Daniel Carrera wrote:

> For once in my life, I will defend Microsoft.

Yes, you new employer. :-)

> I'm sorry Marco, but no. Using different APIs between Word and Front 
> Page does not at all help Microsoft achieve lock-in. And to some extent 
> makes it harder. But the simple fact is that they are different 
> applications.

Yes, it's not necessarily an intended lock-in if you use
"non-standardized" APIs. It can be because it's impossible to treat two
apps with the same API or just because until now nobody thought about it.

> I honestly believe that if something like that happened, it would *kill* 
> OpenDocument simply because it would be next to impossible to support by 
> anyone. This wouldn't be the first time that an attempt at 
> standarization gets killed because a committee decides to add eccessive 
> complexity.

I don't know it that will happen. I don't see OpenDocument as the body
that should work on an API standardization. A proposal like this shows
that the idea of OpenDocument is not understood (IMHO). This format goes
far beyond applications, simply spoken it's a medium to store data.

Remember that many members of the OASIS TC had a completely different
idea about what OpenDocument will be for them, and the agreed standard
is the result of the least common denominator of all the ideas (that
sounds worse than it is!). Adding macros to it of course will leave the
common platform. I'm sure Gary Edwards (who was seen on this list
lately) could give a useful comment here as a member of the OASIS TC.

Macros are always bound to an application, they work on models how the
application interpretes the file format. Even if you standardize this
interpretation, that's beyond the scope of the format itself. But
without further investigation I wouldn't preclude the possibility of a
standardization to at least a small extent, but that should be seen
separately to the OpenDocument effort.

Best regards,
Mathias

-- 
Mathias Bauer - OpenOffice.org Application Framework Project Lead
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