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Official Statement from the OpenDocument Foundation to OASIS
Official statement from the OpenDocument Foundation on leaving OASIS
Thanks to Paul for digging this up. Who would have guessed that years later, these same issues hang like a dark shroud on the future of ODF? Note also that June 1st of 2007 was the cut off date for ODF 1.2 proposals and recommendations. The OpenFormula and Metadata SC's were rushing to make the cutoff.
The List Enhancement proposal itself was just one of many enhancements submitted by Florian Reuter in November of 2006, designed to greatly improve ODF compatibility with MSOffice "ODF". By November of 2006, thanks largely to the Massachusetts Pilot Study, there were a number of ODF plug-ins for MSOffice. All were capable of producing perfectly compliant ISO 26300 ODF, but falling far short of public expectations of high fidelity interop with OpenOffice ODF. Sound familiar?
Everyone knew that it was only a matter of time before Microsoft was pressed into providing MSOffice ODF support. There was no doubt that they would face the exact same interop challenges as the many independent plug-in efforts. Hence the stepped up efforts by many at the OASIS ODF to "fix" ISO 26300!
At the time of the List Enhancement Proposal, we had increasing evidence from the many pilot studies that ODF was impossible to implement in business and workgroup environments where the MSOffice productivity environment was the defining platform. ODF was not designed to be compatible with MSOffice or the binary documents so critical to business processes bound to this environment.
OpenXML was designed exactly to be compatible with these environments. Unless ODF fixed it's compatibility/interoperability problems there was no way for the independent plug-ins to provide a reasonable ODF implementation alternative to OpenXML. And even if Microsoft did produce an MSOffice ODF compliant with ISO 26300, these productivity environments would remain entirely locked.
The world expected ODF to be compatible, interoperable, Web ready, and fully capable of cracking open the iron grip Microsoft has on the desktop. This List Enhancemen
From Notes2Self 2006 post we discover once again that ODF Interop problems are not new. Back in early February 2005, top ranking OASIS Executive James Clark made <a href="http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office-comment/200502/msg00000.html">a comment</a> to the OASIS OpenDocument technical Committee about the lack of interoperability for spreadsheet documents:
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<i>".... I really hope I'm missing something, because, frankly, I'm speechless. You cannot be serious. <b>You have virtually zero interoperability for spreadsheet documents.</b> OpenDocument has the potential to be extraodinarily valuable and important standard. I urge you not to throw away a huge part of that potential by leaving such <b>a gaping hole in your specification</b>...".</i>
Claus Agerskov further commented that this provided a means of creating lock-in (my emphasis)
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<i>"OpenDocument doesn't specify the formulars used in spreadsheets so every spreadsheet vendor can implement formulars in their own way without being an open standard. This way a vendor can create lock-in to their spreadsheets"</i>
People are agog that Microsoft has announced support for Open Document Format (ODF), but I'm not sure why. This was a foregone conclusion once Microsoft figured out how to move lock-in above the file level to the content network.
In other words, to Sharepoint.
Microsoft has been hell-bent on getting enterprises to dump content into its proprietary Sharepoint repository, calling it the next Windows operating system. I call it the future of Microsoft lock-in.
Microsoft to support PDF, ODF 1.1 and ISO OOXML in MSOffice 14. The company will also join the OASIS ODF TC and working group for ISO PDF.
The marbux proposal to ammend the ODF charter to include interoperability with MSOffice
<p>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.</p>
<p>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.</p>
<p>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.</p>
<p>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.</p>
In my recent post, I discussed the case for harmonization, mainly due to trying to portray a more kindly, conciliatory face in the “standards krieg” that I was enjoying so much. I have been forced to take a different tack, in light of being hung out to dry by my more business-focused IBM comrades and the work that the enemy has done in sprucing up the spec. However, as my closest friends know, for me, there are no half-victories, so you can rest assured that I will not settle for this weak “harmonization” compromise. I set out my (and IBM’s) stall some time ago on this, and as those on the Open Document Foundation know, any attempt at harmonization shall be met with swift and final retribution. They were ejected from the odf-coven just days after their impudence. I have baited my trap, inviting this “harmonization” in my lair (the OASIS ODF TC) where I can bog them down in a morass of incompetence, bickering and politicking, so no new standard is ever ratified. I have already been practicing for this, as you can see, by the ODF 1.1 and 1.2 specs.
<p>Patrick Durusau, the OASIS ODF editor has written an open letter praising the OOXML standardization effort at Ecma and ISO. Patrick is a long time member of ISO JTCS1, currently serving as the ODF editor for both ISO and OASIS ODF efforts. That his endorsement of OOXML comes on the eve of the critically important February BRM is beyond incredible. </p>
<p>Jesper offers this quote which i think adequately summarizes Patrick's endorsement:</p>
<p>The OpenXML project has made a large amount of progress in terms of the openness of its evelopment. Objections that do not recognize that are focusing on what they want to see and not what is actually happening with OpenXML"</p>
Great article from the Universal Interoperability Council arguing the case for CDF as a universally interoperable format capable of fully representing desktop productivity environment documents. The UIC arguments are of course opposed by IBM and the lawyer for OASIS, Andy Updegrove.
