty clause" (Section 1.5). "Despite some efforts by the two camps, ODF and OOXML are, for the most part, not interoperable, meaning documents that are created in one format cannot be successfully read by applications based on the other format......" Section 1.5 authorizes the use of "foreign elements" and "alien attributes". These techniques were specifically written into ODF for handling unknown characteristics of existing MSOffice documents (binary and/or xml) on conversion to ODF. Since the Section 1.5 addition in 2003, every other suggestion to improve interop between ODF and MSOffice documents has been rejected by the OASIS ODF TC and Sub Committees. There are three problems with Section 1.5. The first is that there is only so much that can be done with foreign elements and alien attributes. There are still remaining compatibility issues relating to the basic structures of lists, tables, fields, sections and page dymnamics. The OpenDocument Foundaiton spent over a year trying to get approval for five generic elements relating to these structures, without success. As i said, there has not been a single successful comatibility - interoperability effort since 2003, although many have been proposed. The second reason for the failure of Section 1.5 is that OpenOffice only partially implements the "Compatibility Clause". OOo only recognizes "foreign elements and alien attributes" with text spans and paragraphs. The third reason is that "compatibility" is optional in ODF. The clause does not have any teeth. Applications can implement only those aspects of the spec they feel like implementing, and still be in total "compliance". This creates serious interop problem not only for MSOffice plug-in comverted documents, but also renders as
Gary Edwards

Does ODF 1.2 Metadata Solve the Interop Problem? - Microsoft starts rolling out more O... - 0 views

talkback.zdnet.com/5208-12558-0.html

afnor cdf iso maryjo merger metadata odf ooxml opendocument talkback zdnet

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - No Cached
  • Sorry Shish, you're wrong about ODF 1.2 Try ODF 1.5 or ODF 2.0, maybe. The metadata requirements for ODF 1.2 actually did include two way lossless translation capability. Unfortunately these features did not survive the final cut, and were not included in the April 2007 submission. You might also want to check the February 23, 2007 metadata proposal from Florian Reuter. That also would have delivered the goods and perhaps put ODF that grand convergence category of usefulness across desktops, servers, devices and web systems currently the exclusive domains of MS-OOXML and CDF+. Florian had devised a means of using metadata to describe the presentation aspects of content and structural objects. Very revolutionary. And based on the simple notion that bold, font, margins etc. are simply metadata about content and style objects. Where the train came off the track had to do with the concept of an XML ID means of linking metadata to content. Not that there was anything wrong with this mechanism. It's actually quite clever. What went wrong was that Sun insisted that only those elements approved and supported by OpenOffice would be allowed to make use of XML ID metadata. For independent developers, this is a serious constraint. Because of this constraint, the metatdata sub committee started off with six elements supported by OOo that metadata could be appied to. IBM then came in and asked for eleven more elements having to do with charts and graphs. The OpenOffice crew decided they could support this, so in they went. Then an interesting question was posed, "How are independent developers supposed to submit elements for metadata consideration?"
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07
     
    A Second response to Mary Jo's, "Microsoft starts rolling out more OOXML translators" is also posted here. The title is "Standardization by Corporation". Shish-Ka-Bob makes the assertion the ODF 1.2 metadata model will enable lossless two way conversion between MSOffice and ODF. While it's true that that intent was a key component of the original July of 2006 Metadata Requirements, the proposal was eventually stripped from the final submission made in April of 2007. I try to explain to Shish how that came about. The second post here, "Standardization by Corporation", is a follow on to statements made to Shish. The statements have to do with the events at ISO, and what i think will eventually happen. IMHO, ISO will follow either the AFNOR or Brittish proposals to merge ODF and OOXML. To do this they will remove entirely the coproarate vendor influence of Ecma and OASIS, and perfect the merger entirely at ISO. My post just happened to coincide with ISO Governor Mark Bryan's "Standardization by Corporations" letter. A derpressing but nevertheless very true concern. In fact, the OpenDocument Foundation was created specifically to address our concerns about the undue influence big application vendors were exerting on ODF following the April 30th, 2005 approval of ODF 1.0 (which went on to become ISO 26300). ~ge~
Gary Edwards

