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Thomas Vinge, the counsel for the ECIS, comments on Microsoft's most recent restatement of their enduring commitment to interoperability and transparency.

If ever there was a discussion thread of consequence at the OASIS ODF TC, this is it. This is where the ODF interoperability nightmare burst into the daylight of a showdown vote. The interop issues were clear. OpenDocument TC members voted between interoperability and/or application specific innovation. Application specific innovation trumped interoperability. Again. And wha ta sad day it was. The thing is, the recent ECIS antit trust action against Microsoft comes at the request of IBM and Sun. They allege that Microsoft is violating standards requirements for interoeprability, and has launched a series of corrupt activities to push through a non interoperable standard. They are right. Microsoft is guilty. The problem is that Microsof tcan easily point to Sun and IBM activities at OASIS ODF, and make the same allegation! Using this thread as evidence! Furthermore, this thread is evidence that if Microsoft had tried to implement ODF, their efforts to establish interop would have been met with the same response from IBM and Sun that the OpenDocument Foundation recieved. Or so they could argue. Houston, we have a problem. IBM and Sun could have fixed the ODF interop problems at any time during the past five years. Yet, the world is waiting. Meanwhile, this willfull negligence and lack of desire to address pressing market needs for full interop has served to hold the door open for OOXML. And now these negligent acts llook to be the basis of a Microsoft counter claim. Oh well ..

This very funny satire builds on some harsh realities. The ODF chickens have come home to roost, and it isn't pretty. Very funny, yes. But not pretty for those who continue to believe that somehow ODF is a standard worthy of their support. The flip side of the coin is that using the same critieria of interoperability, OOXML is worthless. The sad truth is that both ODF and OOXML are applicaiton specific formats that will continue to defy and defeat all efforts at interoperability. Inparticular, it's the presentation layers of ODF and OOXML that remain bound to the layout engines and feature sets of their originating applications. Just as the presentation layers defy interoperability, they will also defeat harmonization. The only way to harmonize two application specific formats is to harmonize the originating applications. And Microsoft, Sun and IBM are not about to do that. The links in this satire are stunning!!! They shout loudly as to how Microsoft is going to respond to the ECIS anti trust allegations. So when you stop laughing, make certain you track down the links and read through the various OASIS ODF archive threads. IBM and Sun had their chance to fix ODF interoperability. Now it may be too late.

Microsoft's proposed undertaking for resolving the ECIS complaint to the European Commission regarding its office productivity software can be downloaded from this linked web page. I've given it a quick skim. Didn't see anything in it for anyone but competing big vendors. E.g., no profiling of data formats for interop of less and more featureful implementations, no round-tripping provisions. Still, some major concessions offered.