[odf-discuss] Sun's OpenDocument filter for MS office released

[marbux]

On 7/6/07, Lars Noodén <lars at umich.edu> wrote:
>
> Peter Vandenabeele wrote:
> > On 7/5/07, Mirko Nasato <mirko at artofsolving.com> wrote:
>
> >> That's not surprising either: since .doc is proprietary (and different
> >> from one Word version to another)
>
> I'd like to emphasize those points.  ".doc" is a group of several
> (actually many)) different formats sharing two general disadvantages:
> They are both proprietary and binary.
>
> In the context of 'round trip' compatibility, what is needed to deal
> with these formats is nothing more  or less than access to the
> specifications for these formats.


They are a poor target for interoperability in any event because there are
so many versions, each implemented through the Office APIs/converters for
adding native file support. In terms of developing ODF plugins for Office it
might be more productive to push for full specification of those APIs and
their manipulation. (Microsoft is already required to do so by the U.S. v.
MIcrosoft consent decree.)  Those APIs are a far simpler and more stable
target for interoperability development.

I also think it likely that Microsoft will eliminate the ability for Office
users to write to the binary formats in the next version or two, making them
import-only for backward compatibility. That's conjecture, but I do note
that Microsoft has been referring to them as "legacy" file formats since
Ecma 376 was released, notwithstanding that they are still used internally
by the Office apps. (MOOXML itself is implemented using the native file
format support APIs to convert to and from the in-memory binary
representations which are the traditional binary formats before they are
dumped to a file.

Best regards,

Marbux
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