In late 2007, an article by OASIS attorney Andy Updegrove claimed that W3C Compound Document Formats: [i] are non-editable formats; [ii] are not designed for conversions to other formats; and [iii] are therefore unsuitable as office formats. Updegrove could not have been more wrong.
But unfortunately, the erroneous Updegrove article was widely publicized by the usual occupants of the IBM cheering section (1) in the stadium where the latest big vendor game for the Incompatible File Format Cup is being played, IFFC Games Stadium.
<p>Will the real universal document format please stand up! Comments on the recent article posted by the Universal Interoperability Council: <i>"Putting Andy Updegrove to bed without his supper".</i></p>
<p>The UIC article is well worth your time. It is extremely well referenced and researched. The arguments put forth counter claims by IBM and OASIS that the W3C's CDF format can not be used to represent desktop productivity environment documents. Not surprisingly, IBM and OASIS argue that the OpenOffice specific ODF is the only alternative to Microsoft Office specific OOXML.</p>
<p>The UIC argues that the full range of MSOffice legacy binary documents and emerging XML documents can fully be represented in CDF - something that not even the most ardent of ODF jihadists would claim as an ODF capabilitiy. The truth is that ODF was not designed for the conversion of MSOffice binary and xml documents.</p>
This site is now live, although there's a ton of customization and configuration work to be done. But we might as well kick off by reprinting a comment I unsuccessfully attempted to post on IBM vice president Bob Sutor's blog today.
I'm flattered that my post was the apparent triggering event for Sutor's announcement later in the day that he will now only allow comments from people who use their "real names."
This is very cool. It looks like the OASIS committee is looking at coming on board to help out with the work going on in DIN to help understand the translation between Open XML and ODF: http://www.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200801/msg0004
Uh Oh. Microsoft and Novell joined the EU's call to harmonize ODF and OOXML, but Sun and IBM refused the invite. Now we have the invite in front of the OASIS ODF TC!. Is there any rock big enough for them to hide under if they also refuse?
And if the OASIS ODF does join the EU-DIN-ISO effort, where doe stha tleave IBM, Sun and their inistance on a politically mandated "rip out and replace" as the only acceptable solution?
- on 2008-01-29
Under a strategy called "Beyond Office," IBM is developing several technologies to make Symphony an extensible development platform for business applications and Web-based document editors.
Rather than compete head-to-head with Microsoft Office, IBM's strategy is to make documents act like "containers" for information within workflow and collaboration applications, according to IBM executives.
The plan also calls for IBM to make documents based on the Open Document standard available through Web browsers using Adobe Flash or HTML. On Wednesday, IBM opened a Web site called Bluehouse where small business people can access hosted Web applications for sharing documents.
This was a day long event demonstrating for all the world to see that there is no such thing as ODF interoperability. The exchange of documents between OpenOffice 2.0, KOffice and Lotus Symphony is pathetic.
The results of the day long event were so discouraging that Rob Weir took to threatening developers who attended in his efforts to keep a lid on it. I think this is called damage control :). From what i hear, it was a very long day for Rob. but that's no excuse for his threatening anyone who might publicly talk about these horrific interop problems. The public expects these problems to be fixed. But how can they be fixed if the issues can't be discussed publicly?
- garyedwards on 2008-01-10Lotus Symphony is based on the OpenOffice 1.1.4 code base that IBM ripped off back when OpenOffice was under dual license - SSSL and LGPL.
- garyedwards on 2008-01-10
In e-mailed comments, Heintzman said his criticisms about the situation have been made openly.
"We think that Open Office has quite a bit of potential and would love to see it move to the independent foundation that was promised in the press release back when Sun originally announced OpenOffice," he said. "We think that there are plenty of existing models of communities, [such as] Apache and Eclipse, that we can look to as models of open governance, copyright aggregation and licensing regimes that would make the code much more relevant to a much larger set of potential contributors and implementers of the technology....
"Obviously, by joining we do believe that the organization is important and has potential," he wrote. "I think that new voices at the table, including IBM's, will help the organization become more efficient and relevant to a greater audience.... Our primary reason for joining was to contribute to the community and leverage the work that the community produces.... I think it is true there are many areas worthy of improvement and I sincerely hope we can work on those.... I hope the story coming out of Barcelona isn't a dysfunctional community story, but rather a [story about a] potentially significant and meaningful community with considerable potential that has lots of room for improvement...."
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