He still gets it wrong.
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| mark_oz Jun 12, 2006 4:01 PM EDT |
The main way he gets it wrong is to gloss over the fact that Microsoft themselves chose not to support ODF, and therefore Microsoft have put themselves out of any purchasing decision. It can't be anti-competitive of Mass. when Microsoft take themselves out of the bidding. The second way is that Microsoft's competing XML schema requires components of Windows - ActiveX for example. This means that any software application written to be compliant with Microsoft's proposed XML schema will have to be an application that runs ONLY on a Windows platform. Hence Microsoft's competing schema does not address the main concern of Mass. which was the ability to read documents well into the future even if the original vendor and platform on which they were created is long gone. |
| dcparris Jun 12, 2006 4:23 PM EDT |
Do you happen to have any links referring to this? I would sure appreciate anything you can point me to that addresses this very issue. I have had great difficulty finding anything specific that I could point to in support of this kind of argument. |
| mark_oz Jun 12, 2006 10:22 PM EDT |
To dcparris: http://www.topxml.com/XML/re-34771_First-impressions-of-Open... "A new draft of Open XML came out on my birthday. 4081 pages of PDF, and very impressive for anyone who has worked on specification and standards. Two things stick out: first how horrible XML Schema fragments are when stuck inline to document structure; second, how the implementation-neutral tone of the introduction is at odds with the elements for various kinds of Active X embedded objects." On Google, searching for "Open XML" and "ActiveX" yeilds 22,000 hits. ActiveX runs only on Windows. |
| mark_oz Jun 12, 2006 10:27 PM EDT |
Further, from the horses mouth (Brian Jones' weblog) http://blogs.msdn.com/brian_jones/archive/2005/10/11/479808.... " # re: Microsoft Office Open XML Format does not require upgrading to Office "12" Wednesday, October 12, 2005 8:20 PM by BrianJones Inquisitive - Steven Sinofsky (Senior VP for Office) sent a signed letter to the European Union directly addressing that very concern. We will continue to provide the licenses going forward and continue to represent everything in XML (other than obvious binary type structures like pictures, Active X controls, etc.). http://www.microsoft.com/office/xml/response.mspx" HOLD THE PHONE! ActiveX may be do-able on Linux via Wine, I just found out. http://dot.kde.org/994747675/ It looks like they have done it for Konqueror web browser, so it might be possible to write an Office 12 clone to produce Office Open XML format documents on a Linux platform. But my, what a kludge! This is hardly the way to go to try to produce a platform-independant, vendor-neutral and future-proof document format. ODF is miles ahead in terms of platform independence. |
| dcparris Jun 13, 2006 11:28 AM EDT |
Hey thanks! That's really helpful. |
| ABCC Jun 13, 2006 3:11 PM EDT |
Let me see if I understand what you're saying... Assuming Open XML, exluding ActiveX, is certified and becomes an openly implementable format and will theoretically be around in perpetuity. if it were to be implemented by MA ActiveX will also have to become an open standard, freely implementable in GPL'ed software and the like. then MS will actually be enforcing on themselves precisely what they accuse the GPL of doing. Meaning something along the lines of their "The GPL is a viral license" PR campaigns, without even GPLing their software. Woohoo! Another job well done MS! Sadly, since assumptions are the mother of all cock ups, by throwing MA a flawed bone such as OpenXML and thus buying some time something along the lines of [new governor elected, office 12 comes out, offcials can be bought, homeland security directive requiring Office12 is passed, ...] will be more likely to occur. Anyways, I'm looking forward to reading your rebuke dcparris, the last ones have been an entertaining read. ABCC |
| dcparris Jun 13, 2006 5:16 PM EDT |
> Anyways, I'm looking forward to reading your rebuke dcparris, the last ones have been an entertaining read. I'm sure you'll enjoy tomorrow's article. I didn't even bother with the XML specs - you'll see why. I may take on a separate article to address the "openness" of the two formats. |
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