Microsoft to support ODF

[DrewJensen]

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/21/ ... y/msft.php

[Villeroy]

A typical announcement by Microsoft:

... during the first half of 2009.

Let's see if they get finished before end of 2009. Until then there may exist 100 OOXML documents for each ODF document. What's wrong with Sun's add-on for MS Office?

[DrewJensen]

wow, I like you buddy, but sometimes you really can be a 'The glass if half empty' sort.


Then again - maybe I am a 'pie in the sky' sort also...

[Hagar Delest]

:roll: wow, I like you buddy, but sometimes you really can be a 'The glass if half empty' sort.

But I've to agree with Villeroy. They still need a year to finalize that import/export filter when the spec have been issued as ISO standards 2 years ago? when the plugin is already in a beta state? That's marketing, that's all. We have a saying in France about politicians: promises only engage those who believe in them.

[foxcole]

Wow... that's huge news! I just commented in a thread earlier today that MS wasn't supporting ODF, so now I'd better go amend that.

EDIT:
But uh-oh... I've just had a glass-half-empty thought. You know what will happen, right? MS has always had access to the OOo source code, but the reverse has not been true since OOo first came into being. OOo can't yet seamlessly support MS Office formats, and MS only just recently released its source. MS will come out looking like the fat cat because their support of ODF formats could look and work a lot better than OOo's support of MS formats, especially because they've been dragging their feet for years in getting it done. How unfair is that!

[TheGurkha]

Stone me.

Some people would say the glass is half full, some would say it is half empty. Steve Ballmer would bang the table and bellow 'this isn't what I ordered.'

[DrewJensen]

OK - I understand your point..

So, they can support ODF and OOXML and OO.o can support only ODF, but that does not appear to be the case - OOSXML support is already in the works and 6,000 pages or not there is a spec to work from...

What it may mean is that it will come down to who builds the better application that offers a more focused solution to a particular market segment...wow, a novel idea - competition and isn't what this is all about in the long run...for others to have a chance to compete.

[DrewJensen]

LOL - it may not be what he ordered - but is is what ended up being served...

Maybe just a little bit of celebration should be allowed here..huh, just a little bit...would it hurt.

[Hagar Delest]

OO.o can support only ODF, but that does not appear to be the case - OOSXML support is already in the works and 6,000 pages or not there is a spec to work from...

And what's the point now that MSO won't use its own ISO format? -> Office 2007 won't support ISO's OOXML (from an answer to your thread in the mailing list).

[Villeroy]

The only glass beeing almost full is the ODF one. Our beloved office suite supports most of the ODF standard (not 100%). Microsoft is years away from supporting their own pseudo-standard OOXML as Hagar de'l Est points out here: viewtopic.php?f=49&t=2493&p=27953#p27953

What they are trying to do could be a variant of a well established and approved strategy.

The alleged strategy's three phases are[11]
1. Embrace: Development of software substantially compatible with a competing product, or implementing a public standard.
2. Extend: Addition and promotion of features not supported by the competing product or part of the standard, creating interoperability problems for customers who try to use the 'simple' standard.
3. Extinguish: When extensions become a de facto standard because of their dominant market share, they marginalize competitors that do not or cannot support the new extensions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_e ... extinguish

Yes, I'm convinced. Microsoft is evil

[DrewJensen]

sheesh - you guys are tough room as they say....

OK - Toil and bother...Toil and bother...it is all a plot...

My final thought on this...promise last one...when you are fighting someone bigger then yourself..fist thing you gotta do is make 'em blink...I think he just blinked.

But you guys are correct - it isn't the end of the bout it is just the end of round 1.

( now I'm gonna go find that Gal that walks around the ring with the round number on a big card..and ...errr...relax... for a moment.. )

[crusader]

Sorry, I just couldn't stay out of this one...

Call me a cynic; however, there is nothing M$ has done/can do that does not have an ulterior motive. My guess is the announcement is timed to weaken/slow down EU investigation of other misdeeds by M$.

As for the glass, it is full -- of hot air -- M$ style!

[wurzel]

Just to add my 2c...
Coincidentally, the Republic of South Africa has just introduced an appeal against the ISO decision agreeing to accept OOXML as an ISO standard. Opinions differ as to what this might mean to Microsoft, but hey, better to support a standard you can extend (and retain market share), than one that you can't even develop for yet and in the long run might be refused...

