Skip to main content

Home/ OpenDocument/ Group items tagged ODF

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
Gary Edwards

OOXML and ODF: The next step | [odf-discuss] Marbux Responds! - 0 views

lists.opendocumentfellowship.com/...007308.html

interop interoperability iso marbux odf ooxml opendocument-fellowship

shared by Gary Edwards on 09 Apr 08 - Cached
  • The issue we were discussing -- and what I believe the ODEF conference was very much concerned with -- was whether ODF plus vendor-specific extensions will be classified as conformant ODF. The market requirement is for "Exchange Formats" and document-level interoperability. I could repose my question as whether ODF v. 1.2 will "clearly and unambiguously specify interoperability requirements essential to achieve the interoperability," as required by JTC 1 Directives. As you noted in an earlier post in this thread, you can't do interoperability if you use vendor extensions. > I see a standard as providing a shared vocabulary for buyers and sellers > to express their requirements. You are in error. This is a matter controlled by law rather than by personal opinion. Standards are all about the substitutability of goods, weights, and measures. A standard specifies all characteristics of a product, weight, or measure in mandatory terms so there is uniformity. Standards are the antithesis of product differentiation. Their very purpose is to eliminate product differentiation.
  • Gary Edwards on 09 Apr 08
     
    Excellent legal argument by the legendary marbux concerning OOXML and ODF itneroperability. Covers ISO Interop Requirements and the demands of International Trade Agreements. Key to this thread is ODF v 1.2 and what must be done to bring ODF into legal compliance with International demands.
  • Gary Edwards on 09 Apr 08
     
    Outstanding analysis and research by the legendary marbux
Gary Edwards

Open Document Foundation Gives Up | Linux Magazine - 0 views

www.linux-magazine.com/...n_document_foundation_gives_up

cdf odf ooxml w3c

shared by Gary Edwards on 16 Nov 07 - Cached
  • The reasons for the move to CDF was improved compatibility with Microsoft’s OOXML format the foundation claimed at the time. Cris Lilley from W3C contradicted. CDF is not an office format, and thus not an alternative to the Open Document Format. This turn-down is likely the reason for the abrupt ditching of the foundation.
  • Gary Edwards on 16 Nov 07
     
    I've got to give this one extra points for creativity!  All anyone has to do is visit the W3C web sites for CDF WICD Full 1.0 to realize that there is in fact a CDf profile for desktops.  CDF WICD Mobile is the profile for devices.

    My guess is that Chris Lilley is threading the needle here.  IBM, Groklaw, and the lawyer for OASIS have portrayed the Foundation's support for CDF WICD Full as a replacement for ODF - as in native file format for OpenOffice kind of replacement.  Mr. Lilley insists that CDF WiCD Full was not designed for that purpose.  It's for export only!  As in a conversion of native desktop file formats.

    Which is exactly what the da Vinci group was doing with MSOffice.  The Foundation's immediate interest in CDF WICD was based on the assumption that a similar conversion would be possible between OpenOffice ODF and CDF WICD.

    The Foundation's thinking was that if the da Vinci group could convert MSOffice documents and processes to CDF WICD Full, and, a similar conversion of OpenOffice ODF documents and processes to CDF WICD could be done, then near ALL desktop documents could be converted into a highly interoperable web platform ready format.

    Web platform ready documents from OpenOffice?  What's not to like?  And because the conversion between ODF and CDF WICD Full is so comparatively clean, OpenOffice would in effect, (don't go native file format now) become ahighly integrated rich client end user interface to advancing web platforms.

    The Foundation further reasoned that this conversion of OpenOffice ODF to CDF WICD Full would solve many of the extremely problematic interoperability problems that plague ODF.  Once the documents are in CDF WICD Full, they are cloud ready and portable at a level certain to diminish the effects of desktop applications specific feature sets and implementation models.

    In Massachusetts, the Foundation took
Gary Edwards

V1 committee gives thumbs down to Open XML doc spec - 0 views

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

shared by Gary Edwards on 20 Jul 07 - No Cached
  • Sun Microsystems Inc., largely considered an avowed opponent of Open XML because of its own development and support for the competing, ODF-based StarOffice suite, found itself in the unexpected position of stating its support for ratifying Open XML -- albeit after some changes in the proposal are made.
  • Gary Edwards on 20 Jul 07
     
