[ILUG] Microsoft And ODF: Bad For Everyone (Link)

[Gareth Eason]

	Not only does it run to ~6,000 pages, but within those pages the OOXML
standard defines behaviours for various things as being the behaviour as
exhibited by Word/Excel/etc. This means that it is effectively an
unimplementable standard, since to define the behaviour you have to somehow
reverse engineer and infer the behaviour of Microsoft's own applications under
various conditions.

	I think it's a great pity that some shortsighted people cannot see the
benefit of defining and sticking to standards for information interchange.

	I'm not saying ODF is a panacea - but it's the best we have at the moment for
the types of documents it encompasses. I use OOo (OpenOffice.org) pretty much
every day, on Linux, Windows and OS X, interchanging my documents between the
three platforms and even between versions of OOo - I still run OOo 2.4 on this
desktop, but 3.0 on OS X, Windows and other Linux machines. I've yet to run
into a serious problem with readability for documents stored in ODF. I cannot
say the same about Word/Excel/Powerpoint documents, including those in docx
(OOXML?) format.

	Best regards,
	-->Gar



Vicente Werner wrote:
> It's even larger:
> ISO/IEC 29500:2008
> 
> The ISO/IEC standard is structured into four parts, each of which are
> independent standards.[31]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_Open_XML#cite_note-StandardIS29500-30>
> [*citation needed <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed>*]
> Part 1. Fundamentals and Markup Language Reference (5560 pages)Contains
> conformance definitionsContains the reference material for WordprocessingML,
> SpreadsheetML, PresentationML, DrawingML, Shared MLs and Custom XML Schema,
> defining every element and attribute including the element hierarchy
> (parent/child relationships)XML schemas for the markup languages are
> declared as XSD and (non-normatively) using RELAX NGDefines the custom XML
> data storing facilitySchemas are included in the textPart 2. Open Packaging
> Conventions (129 pages)Defines the Open Packaging Conventions (package
> model, physical package)Defines core properties,
> thumbnails<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thumbnail>
>  and digital signatures <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_signature>XML
> schemas for the OPC are declared as XML Schema
> Definitions<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML_Schema_(W3C)> (XSD)
> and (non-normatively) using RELAX NG
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RELAX_NG> (ISO/IEC
> 19757-2)Part 3. Markup Compatibility and Extensibility (40 pages)Describes
> extension facilities of OpenXML documents and specifies elements and
> attributes by which applications with different extensions can
> interoperateExtensibility
> rules are expressed using
> NVDL<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Namespace-based_Validation_Dispatching_Language>
> (ISO/IEC
> 19757-4)Part 4. Transitional Migration Features (1464 pages)Contains
> reference material of legacy and transitional interestContains controversial
> material such as compatibility settings and the graphics markup
> language VMLContains
> list of differences between ECMA-376 and ISO/IEC 29500:2008
> 
> The standard specifies six levels of document and application conformance, *
> strict* and *transitional* for each of WordprocessingML, PresentationML and
> SpreadsheetML. The standard also specifies applications descriptions of *
> base* and *full*.
> 
> 
> (From Wikipedia)
> 
> On Mon, May 25, 2009 at 12:17 PM, Gerard Hooton <g.hooton at ucc.ie> wrote:
> 
>> Is it true thar Microsoft's OOXML iso standard runs to about 3000 pages?
>> //Ger
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Vicente Werner <vwerner at gmail.com>
>> To: Frank Murphy (Frankly3d) <frankly3d at gmail.com>
>> Cc: ilug at linux.ie
>> Subject: Re: [ILUG] Microsoft And ODF: Bad For Everyone (Link)
>> Date: Mon, 25 May 2009 11:18:13 +0100
>>
>> The only way some one could have been surprised by that is by being
>> extremely naive, Microsoft has made its business by tying customers to
>> their
>> products, not by opening them and allowing free flown of data.
>>
>> On Sun, May 24, 2009 at 11:50 AM, Frank Murphy (Frankly3d) <
>> frankly3d at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>>
>> http://www.linuxloop.com/news/2009/05/22/microsoft-and-odf-bad-for-everyone/
>>> Frank
>>>
>>> --
>>> msn: frankly3d  skype: frankly3d
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>>
>>
>> --
>> Vicente Werner y Sánchez
>> --
>> Gerard Hooton.
>> Department of Microelectronic Engineering U.C.C.
>> Butler Building,
>> Enterprise Centre,
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>>
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>> Fax: +353 21 4904573
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>>
>>
>>
>>
> 
>