Plus, the current filter implementation for ODF to XLS has very poor performance on spreadsheets, judging by test results published elsewhere on the web. Its all linked I tell you, they're out to get me, those martians, MS, the US government...hold on, I've got to take my pills )

Alex

[acknak]

Absolutely. MS has a long history of actions that are 180-degrees opposed to standards, open or not.

If you think about it, it makes perfect sense: standards pave the way for head-to-head competition, something any sane businessperson tries hard to avoid.

I think this is simply a reaction to the growing wave of influential customers who are demanding that MS support standards. Even though their dirty tricks got OOXML through ISO, I expect it will go down as a classic pyrrhic victory: MS and ISO's reputations are badly tarnished, and many people were listening to the debate which made the issues crystal clear. It doesn't take a conspiracy nut to see that MS is strongly motivated to undercut any real standards effort. I think there are simply people--customers--that MS respects, as well as people within MS, who are saying "The party's over. Either MS begins to support real standards, or we'll be moving to someone else's product".

In any case, the real question is: How sincere is MS? Is this a change of heart, or just a delay for "talk, talk, talk"? MS has used the vaporware ploy effectively many times. We'll know better when the ODF support actually arrives, and I think there's a key feature to look for: Can a MSO user select ODF as the default format, just as OOo users can set MSO formats as their default?

As a dyed-in-the-wool, glass-half-empty cynic, my prediction is "no". There's just too much money to be made by hanging on to their monopoly as long as possible.

[DrewJensen]

Agreed - the proof is when the code ships..none the less here is a direct quote from the Microsoft press release ( emphasis added )

"When using SP2, customers will be able to open, edit and save documents using ODF and save documents into the XPS and PDF fixed formats from directly within the application without having to install any other code. It will also allow customers to set ODF as the default file format for Office 2007."

[acknak]

Cool--thanks for pointing that out, Drew.

Well, they're certainly making the right noises. Let's see what happens.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

This may be off-topic, but what is the XPS Paper Document Specification about. I seem to have acquired a printer driver to produce XML documents, either since attempting (unsuccessfully) to install .NetFramework 3.5, or after upgrading my Jarte 3.0 wordprocessor.

Is this another open document format, or something else?

[DrewJensen]

Found some information about it here
http://www.ecma-international.org/memento/TC46.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML_Paper_Specification

And you now as much about it as I do...

[Villeroy]

They throw "Silverlight" to fight "Flash", "XPS" to fight "PDF" and "OOXML" to fight OpenOffice.org's XML based file format.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

I'm none the wiser. I printed a document and attempted to open it. I was told I need to download .NetFramework. I already have .NetFramework 2.0 installed. Anyway, this time version 3.5 installed OK.

Then I attempted to open the XPS document and Opera attempted to open it in the XPS Viewer. Accepting that option just opened blank tabs one after the other.

The XPS document opens after a bit of disk grinding in Internet Explorer and looks similar to the original document, though with some banding on graphics. It definitely doesn't seem to be an open standard. Not as useful as PDF format.

[Weatherlawyer]

M$ has to reach a standard, any standard if it is to be accepted by its customers in the VNF. Since it can't reach the Ooksmell (as nothing can) it stands to reason it must make a stab at ODF.

It will probably introduce another version of its product to do so and that will entail more expense for corrupt buyers and stupid politicians (yes I do know there are no other species of the sub-genus.)

Well, whatever happens, you pays your moneys and yer takes yer choices.
A fool and his as the saying goes...

[DrewJensen]

A service pack is the way they will deliver the new functionality supposedly.

LOL - yes a fool and his money...I went through a particularly brain dead period where I first bought a Fiat...following that with a used Renault 'Le Car'...Why do I say brain dead"? Were they bad automobiles? No. ( well, one was not so hot actually ) They where great when they where serviced properly, which would of been more likely if I wasn't living in a remote section of Idaho at the time...getting a local mechanic that could work on them was..well, challenging to say the least. It was a case of context therefore...as are most things in life.

Time will tell soon enough the 'context' Microsoft chooses to put their ODF support in.