[odf-discuss] Microsoft wins prize for "Best Campaigner against OOXML Standardization"

[marbux]

On 10/2/07, Daniel Carrera <daniel.carrera at zmsl.com> wrote:
>
> marbux wrote:
> > This would necessitate that vendors remain free to extend the
> > specification, but files containing any such extensions would need to
> > contain a flag so the user can be alerted to a file that may contain
> > formatting that cannot be rendered by the application in use.
>
> A flag is not needed. Just check to see if there are any namespaces
> other than those defined in the spec. Any extensions must be in a
> non-ODF namespace.


That was true in ODF 1.0 and ODF 1.1. But ODF v. 1.2 adds support for RDF
metadata which can be either stored in a metafile or embedded in the
content.

"Metadata may be contained either in separate files within the package (see
> > 1.1), or it may be embedded in content of the document (see ).1.2"
> >
>
The RDF metadata does not necessarily use a separate namespace and is far
more extensible than foreign elements and attributes.

> I haven't checked, but my suspicion is that Sun has not decoded the
> > Microsoft native file support APIs sufficiently to allow a compatibility
> > mode to be set within the Office apps. They certainly have not decoded
> > the Word API to the extent we have or there would be no conversion
> > artifacts in the ODF their plug-in generates.
>
> That is not necessarily true. They might have decoded them just as well
> and better than you, but have chosen not insert "dark matter" in ODF.
> Not everyone feels that inserting non-ODF "dark matter" elements is the
> way to go.


Well, I suppose it's conceivable. But that would mean that they settled for
80-85 per cent fidelity when they could have achieved well over 99 per cent
fidelity even without storing dark matter. And I sincerely doubt that a
company that has added more than 150 proprietary extensions to ODF in its
own implementations would be all that concerned about a very small amount of
dark matter that in no manner affects application performance except by
enhancing round-trip ability.

Plus I can't see why a company that is so demonstrably dead-set against
high-fidelity round-trip interop with MS Office would bother to spend the
R&D resources to develop the means to do so just to put it on the shelf and
forget it.

But I do recognize the possibility, albeit minute, which is why I labeled it
as a suspicion rather than an established fact.

Best regards,

BUCK "MARBUX" MARTIN
  Director of Legal Affairs
  OpenDocument Foundation
  Contact:
<http://www.opendocumentfoundation.us/contact.htm>
-- Universal Interop Now!
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