Group items tagged

Surprising post from Sun's Michael Brauer supporting the mandatory "shall - must" preservation of the metadata XML:id. Preservation of metadata information is critical to the high fidelity "round trip" interoperable exchange of ODF documents.

Marbux is currently locked into a raging interoperability battle with the ODF Metadata Sub Committee where it's been proposed that preservation of metadata be optional!

The entire thread is located here:
ODF-Metadata-Proposal-22August2007

This is one worth watching. The fight to limit ODF interoperability continues. Marbux is a distinguished Universal Interoperability expert with a blazing background in International Trade Agreements and anti trust based on interoperability violations.

ODF officially died on February 28, 2007, at the Advanced eGovernment Conference in Berlin.  Hellow ODEF

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

Microsoft is closing off the exits!  MSOffice 2003 is the only application suite capable of producing Ecma 376 documents, and now it's getting EOL'd. 

The ISO vote on Ecma 376 isn't scheduled until September. 

This is a follow up comment to a question cocerning my previous post, "commercialization of interoperability".  The question from "mosborne" is as follows:

A different viewI'm not on the ODF TC, but I have followed its evolution through the information publicly available at Oasis.

My outside view of some of the various interoperability discussions you mention is different than yours. I saw a resistance to adoption of features if the sole reason was because OOXML did it that way. The dissenting members wanted a more substantial reason, not simply to add OOXML "features" to ODF.

If the goal is to simply make ODF like OOXML, then what is the point? You would have conceded all control to Microsoft since they have effective control of OOXML.It's an interesting question, but not well informed.  The threads at OASIS ODF having to do with interoperability are focused on efforts to have our cake and eat it too. 

The List Enhancement Proposal thread played out over a six month period.  And yes, it is true that Sun fought the Novell proposal because they felt new and innovative features for OpenOffice/StarOffice were more important than the interoperability CIO's and IT departments are demanding.   But that misses the more important point that Novell was able to craft their interoperability proposal exactly so that the precious advanced feature sets of applications that command les sthan 1% marketshare would be accommodated.

What Sun and most others on the ODF TC don't get is that the markets have no use for these new and innovative feature sets unless and until they can transition their documents and business processes out of MSOffice.  If workgroup bound end users can't do that first, it won't matter how

Eric Lai keesp pokign at that Massachusetts hornets nest. One of these days he's going to crack it open, and it will be back to square one for the ODF Community.  Still missing from his research is the infoamous 300 page pilot study and accompanying web site where comments and professional observations document a year long study concernign the difficulties of implementing ODF solutions and making the migration.  <br><br>

The study was focused on OpenOffice, StarOffice, Novell Office, and a IBM WorkPlace prototype.<br><br>

The results of the year long pilot have never seen the public light of day.  But ComputerWorld is one of the media orgs that successfully filed a court action to invoke the freedom of information act in Massachusetts.  How come they can't find the Pilot Study?<br><br>

At the end of the pilot study period, Massachusetts issued their infamous RFi; the request for information regarding the possiblity of a ODF plugin for MSOffice!  Meaning, the Pilot Study did not go well for the heroes of ODF - OpenOffice, StarOffice, Novell Office and WorkPlace.  Instead, Massachusetts sought an ODF plugin that would no doubt extend the life of MSOffice for years to come.  No rip out and replace here folks!<br><br>

~ge~

This is the official community gathering place and information resource for the OpenDocument Format (ODF) OASIS Standard (ISO/IEC 26300). Suitable for text, spreadsheets, charts, graphs, presentations, and databases, ODF frees documents from their applications-of-origin, enabling them to be exchanged, retrieved, and edited with any OpenDocument-compliant software or tool. This is a community-driven site, and the public is encouraged to contribute content.

Whoa, Wiki Ricki is right.  This is a great article!  A must read interview with Louis Gutierrez.  I wonder though, since it was ComputerWorld and the Boston Globe that filed the August 2006 Freedom of Information Act invocation to get all the Massachusetts conversations and meetings, no doubt they were carryign some heavy ammunition into this interview.  Up until this interview it's been next to impossible for the public or press to get truthful information.  This is a good start, and i for one wonder just how far Massachusetts execs are willing to go with their public disclosures?

Count on Walt Hucks to nail it every time.  Once again he comes through with another gem, commenting on the Mary Jo Foley interview with the slippery Tom Robertson, General Manager of laugh out loud "Interoperabiltiy and Standards" for Microsoft.  I kid you not. 

Microsoft describes their highly proprietary and self serving implementation of interoperbiltiy as, "Interoperability by design".  Which means, only those applications, systems and services designed by Microsoft will have the needed interoperability consumers must have to make sense of the many volumes of information and information processes that drive critical day to day workflows.

Now with Ecma 376, we have a clear example of Microsoft "Standards by Design".  Very sad, but it's our lot in life.

Thanks Walt, once again a great commentary,
~ge~

Eventually i suspect the truth will come out concerning ODF and the events in Massachusetts.  Migration is difficult and our friends in Redmond are not about to lend a hand.  The problem is the starting point, the MSOffice desktop productivity environment.  A starting point owned and controlled entirely by Microsoft.  The challenge is to get from the overwhelming dominance of proprietary Microsoft binary documents and into an open XML universal file format that any application, running on any platform can interactively read, render and write to.

