[odf-discuss] Gnome Foundation and ECMA

[Alberto Barrionuevo]

Dear Jeff,

On Wednesday 31 October 2007 13:50:41 Jeff Waugh wrote:
> <quote who="M. Fioretti">
>
> > "Jody's participation is principally about to make OOXML easier to
> > tolerate and generate/distribute OOXML even by Free Software users"
>
> Wouldn't it be great to have the SMB/CIFS protocol documented? Perhaps
> parts of the Win32 API for interoperability reasons? Why not the Microsoft
> binary and XML formats? Should we not interoperate with Microsoft at all?
> How would you expect our software to be embraced by users in the real world
> if we were entirely unable to interoperate?

Joining to ECMA *NOW* that the ECMA specification is frozen since March as DIS 
29500 is not getting more interoperability information out of Microsoft, but 
helping to Microsoft to resolve the thousand of comments collected against 
the specification in a way that Microsfot gets finally its ISO. At the end 
your official "support" is definitelly helping to spread a *NEW* and mostly 
unused (closed) format among public administrations worlwide.

Of course this action is against the already blessed real open format that 
would help the adoption of the free desktop: ODF (ISO 26300).

One thing is to implement the OOXML format for interoperability reasons 
(better letting only to import, not to export because that helps to its 
adoption), but another well different is to help to its adoption as seems to 
be doing Gnome Foundation sending officially to an OOXML backer as Jody *NOW* 
to ECMA.

With your "support" you are just and at least creating noise in the delicate 
ISO process. And the only one who profit from that noise is your theorical 
main and mostly only competitor, Microsoft, who will make sure a wide use of 
your "support" and of the Gnome name.

Strategically you are doing a huge error damaging the free desktop and the 
only way to solve it is to make a clear official statement against the 
adoption of OOXML at ISO in the terms that Marco has suggested.

Please, just for clarification, could you explain me which you see that could 
be the profit for Gnome of OOXML getting its ISO?

Best,
-- 
Alberto Barrionuevo
Vice President FFII
www.ffii.org