As information exchange in and with public administrations is very often bound to documents, editing, archiving and exchange possibilities for documents are crucial for the optimum function of administrations, both in terms of practicality and cost.






Initiatives such as the PEGSCO Recommendations on Open Document Formats published by the IDABC Management Committee, demonstrate public administrations preference for "open" document exchange and storage formats that are subject to formal standardisation via international standardisation procedures.


 


The primary objectives of the Berlin event, held at the German Federal Ministry of the Interior (BMI), were to:




• compile further input from Member State public administrations on their experiences and strategies on ODEF


• gather industry viewpoints on the initiatives relating to ODEF standardization and information on future standardisation developments


• provide a platform for exchange between stakeholders in public administrations and main industry players



The program of the workshop included, among other:




• 
  
  ODEF Strategies: Examples from European Administration
  
  


• 
  
  Practical Experiences with the implementation of ODEF
  
  


• 
  
  Report on ODEF-Standardisation activities
  
  


• 
  
   4 parallel sessions with participants 
  
  


• 
  
   A panel discussion with stakeholders 

Subject: Suggested ODF1.2 items



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• From: "Florian Reuter" <freuter@novell.com>


• To: <office@lists.oasis-open.org>


• Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 17:03:24 +0100



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Suggested enhancement for OpenDocument V1.2

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

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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.

A week or so ago, I published a podcast at IT Conversation with Scott Mace interviewing Gary Edwards about OpenDocument. Edwards is the president of the OpenDocument Foundation. OpenDocument Foundation is a non-profit that works to promote the OpenDocument file format–an XML file format for office documents.

There’s no question that businesses want an XML-based file format for office data. The question, naturally, is which XML-based file format. Microsoft has it’s own XML-based file format called OpenXML.

The former State Government CIO of Massachusetts (a state in USA) Louis Gutierrez has a worthwhile interview in Computerworld this week. What I like about the article in particular is that he seems clear that the role of govenment is not just to passively accept standards, but to pragmatically assess the suitability and impact and processes of each one. ISO makes “voluntary standards” not laws.

Gutierrez says the obvious: that there is a marked difference in the feature set between ODF and OpenXML (”straightforward simplicity” versus “feature-rich but very idiosyncratic diversty”): he does not trivialize the difference in coverage or scope between the two.

Q&A: Former Mass. CIO feels 'bittersweet pride' after battles with Microsoft, legislature