Microsoft has decided to keep secret the blueprint to these billions of binary documents, reserving exclusively for themselves the right to convert then to XML.  Of course, the only version of XML Microsoft will convert them to is the wholly owned and controlled OOXML file format. 

Microsoft refuses to cooperate in any way with the conversion of these legacy binary documents to the only truly open XML universal file format, OASIS OpenDocument.  Which leaves the world with a near insolvable problem; how to get from where we are today, with the boot of a ruthless monopolist on the neck of our information and information processes, to where we really desire to be -  with our digital civilization in the hands of open standards, and out of the control of proprietary applications and platform vendors.

This document describes what the OpenDocument Foundation learned in Massachusetts about the challenge of migrating to ODF. 

This quote from Chalres Schultz is ridiculous. Because Novell is not allowed to commit code to OpenOffice, they must maintain a separate code base of extensions and improvements. With each build of OpenOffice, Novell must reintegrate their changes into the code base, making for a managerial nightmare. When Novell does have improvements that Sun wants though, there is no end to the hoops of fire the Sun developers will jump through to get it. The Field Enhancement routine written by Novell's Florian Router is one of those improvements that Sun had to have. Sun even went so far as to arguing for changes in the way ODF implements fields to accomodate the Novell improvements! It's important to note however that Sun did not support the ODF Field Enhancements UNTIL Novell agreed to donate Florian's code to OpenOffice!!!!!! Proving conclusively what i have been arguing for years: Sun does not allow for any changes to ODF unless and until those changes can be implemented by OpenOffice. The ODF Field Enhancements needed by Florian's fix to OpenOffice were originally proposed on July 12th, 2006, when Florian was the CTO of the OpenDocument Foundation. These changes to the way ODF implements fields were needed by the da Vinci plug-in as part of our efforts to save ODF in Massachusetts. so here we have a rather direct example of Sun refusing improvements to ODF when needed by another application (da Vinci), but supporting those exact same changes when it is OpenOffice that can be improved!!! The arguments that the OpenOffice.org Community isn't open also apply to the OASIS ODF TC work!!!!!!

Good catch by Eric!
This link is to the infamous Sun statement of support for MS OOXML issued by Jon Bosak when ISO DIS 2900 was voted on by the US delegation to ISO.
The statement is important because it directly references the core issue: MS OOXML was written for MSOffice and the billions of binary docuemnts bound to that application suite. ODF on the other hand was written to OpenOffice.
Because ODF was not designed for the conversion of those billions of MSOffice documents, conversion is next to impossible. The implementation of ODF in MSOffice is next to impossible. The loss of information, especially the presentation-layout information, is so severe as to be intolerable in the real world.
This leaves the real world, where MSOffice dominates over 550 million desktops, unable to implement ODF. In light of this real world problem, Sun's Bosak urges support for MS OOXML as an ISO standard!!!
So we have this situation at OASIS ODF where Sun is in control of both ODF and OpenOffice, refusing in all cases to compromise the linkage or accomodate the much needed interoperability enhancemnts seeking to improve the conversion of billions of documents to ODF. And publicly supporting MS OOXML as the only pragmatic alternative to the situation Sun is responsible for!

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~

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,

More bad information, accusations and smearing innuendo.  Wrong on the facts,  Emotionally spent on the conclussions.  But wow it's fun to see them with their panties in such a twist.

The truth is that ODF is a far more "OPEN" standard than MS-OOXML could ever hope to be.  Sam's Open Standards arguments for the past five years remain as relevant today as when he first started makign them so many years ago.

The thing is, the Open Standards requirements are quite different than the real world Implementation Requirements we tried to meet with ODF.

The implementation requirements must deal with the reality of a world dominated by MSOffice.  The Open Standards arguments relate to a world as we wish it to be, but is not.

It's been said by analyst advising real world CIO's that, "ODF is a fine open standards format for an alternative universe where MSOffice doesn't exist".

If you live in that alternative universe, then ODF is the way to go.  Just download OpenOffice 2.3, and away you go.  Implementation is that easy.

If however you live in this universe, and must deal with the impossibly difficult problem of converting existing MSOffice documents, applications and processes to ODF, then you're screwed. 

All the grand Open Standards arguments Sam has made over the years will not change the facts of real world implmentation difficulities.

The truth is that ODF was not designed to meet the real world implmentation requirements of compatibility with existing Microsoft documents (formats) and, interoperability with existing Microsoft Office applications.

And then there are the problmes of ODF Interoperability with ODF applications.  At the base of this problem is the fact that compliance in ODF is optional.  ODF applications are allowed to routinely destroy metadata information needed (and placed into the markup) by other applications.<b

Microsoft's Gray Knowlton on the reasons for the Redmond decision to provide native support for ODF 1.1. But most noteworthy, I think, is Knowlton's statement indicating that Microsoft aims at improving interop through best practices & patterns, i.e., application-level interop initiatives, as opposed to amending the ODF standard to specify conformity requirements essential to achieve interoperability, as required by JTC 1 Directives, international law, and antitrust law. In other words, big vendor negotiations around interop rather than giving software users and independent developers a seat at the table.