ODF 1.2 Metadata? You're Dreaming! Microsoft starts rolling out more OOXML translators... - 0 views

talkback.zdnet.com/5208-12558-0.html

cdf ge mary-jo metadata microsoft odf ooxml opendocument shish

shared by Gary Edwards on 12 Dec 07 - No Cached
  • Sorry Shish, you're wrong about ODF 1.2 Try ODF 1.5 or ODF 2.0, maybe. The metadata requirements for ODF 1.2 actually did include two way lossless translation capability. Unfortunately these features did not survive the final cut, and were not included in the April 2007 submission. You might also want to check the February 23, 2007 metadata proposal from Florian Reuter. That also would have delivered the goods and perhaps put ODF that grand convergence category of usefulness across desktops, servers, devices and web systems currently the exclusive domains of MS-OOXML and CDF+. Florian had devised a means of using metadata to describe the presentation aspects of content and structural objects. Very revolutionary. And based on the simple notion that bold, font, margins etc. are simply metadata about content and style objects. Where the train came off the track had to do with the concept of an XML ID means of linking metadata to content. Not that there was anything wrong with this mechanism. It's actually quite clever. What went wrong was that Sun insisted that only those elements approved and supported by OpenOffice would be allowed to make use of XML ID metadata. For independent developers, this is a serious constraint. Because of this constraint, the metatdata sub committee started off with six elements supported by OOo that metadata could be appied to. IBM then came in and asked for eleven more elements having to do with charts and graphs. The OpenOffice crew decided they could support this, so in they went. Then an interesting question was posed, "How are independent developers supposed to submit elements for metadata consideration?"
Gary Edwards

Independent study advises IT planners to go OOXML - 0 views

talkback.zdnet.com/5206-12558-0.html

anti-trust browser-wars gates msoffice netscape ooxml w3c

shared by Gary Edwards on 20 Jan 08 - Cached
  • From: Bill Gates Sent: Saturday, December 5 1998 To: Bob Muglia, Jon DeVann, Steven Sinofsky Subject : Office rendering "One thing we have got to change in our strategy - allowing Office documents to be rendered very well by other peoples browsers is one of the most destructive things we could do to the company. We have to stop putting any effort into this and make sure that Office documents very well depends on PROPRIETARY IE capabilities. Anything else is suicide for our platform. This is a case where Office has to avoid doing something to destroy Windows. I would be glad to explain at a greater length. Likewise this love of DAV in Office/Exchange is a huge problem. I would also like to make sure people understand this as well." Tuesday, August 28, 2007
  • 3.2.2.2. A pox on both your houses! gary.edwards - 01/22/08 Hi Robert, What you've posted are examples of MSOffice ”compatibility settings” used to establish backwards compatibility with older documents, and, for the conversion of alien file formats (such as various versions of WordPerfect .wpd). These compatibility settings are unspecified in that we know the syntax but have no idea of the semantics. And without the semantic description there is no way other developers can understand implementation. This of course guarantees an unacceptable breakdown of interoperability. But i would be hesitant to make my stand of rejecting OOXML based on this issue. It turns out that there are upwards of 150 unspecified compatibility settings used by OpenOffice/StarOffice. These settings are not specified in ODF, but will nevertheless show up in OpenOffice ODF documents – similarly defying interoperability efforts! Since the compatibility settings are not specified or even mentioned in the ODF 1.0 – ISO 26300 specification, we have to go to the OOo source code to discover where this stuff comes from. Check out lines 169-211. Here you will find interesting settings such as, “UseFormerLineSpacing, UseFormerObjectPositioning, and UseFormerTextWrapping”. So what's going on here?
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 23 Jan 08
       
      ..... response to Robert Crocker concerning Mary Jo's article, "Independent study advises IT planners to go OOXML". 3.2.2. So this is well documented? Robert Crocker - 01/14/08 : Mind explaining these functions to us then? - Section 2.15.3.6 page 2161, autoSpaceLikeWord95. - Section 2.15.3.26 page 2199, footnoteLayoutLikeWW8. - Section 2.15.3.31 page 2209, lineWrapLikeWord6. - Section 2.15.3.32 page 2210, mwSmallCaps. - Section 2.15.3.41 page 2225, shapeLayoutLikeWW8. - Section 2.15.3.51 page 2245, suppressTopSpacingWP
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