    Quote: Sun Microsystems Inc., largely considered an avowed opponent of Open XML because of its own development and support for the competing, ODF-based StarOffice suite, found itself in the unexpected position of stating its support for ratifying Open XML -- albeit after some changes in the proposal are made. "We wish to make it completely clear that we support DIS 29500 becoming an ISO Standard and are in complete agreement with its stated purposes of enabling interoperability among different implementations and providing interoperable access to the legacy of Microsoft Office documents," Jon Bosak, a Sun representative to V1, wrote in an e-mail to other committee members over the weekend. "Sun voted No on Approval because it is our expert finding, based on the analysis so far accomplished in V1, that DIS 29500 as presently written is technically incapable of achieving those goals, not because we disagree with the goals or are opposed to an ISO Standard that would enable them." Sun "found itself in the unexpected position of stating its support for ratifying OOXML"?  What???? This is the official position of Sun?

    For the near five years that i have been a member of the OASIS ODF TC, Sun has opposed
Gary Edwards

Harmonization and Interop: The dizzying dance of ODF, OOXML, and CDF - 0 views

digg.com/...izzying_dance_of_ODF_OOXML_CDF

cdf ibm interop oasis odf ooxml opendocument openxml uic w3c

shared by Gary Edwards on 06 Feb 08 - Cached
  • With the ISO BRM fast approaching, the harmonization of ODF and OOXML is all the rage. The legendary marbux takes on this discussion arguing that ODF and OOXML both lack the interoperability framework needed to meet ISO directives describing interop requirements. He argues that interop between MSOffice and OpenOffice can be achieved using CDF.
  • Gary Edwards on 06 Feb 08
     
    Will the real universal document format please stand up! Comments on the recent article posted by the Universal Interoperability Council: "Putting Andy Updegrove to bed without his supper". The UIC article is well worth your time. It is extremely well referenced and researched. The arguments put forth counter claims by IBM and OASIS that the W3C's CDF format can not be used to represent desktop productivity environment documents. Not surprisingly, IBM and OASIS argue that the OpenOffice specific ODF is the only alternative to Microsoft Office specific OOXML. The UIC argues that the full range of MSOffice legacy binary documents and emerging XML documents can fully be represented in CDF - something that not even the most ardent of ODF jihadists would claim as an ODF capabilitiy. The truth is that ODF was not designed for the conversion of MSOffice binary and xml documents.
Gary Edwards

XML.com: Standard Data Vocabularies Unquestionably Harmful - 0 views

www.xml.com/...perry.html

odf ooxml presentation semantics xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 21 Jan 08 - Cached
  • At the onset of XML four long years ago, I commenced a jeremiad against Standard Data Vocabularies (SDVs), to little effect. Almost immediately after the light bulb moment -- you mean, I can get all the cool benefits of web in HTML and create my own tags? I can call the price of my crullers <PricePerCruller>, right beside beside <PricePerDonutHole> in my menu? -- new users realized the problem: a browser knows how to display a heading marked as <h1> bigger and more prominently than a lowlier <h3>. Yet there are no standard display expectations or semantics for the XML tags which users themselves create. That there is no specific display for <Cruller> and, especially, not as distinct from <DonutHole> has been readily understood to demonstrate the separation of data structure expressed in XML from its display, which requires the application of styling to accomodate the fixed expectations of the browser. What has not been so readily accepted is that there should not be a standard expectation for how a data element, as identified by its markup, should be processed by programs doing something other than simple display.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 21 Jan 08
       
      ODF and OOXML are contending to become the Standard Data Vocabulary for desktop office suite XML markup. Sun and Microsoft are proposing the standardization of OpenOffice and MSOffice custom defined XML tags for which there are no standard display expectations. The display expectations must therefore be very carefully described: i.e. the semantics of display fully provided.
      In this article Walter Perry is pointing out the dangers of SDV's being standardized for specific purposes without also having well thought out and fully specified display semantics. In ODF - OOXML speak, we would call display presentation, or layout, or "styles".
      The separation of content and presentation layer of each is woefully underspecified!
      Given that the presnetation layers of both ODF and OOXML is directly related to how OpenOffice and MSOffice layout engines work, the semantics of display become even more important. For MSOffice to implement an "interoperable" version of OpenOffice ODF, MSOffice must be able to mimic the OpenOffice layout engine methods. Methods which are of course quite differeent from the internal layout model of MSOffice. This differential results in a break down of conversion fidelity, And therein lies the core of the ODF interoeprability dilemma!
  • There have also emerged a few "horizontal" data vocabularies, intended for expressing business communication in more general terms. One of these is the eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL), about which more below. Most recently, governments and governmental organizations have begun to suggest and eventually mandate particular SDVs for required filings, a development which expands what troubles me about these vocabularies by an order of magnitude.
  • ...5 more annotations...
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 21 Jan 08
       
