[odf-discuss] Mass may endorse OXML.

[Daniel Carrera]

Hi Lars,

Lars Noodén wrote:
> Hmm. I thought I posted a similar article on the topic.  Hopefully it is
> just human error.  I am changing mail clients this week and hope I don't
> have to go back to the old one which turns out to be more mature and
> flexible.

I just checked. Your email went to the odf-members list, not this one.

> My take is that the spin on the headlines is egregiously incorrect.
> 
> The headline is quite wrong or at least premature.  From that and other
> articles on the topic I see that nothing has been decided yet. From what
> I read it is still in the proposal stage. Furthermore, the proposal is
> not about MOOX per se, but a more general attack on the definition of
> "open" in the context of data specifications.

Hmmm... thanks, I didn't pick up on that at all. Does this mean that 
there is still time to influence this decision? Should we make some sort 
of campaign? If we do, we should make sure we get all the facts straight 
first. If they are using a bad definition of "open" we'll need to 
explain why it is bad. Personally, my take was simply that having two 
competing standards is bad.

> Pretty much everyone except MS and its boosters have come to a similar
> conclusion.  For me, when I looked at the (then) proposal for Ecma 376 I
> concluded that it is pretty much unimplementable due to a combination of
> volume, complexity and incompleteness.
> 
> Anyway, as Chris points out, the new format is irrelevant. It is the
> legacy formats (note the plural) and legacy systems that are the
> problems. The only prerequisite for interoperability with the old data
> formats is access to and use of the full specifications for the old
> formats.  Discussing that in the context of any new data formats is at
> best a distraction and counterproductive.
> 
> To go back to my starting point, the spin on these articles is rather
> bad and draws an incorrect conclusion of the current affairs.
> 
> Best regards,
> -Lars
> 
> --
> Lars Noodén
> Ensure access to your data in the future:
> 	http://www.noooxml.org/petition/
> 	http://opendocumentfellowship.org/introduction
>