I don't know how closely you have followed this story but it has grave implications. ISO as a standards body is being questioned and countries are beginning to pull out over OOXML. Initially OOXML was turned down but M$ used its muscle to get it through over the objections of many countries. Once it was set as a "standard" M$ refused to include their own standard that they pushed though and which has all but destroyed ISO in Office, but they did include ODF which they had opposed. Now it seems that ODF is so good and OOXML is such a dog that M$ wants to control the open source document standard. If they do this it becomes no longer open source in its true sense. It is an open source standard which becomes the de facto Office file format and M$ will have gained control over something they fought against and which many open source developers worked so hard on. This makes a sham of the whole concept of a standards body and it shows the power of M$ and their arrogant attitude and malevolent intentions. Can it be the way that M$ will deal with anything open source? Instead of devloping they just have to muscle control and take over making somethng they had nothing to do with their own. Scary. Roy
Linux: Fast, friendly, flexible and .... free! Support Open source. <*,)}}+< Only dead fish go with the flow! ----- Original Message ---- From: Scott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [email protected] Sent: Friday, October 3, 2008 9:50:41 PM Subject: Re: [LINUX_Newbies] M$ dumps its own stnadard and wants to control ODF? On Fri, Oct 03, 2008 at 06:25:35PM -0700, Linux Canuck wrote: > I post this as an information piece with big potential repercussions for us > all as ODF is the open source darling and OOXML is a disaster. If M$ can't > back its own standard because it is not a standard but they get control over > ODF what are we left with? > Well, to be a bit cynical.... A product that for better or worse is probably on 75-90 percent of office workstations. A format that whether it is good or not, is the de facto standard--so much a standard in fact, that, to my amusement, I saw a Linux admin job posting with the line, "Resumes must be submitted in .doc format" Sigh. Unfortunately, few people are in powerful enough positions to say, do not send me .doc format and I will not send it either. Piers Anthony, the best selling writer can get away with it. I suspect that most writers for his publisher (and all publishers) can't. Businesses have to deal with it because their customers will require it, and one of the most important things about OpenOffice is its compatibility with MS doc and xls format. Whether or not this is really changing, I don't know. For example, our company uses OpenOffice for most of the workstations. However, the VIPs insist upon, and get, MS Office. There are some things that OpenOffice simply doesn't handle properly. One can argue, "That's because MS office is terrible and doesn't follow standards," but when push comes to shove, companies have to be able to accomodate their customers. Regardless of how poorly MS plays its cards (and while arrogant, they're not stupid--they didn't get where they are by ignoring what people want), it's going to be a long time before MS Office loses its dominance in the business world. -- Scott Robbins PGP keyID EB3467D6 ( 1B48 077D 66F6 9DB0 FDC2 A409 FA54 EB34 67D6 ) gpg --keyserver pgp.mit.edu --recv-keys EB3467D6 Wesley: Wait for Faith. Buffy: That could be hours. The girl makes Godot look punctual. __________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Canada Toolbar: Search from anywhere on the web, and bookmark your favourite sites. Download it now at http://ca.toolbar.yahoo.com. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ To unsubscribe from this list, please email [EMAIL PROTECTED] & you will be removed.Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LINUX_Newbies/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LINUX_Newbies/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