      Exactly! When governments mandate a specific SDV, they also are mandating inherent concepts and methods unique to the provider of the SDV. In the case of ODF and OOXML, where the presentation layers are application specific and woefully underspecified, interoperability becomes an insurmountable challenge. Interop remains stubbornly application bound.
      Furthermore, there is no way to "harmonize" or "map" from one format to another without somehow resolving the application specific presentation differences.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 21 Jan 08
       
      "in the nature of the SDV's themselves is the problem of misstatement, of misdirection of naive interpretation, and potential for fraud.
      Semantics matter! The presentation apsects of a document are just as important as the content.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 21 Jan 08
       
      Walter: "I have argued for years that, on the basis of their mechanism for elaborating semantics, SDVs are inherently unreliable for the transmission or repository of information. They become geometrically less reliable when the types or roles of either the sources or consumers of that information increase, ending at a nightmarish worst case of a third-order diminution of the reliability of information. And what is the means by which SDVs convey meaning? By simple assertion against the expected semantic interpretations hard-coded into a process consuming the data in question.
      At this point in the article i'm hopign Walter has a solution. How do we demand, insist and then verify that SDV's have fully specifed the semantics, and not jus tpassed along the syntax?
      With ODF and OOXML, this is the core of the interoperability problem. Yet, there really is no way to separate the presentation layers from the uniquely different OpenOffice and MSOffice layout engine models.
    • Gary Edwards
      Gary Edwards on 21 Jan 08
       
      Interesting concept here: "the bulk of expertise is in understanding the detail of connections between data and the processes which produced it or must consume it ........ it is these expert connections which SDV's are intended to sever.
      Not quite sure what to make of that statement? When an SDV is standardized by ISO, the expectation is that the connections between data and processes would be fully understood, and implementations consistent across the board.
      Sadly, ODF is ISO approved, but doesn't come close to meeting these expectations. ODF interop might as well be ZERO. And the only way to fix it is to go into the presentation layer of ODF, strip out all the application specific bindings, and fully specifiy the ssemantics of layout.
  • In short, the bulk of expertise is in understanding the detail of connections between data and the processes which produced it or must consume it. It is precisely these expert connections which standard data vocabularies are intended to sever.
Gary Edwards

FAA May Ditch Microsoft's Windows Vista And Office For Google And Linux Combo - Technol... - 0 views

www.informationweek.com/...showArticle.jhtml

iso microsoft odf ooxml xml

shared by Gary Edwards on 13 Mar 07 - Cached
  • Bowen's compatibility concerns, combined with the potential cost of upgrading the FAA's 45,000 workers to Microsoft's next-generation desktop environment, could make the moratorium permanent. "We're considering the cost to deploy [Windows Vista] in our organization. But when you consider the incompatibilities, and the fact that we haven't seen much in the way of documented business value, we felt that we needed to do a lot more study," said Bowen. Because of Google Apps' sudden entry into the desktop productivity market
  • Gary Edwards on 13 Mar 07
     
    The FAA issues their "NO ViSTA" mandate, hinting that it might be permanent if they can come up with MSOffice alternatives.  They are looking at Google Apps!

    Okay, so plan B does have legs.  The recent failure of ISO/IEC to stand up to the recidivist reprobate from Redmond is having repercussions.  Who would have ever thought ISO would fold so quickly without ceremony?  One day there are 20 out of 30 JTCS1 national bodies (NB's) objecting to Micrsoft's proprietary XML proposal, the MOOX Ecma 376 specfication, and the next ISO is approving without comment the placing of MOOX into the ISO fast track where approval is near certain.  With fast track, the technical objections and contradictions are assumed to be the provence of Ecma, and not the JTCS1 experts group.

    Apparently the USA Federal Government divisions had a plan B contingency for just such a case.  And why not?  Microsoft was able to purchase a presidential pardon for their illegal anti trust violations.  If they can do that, what's to stop them from purchasing an International Standard?  Piece of cake!

    But Google Apps?  And i say that as one who uses Google Docs every day.

    The problem of migrating away from MSOffice and MOOX to ODF or some other "open" XML portable file format is that there are two barriers one must cross.

    The first barrier is that of converting the billions of MS binary docuemnts into ODF XML. 

    The second is that of replacing the MSOffice bound business processes that drive critical day to day business operabions. 

