[odf-discuss] Microsoft will now support ODF

[Lars Noodén]

Sigrid Kronenberger wrote:
> ... I think, this is good news. 

It is, but only kinda sorta.  Right now it is just a rumor.

It will be news first on the day they ship a working service pack that
provides full, compliant OpenDocument support -- until then it is a rumor.

There is a higher likelihood of ODF compliance if the task were to be
outsourced to IBM or Sun.  Kerberos has been out for 20 years and MS
still doesn't have a compliant implementation.  IIRC similar for TCP/IP.
 In fact the latest version of MS product seems to have a rather badly
broken and poorly made attempt at replacing the BSD TCP/IP stack.

> Now, we just have to wait until next year,
> until the Service pack for Office is distributed. 

No waiting.  That's what MS wants and why vaporware is used so
frequently in its marketing.

Right now, OpenOffice.org 3.0beta has been available for download for
some time.  Both Koffice and OpenOffice.org have used OpenDocument
format for a couple of years already.  So, for those looking to the
future[1], OpenOffice and Koffice are already years ahead in support for
open standards.

IIRC Koffice is also now available even for legacy systems.

Even for those looking to migrate away from legacy systems it is
important to note that OOo has always had best support for legacy
document formats.  As of last year, OOo's major competitor actually
dropped support for those old formats leaving OOo without competition in
that area.

Also, some very big new with 3.0 is native Aqua (Macintosh OS X gui)
support.  Now OOo can run natively on OS X without X11.  Being involved
in technical projects I use X11 and have it installed already.  However,
native support is clearly an advantage.  This is especially true now
that the closed source OS market has shifted:

http://blogs.eweek.com/applewatch/content/channel/macs_defy_windows-gravity.html
http://www.osweekly.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2732&Itemid=449
http://www.itworld.com/Comp/2296/071114leopardmauls/

Now with commercial projects like Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Fluxbuntu, Fedora,
etc. there is more choice on the market then ever. And each of these
either have OpenOffice.org (or Koffice) pre-installed or can install
them in a click or two.

Best Regards,
-Lars (aka larsnooden (a) openoffice.org )

[1]	http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/7403/469