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Technology Considerations The Microsoft OpenXml Viewer is a cross browser cross OS plugin. The core of the application has to be OS independent. Therefore, the application is developed using C++. Future possibilities The generated html from the docx file can be rendered using silverlight and similar rich platforms. The same can be used in a server scenario to render docx files as html.

Interesting project based on an XSLT "one-way" conversion from OOXML to HTML. The conversion process will break any kind of business or application specific logic embedded in the document. There is a conversion of VML to SVG that i think will be important to watch.

What's seriously lacking is a conversion or locking of scripts, macros, OLE, data - media bindings, and security settings .... the logic parts so important to any business process or productivity environment setting embedded in the original MSOffice document.

Through the Document Interoperability Initiative (DII) global forums, technology leaders have been working together to promote interoperability between different document format implementations to provide greater value and choice to customers, and the events - including one held in Belgium this week - are yielding practical results. Interoperability solutions announced today translate Open XML documents to a Web page (HTML) allowing readability on Web-friendly browsers such as Firefox, improve translations between different formats through optimized templates, and enable features that provide greater choice for customers and opportunities for independent software developers as they create and use business applications built on Java that manipulate business documents. At the DII events, discussions were also held about developing document test libraries and schema validators, and vendors had the opportunity to test their implementations of document formats in a lab environment to identify potential issues to be addressed.

Stephane Rodriquez sums it up: Microsoft has won ... "Future of OOXML? There are two answers. Frankly, who freaking cares the paper? This paper will ALWAYS be at odds with the actual Office implementation. We have a good example for the time being, but it has always been the case. What about the actual file format then? It will be the subject of reverse engineering from implementers whose only recourse is to catch up all the undocumented stuff. Make no mistake though, now it's about applications, not documents anymore." "Conclusion : if you are still in the OOXML conspiracy game, about time to move on guys. "

Most ISO and IEC standards are only available for purchase. However, a few are publicly available at no charge. ISO/IEC:26300-2006 is one of the latter and can be downloaded from this page in XHTML format. Note that the standards listed on the page are arranged numerically and the OpenDocument standard is very near the bottom of the page. This version of ODF is the only version that has the legal status of an international standard, making it eligible as a government procurement specification throughout all Member nations of the Agreement on Government Procurement.