    Google Apps is fine for documents that benefit from collaborative computing activities.  But there is no way one can migrate MSOffice bound business processes - the workgroup-worflow documents to Google Apps.  For one thing Google Apps is unable to facillitate important issues like XForms.  Nor can they round trip an ODF document with the needed fidelity a
Gary Edwards

War rages on over Microsoft's OOXML plans: Insight - Software - ZDNet Australia - 0 views

www.zdnet.com.au/...0,139023769,339284737,00.htm

australia cdf interop iso microsoft odf ooxml opendocument

shared by Gary Edwards on 27 Dec 07 - Cached
  • "We feel that the best standards are open standards," technology industry commentator Colin Jackson, a member of the Technical Advisory committee convened by StandardsNZ to consider OOXML, said at the event. "In that respect Microsoft is to be applauded, as previously this was a secret binary format." Microsoft's opponents suggest, among a host of other concerns, that making Open XML an ISO standard would lock the world's document future to Microsoft. They argue that a standard should only be necessary when there is a "market requirement" for it. IBM spokesperson Paul Robinson thus describes OOXML as a "redundant replacement for other standards". Quoting from the ISO guide, Robinson said that a standard "is a document by a recognised body established by consensus which is aimed at achieving an optimum degree of order and aimed at the promotion of optimum community benefits". It can be argued that rather than provide community benefit, supporting multiple standards actually comes at an economic cost to the user community. "We do not believe OOXML meets these objectives of an international standard," Robinson said.
  • Gary Edwards on 27 Dec 07
     
    "aimed at achieving an optimum degree of order .... and .... aimed at the promotion of optimum community benefits:. Uh, excuse me Mr. Robinson, tha tsecond part of your statement, the one concerning optimum community benefits - that would also disqualify ODF!! ODF was not designed to be compatible with the 550 million MSOffice desktops and their billions of binary docuemnts. Menaing, these 550 million users will suffer considerable loss of information if they try to convert their existing documents to ODF. It is also next to impossible for MSOffice applications to implement ODF as a fiel format due to this incompatbility. ODF was designed for OpenOffice, and directly reflects the way OpenOffice implements specific document structures. The problem areas involve large differences between how OpenOffice implments these structures and how MSOffice implements these same structures. The structures in question are lists, fields, tables, sections and page dynamics. It seems to me that "optimum community benefits" would include the conversion and exchange of docuemnts with some 550 million users!!!! And ODF was clearly not designed for that purpose!
  • Gary Edwards on 27 Dec 07
     
    I don't agree with this statement from Microsoft's Oliver Bell. As someone who served on the OASIS ODF Technical Committee from it's inception in November of 2002 through the next five years, i have to disagree. It's not that Microsoft wasn't welcome. They were. It's that the "welcome" came with some serious strings. Fo rMicrosoft to join OASIS would have meant strolling into the camp of their most erstwhile and determined competitors, and having to ammend an existing standard to accomodate the implementation needs of MSOffice. There is simply no way for the layout differences between OpenOffice and MSOffice to be negotiated short of putting both methodologies into the spec. Meaning, the spec would provide two ways of implementing lists, tables, fields, sections and page dynamics. A true welcome would have been for ODF to have been written to accomodate these diferences. Rather than writing ODF to meet the implementation model used by OepnOffice, it would have been infinitely better to wrtite ODF as a totally application independent file format using generic docuemnt structures tha tcould be adapted by any application. It turns out that this is exactly the way the W3C goes about the business of writing their fiel format specifications (HTML, XHTML, CSS, XFORMS, and CDF). The results are highly interoperable formats that any applciation can implement.
  • Gary Edwards on 27 Dec 07
     
    You can harmonize an application specific format with a generic, applicaiton independent format. But you can't harmonize two application specific formats!!!!
    The easy way to solve the document exchange problem is to leave the legacy applications alone, and work on the conversion of OOXML and ODF docuemnts to a single, application independent generic format. The best candidate for this role is that of the W3C's CDF.
    CDF is a desription of how to combine existing W3C format standards into a single container. It is meant to succeed HTML on the Web, but has been designed as a universal file format.
    The most exciting combination is that of XHTML 2.0 and CSS in that it is capable of handling the complete range of desktop productivity office suite documents. Even though it's slightly outside the W3C reach, the most popular CDF compound is that of XHTML, CSS and JavaScript. A combination otherwise known as "AJAX".
Gary Edwards

Standardization by Corporation | Can big application vendors be stopped from corrupting... - 0 views

talkback.zdnet.com/;jsessionid=lpZyhV8gwAfQR3UXAr

bryan cdf ecma ibm iso mary-jo microsoft oasis odf ooxml opendocument sun w3c zdnet

shared by Gary Edwards on 11 Dec 07 - Cached
  • Standardization by Corporation Maybe i spoke to soon. This just came in from ISO, the resignation letter of the SC34WG1 Chairman who has completed his three year term. There is a fascinating statement at the end of the Martin Bryan letter. "The disparity of rules for PAS, Fast-Track and ISO committee generated standards is fast making ISO a laughing stock in IT circles. The days of open standards development are fast disappearing. Instead we are getting “standardization by corporation”, something I have been fighting against for the 20 years I have served on ISO committees. I am glad to be retiring before the situation becomes impossible..." When corporations join open standards or open source efforts, they arrive with substantial but most welcome financial and expert resources. They also bring marketshare and presence. And, they bring business objectives. They have a plan. As long as the corporate plan is aligned with the open standards - open source community work, all is fine. In fact it's great. For sure though there will come a time when the corporate plan asserts it's direction, and there is possible conflict. At this point, the very same wealth of resources that were cause for celebration can become cause for disappointment and disaster. One of the more troubling things i've noticed is that corporations treat everything as a corporate asset to be traded, bartered and dealt for shareholder advantage and value. This includes patents and interoperability issues which not surprisingly are wrapped into open standards and open source efforts. Rather than embrace the humanitarian – community of shared interest drivers of open standards and open source, corporations naturally plot to get maximum value out of the resources they commit. A primary example of this is Sun's use of OpenOffice, ODF, and an anti trust settlement disaster that left them at the mercy of Microsoft.
  • Gary Edwards on 11 Dec 07
     
    Will ISO follow either the AFNOR or Brittish proposals to merge ODF and OOXML? I think so. If they continue on their current path of big vendor sponsored document wars, ISO will beocme irrelevant. Sooner or later the ISO National Bodies must take back the standards process from corporate corruption and influence. One thing is clear. Neither Microsoft or IBM is about to compromise. IBM has had many chances to improve ODF's interoperability with Microsoft Office and the Office documents, but has been steadfast in their stubborn refusal to concede an inch. Microsoft hides behind their legacy installed base of over 550 million MSOffice desktops. There simply isn't a pragmatic or cost effective way of transitioning the installed base to ODF without either seriously re writing and replacing those applications, or, changing ODF to be compatible. The marketplace is clear on what they intend on doing. Pragmatism will rule. Productivity trumps standards initiatives whenever they are out of sink. In the face of this clear marketplace intent, one would think IBM might compromise on ODF. No way! They are intent on using ODF to force a market wide rip out and replace of MSOffice. Most people assume that there are two opposing groups at war here; the Microsoft OOXML group vs. the IBM ODF group. This isn't an accurate view at all. There is a third, middle group of developers working the treacherous space of conversion - the no man'sland between OOXML MSOffice and ODF OpenOffice. The conversion group know the problems involved, and are actually trying to dliver marketplace facing solutions. The vendors of course are in this war to the bitter end, and could care less about the damage they cause to end users. It's also true that the conversion group seeks to bridge desktop productivity into the larger, highly interoeprable web platform. It's also possible that ISO will chose to merge
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 11 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 11 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~
Paul Merrell

Where is there an end of it? | Real Conformance for ODF? - 0 views

www.adjb.net/...Real-Conformance-for-ODF.aspx

ODF conformance foreign elements ODF TC ODF politics

shared by Paul Merrell on 23 Feb 09 - Cached
  • There has been quite a lot of hubbub recently about ODF conformance, in particular about how conformance to the forthcoming ODF 1.2 specification should be defined.
  • The proposal caused much debate. In support of the new conformance clause, IBM's Rob Weir described foreign elements (formerly so welcome in ODF) as proprietary extensions that are “evil” and as a “nuclear death ray gun”. Questioning the proposal, KOffice's Thomas Zander wrote that he was “worried that we are trying to remove a core feature that I depend on in both KOffice and Qt”. Meanwhile Microsoft's Doug Mahugh made a counter-proposal suggesting that ODF might adopt the Markup Compatibility and Extensibility mechanisms from ISO/IEC 29500 (OOXML). Things came to a head in a 9-2-2 split vote last week which saw the new conformance text adopted in the new ODF committee specification by will of the majority. Following this there was some traffic in the blogosphere with IBM's Rob Weir commenting and Microsoft's Doug Mahugh counter-commenting on the vote and the circumstances surrounding it.
Bernard (ben) Tremblay

The ODF Toolkit Project - 0 views

odftoolkit.org

odf odd

shared by Bernard (ben) Tremblay on 11 Nov 08 - Cached
  • Bernard (ben) Tremblay on 11 Nov 08
     
    The ODF Toolkit provides a home for libraries that ease the development of applications that support ODF , the unique vendor neutral open standard for office documents. The ODF Toolkit further provides a home for tools that process ODF or check ODF conformance.
Gary Edwards

ODF Alliance on the Microsoft Disposition of ISO Comments on OOXML - 0 views

www.odfalliance.org/...isposition%20of%20Comments.pdf

brm odf odf-alliance ooxml opendocument openxml

shared by Gary Edwards on 30 Jan 08 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 30 Jan 08
     
    The ever audacious and prevaricating lobbyist group known as the ODF Alliance has posted their critique of Ecma's (Microsoft's) proposed disposition of ISO comments rejecting OOXML. The critique's appeal to ignorance is breath-taking in scope. E.g., whilst slamming DIS-29500 on the subject of interoperability, the same document pushes for harmonization using the following argument: "Harmonization starts from looking at where the two formats overlap - and there is a significant, perhaps 90 percent or more, area where OOXML and ODF do overlap - and expressing this functional overlap identically. This common functionality between ODF and OOXML would also include a common extensibility mechanism. The remaining 10 percent of the functionality, where these standards do not overlap, would represent the focus of the harmonization effort. That portion of it which represents a widespread need could be brought into the core of ODF. That remaining portion which only serves one vendor's needs, such as flags for deprecated legacy formatting options, could be represented using the common extensibility mechanism." And precisely how do vendor-specific extensions aid interoperability, particularly when the proposed "harmonization" does not require profiles and an interoperability framework?
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 19 Oct 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 19 Oct 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

Document Interoperability Initiative: Appendix H - 0 views

www.documentinteropinitiative.org/...P1-9999.AppendixH.aspx

odf ooxml interoperability opendocment Open-Standards

shared by Gary Edwards on 16 Dec 08 - Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 16 Dec 08
     
    Microsoft recently released their blueprint for implementing ISO 26300 (ODF 1.0 - dated May 1, 2005), and referenced this Web site. Appendix H is interesting in that it lists 13 of the 28 contributors sponsored by The OpenDocument Foundation. This contributor list contradicts the determined liars (er, editors) at Wikipedia who insist that The OpenDocument Foundation was two guys without a garage. The OpenDocument Foundation was founded in 2005 (shortly after OASIS approval of ODF 1.0) for the express purpose of balancing out the rapidly growing participation in the ODF technical committee of corporate contributors. IBM, Oracle, Novel, Intel and Adobe led a corporate wave joining the ODF TC following the May 2005 OASIS approval of ODF 1.0 and subsequent submission to ISO. The Foundation was set up to fund the participation of expert individuals representing both open source communities and groups interested in an Open Web future.
Jesper Lund Stocholm

Microsoft Expands List of Formats Supported in Microsoft Office: Move enhances customer... - 0 views

www.microsoft.com/...05-21ExpandedFormatsPR.mspx

microsoft msoffice 14 msoffice 2007 odf pdf xps

shared by Jesper Lund Stocholm on 22 May 08 - Cached
  • REDMOND, Wash. — May 21, 2008 — Microsoft Corp. is offering customers greater choice and more flexibility among document formats, as well as creating additional opportunities for developer and competitors, by expanding the range of document formats supported in its flagship Office productivity suite.
  • With the release of Microsoft Office 2007 Service Pack 2 (SP2) scheduled for the first half of 2009, the list will grow to include support for XML Paper Specification (XPS), Portable Document Format (PDF) 1.5, PDF/A and Open Document Format (ODF) v1.1.
  • It will also allow customers to set ODF as the default file format for Office 2007. To also provide ODF support for users of earlier versions of Microsoft Office (Office XP and Office 2003), Microsoft will continue to collaborate with the open source community in the ongoing development of the Open XML-ODF translator project on SourceForge.net.
    • Paul Merrell
      Paul Merrell on 22 May 08
       
      The wookie here is the lack of native ODF support in older versions of MS Office, together with the earlier-announced intent to develop a new special API for other vendors to add native file suport via MS Office plug-ins. As part of its previous effort to backport OOXML support to earlier versions of Office and to port it to Office for the Mac, Microsoft engineers internally added OOXML support using the Office 2003 native file support to the Office 2003 native file support plug-in APIs, ripped it out of Office 2003 for Office 2007, wrapped it as a module with the same interface as the older APIs, then back and cross ported the module to the earlier versions and Office for the Mac. The new APIs for use by competitors must of necessity be integrated with the existing module. Anytime Microsoft needs to issue a bug fix for OOXML in the earlier versions, it would seem that the most efficient manner for Micriosoft to do so would be a patch for all versions that support OOXML. A patch that adds ODF support for the other Office versions would seem to be a fairly trivial task that could be rolled out with the patches that bring the older versions up to date with the final version of ISO/IEC OOXML In my view, the only conceivable reason for the new APIs is to limit the Office functionality available to competitors who write plug-ins for Office.
    • Jesper Lund Stocholm
      Jesper Lund Stocholm on 02 Jun 08
       
      Another key point in the silver lining here is that Microsoft will add native support for ODF to Microsoft Office 2007 SP2 "and beyond". However support for ODF in previous versions of Microsoft Office will not be native but through the CleverAge Converter on SourceForge. It will in other words be XSLT-based translation of ODF to/from OOXML with the known issues with translation such as bad quality and performance. http://idippedut.dk/post/2008/05/Document-translation-sucks-(When-Rob-is-right2c-hes-right).aspx
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • “Microsoft’s support for ODF in Office is a great step that enables customers to work with the document format that best meets their needs, and it enables interoperability in the marketplace,” said Roger Levy, senior vice president and general manager of Open Platform Solutions for Novell Inc. “Novell is proud to be an industry leader in cross-platform document interoperability through our work in the Document Interoperability Initiative, the Interop Vendor Alliance and with our direct collaboration with Microsoft in our Interoperability Lab. We look forward to continuing this work for the benefit of customers across the IT spectrum.”
  • Paul Merrell on 22 May 08
     
    Microsoft press announcement: REDMOND, Wash. - May 21, 2008 - Microsoft Corp. is offering customers greater choice and more flexibility among document formats, as well as creating additional opportunities for developer and competitors, by expanding the range of document formats supported in its flagship Office productivity suite.
  • Jesper Lund Stocholm on 02 Jun 08
     
    Microsoft press announcement: REDMOND, Wash. - May 21, 2008 - Microsoft Corp. is offering customers greater choice and more flexibility among document formats, as well as creating additional opportunities for developer and competitors, by expanding the range of document formats supported in its flagship Office productivity suite.
Gary Edwards

Can a file be ODF and Open XML at the same time? (and HTML? and a Java servlet? and a P... - 0 views

www.oreillynet.com/..._file_be_odf_and_open_xml.html

jellife odf ooxml pdf html OPC zip

shared by Gary Edwards on 14 Jan 09 - Cached
  • The recent bomb in the ODF world from Gary Edward’s claims that Sun successfully blocked the addition of features to ODF that would be needed for full interchange with Office are explosive not only because they demonstrate how ODF was (properly, in my view) developed to cope with the particular features of the participants, not really as a universal format, but also because the prop up Microsoft’s position that Open XML is required because it exposes particular features that ISO ODF is not capable of exposing. Both because ODF is still in progress and because sometimes the features are simply incompatible in the details.
  • Actually, ODF is about to get a new manifest along with the new metadata stuff. Because we base that on RDF, the manifest will also be RDF-based. It gives us the extensibility we want to provide (extension developers, for example, can add extra metadata they may need), without having to worry about breaking compatibility. The primary addition we've made is a mechanism to bind a stable URI to in-document content node ids and files. This is conceptually not all that different than what I see in OPC; it's just that the unique IDs are in fact URIs. Among other things, in the RDF context that allows further statements to be bound to those URIs. Bruce D'Arcus | July 29, 2007 01:02 PM
  • Gary Edwards on 14 Jan 09
     
    What Bruce doesn't explain in this highlighted clip is that Sun decided to limit the "extra metadata" developer might need to just a handful of elements Sun and IBM needed to use in OpenOffice. The original OpenDocument Foundation metadata proposal was to open up the use of metadata to the extent that metadata could be used for all aspects of presentation (formatting AND layout!).
  • Gary Edwards on 14 Jan 09
     
    This vendor specific - application specific limiting ended the last hope we had for ODF interoperability and backwards compatibility with the billions of "in-process" MSOffice documents known to be populating business processes the world over. In fact, the problem ODF adoption faces is primarily that of MSOffice bound business processes, reflected in these billions of workgroup-workflow documents.
  • Gary Edwards on 14 Jan 09
     
    Proposal to have a standard packaging for combining application specific XML formats, Open HTML, and PDF. Great comments. This July 2007 article links to a January 2009 article: http://broadcast.oreilly.com/2009/01/packaging-formats-of-famous-ap.html
Gary Edwards

Microsoft trounces pro-ODF forces in state battles over open document formats - 0 views

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

shared by Gary Edwards on 09 Jun 07 - Cached
  • Microsoft trounces pro-ODF forces in state battles over open document formats Eric Lai and Gregg Keizer   document.write(''); if (navigator.userAgent.indexOf("Gecko")==-1) { document.write(''); } document.write(''); if (document.getElementById('dclk999')) { document.getElementById('dclk999').src = 'http://ad.doubleclick.net/adi/idg.us.cpw.desktopapplications/index;pos=imu;tile=3;sz=336x280;ord=' + ord + '?'; } document.write(''); if ((!document.images && navigator.userAgent.indexOf('Mozilla/2.') >= 0)|| navigator.userAgent.indexOf("WebTV") >= 0) {document.write('');} 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.
  • Gary Edwards on 09 Jun 07
     
    Uh Oh.  They got IBM dead to rights in Massachusetts.  I guess the truth about Massachusetts will be told!  Finally.  ODF failed in Massachusetts because there isn't a reasonable  means of implementing ODF.  Same in California.
  • Gary Edwards on 09 Jun 07
     
    A must read.  And yes, the ODF Vendors are the reason ODF lost.  They didn't provide useful solutions.  In fact, the applicaitons they proposed were seen by government CIO's as cstly and disruptive "rip out and replace" non starters.  In California, CIO's asked if it was even possible to implement ODF!!!
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
Paul Merrell

Brian Jones: Open XML Formats : More on yesterday's ODF announcement - 0 views

blogs.msdn.com/...terday-s-odf-announcement.aspx

interop microsoft strategy

shared by Paul Merrell on 22 May 08 - Cached
  • Paul Merrell on 22 May 08
     
    "Even though ODF 1.0 is the official ISO version of the format, the decision was made to use version 1.1 which had some accessibility improvements. Hopefully future versions of ODF will be brought back to ISO so that we have a more current ISO version soon. You also may have noticed that we as Microsoft plan to start participating in the ODF standardization efforts, whether that happens in OASIS or ISO. ... I've heard different opinions though on what to do if the standard says one thing and Open Office does something else. I think the right thing to do is to follow the standard, but I'd be curious to hear what other folks have to say." Note that this Jones post includes several links to commentary on the ODF support announcement written by other Softies
Gary Edwards

Office 2007 won't support ISO's OOXML - SD Times On The Web - 0 views

www.sdtimes.com/...article.aspx

iso oasis odf ooxml pdf

shared by Gary Edwards on 21 May 08 - Cached
  • In a surprise move, the company also announced that it intends to participate in the OASIS ODF working group and the corresponding ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee 1 Subcommittee 34 working groups for ODF, as well as the ISO Technical Committee 171 working group for PDF, said Doug Mahugh, senior product manager for Microsoft Office.He added that Microsoft would also introduce an API to allow developers to plug their own converters for formats, such as ODF, into Office to make it the default conversion path. ODF 1.1 was chosen over the ISO-standard ODF 1.0 as a practical decision based upon interoperability with existing implementations, Mahugh explained.
    • Paul Merrell
      Paul Merrell on 22 May 08
       
      The announcement of the new API for others to use for plug-ins is not new news. It was originally made when Microsoft claimed to have gotten religion on interoperability a few months ago. The wookie is that the only conceivable reason for a new API for use by others is that Microsoft does not want to disclose the specs for its existing API. That in turn suggests that the API for use by others will have functionality different from the API used by Microsoft itself, almost certainly far less.
  • “Customers that are expecting true document fidelity from XML-based, ISO-standard document formats will continue to be disappointed,” said Michael Silver, a Gartner Research vice president. Silver observed that the most compatible formats to use today are Microsoft’s legacy binaries, and he believes that Microsoft will be unlikely to convince customers to move to OOXML in the foreseeable future.
  • Gary Edwards on 21 May 08
     
    Microsoft to support PDF, ODF 1.1 and ISO OOXML in MSOffice 14. The company will also join the OASIS ODF TC and working group for ISO PDF.
« First ‹ Previous 41 - 60 of 331 Next › Last »
Showing 20▼ items per page