John Meyer wrote: > Harold Fuchs wrote: >> Slightly off topic but of interest, I think. Sorry if it's old news - >> I've >> been away. >> >> > > Okay, forgive me for being the idjit on this one, but given > Microsoft's proprietary nature, why in the world would it want to make > OOXML an "open standard"? As one poster put it on that blog, all of > Microsoft's other formats have become more or less de facto and they > haven't been opened up. > And as far as the "competing on standards", that's like saying you're > going to compete on languages to my thinking.
The problem for Microsoft is that many governments and other institutions around the world are insisting on using ISO standards. If OOXML is not an ISO standard, it'll be ineligible. Since MS refuses to use ODF, the only way they can sell to those organizations is to have OOXML declared a "standard". It's quite obvious from the published spec, that OOXML is simply an incomplete description of the way MS has done things and is tightly tied to Windows and MS Office. It also contains many significant bugs, such as claiming 1900 is a leap year. It's beyond me why a new standard should carry around such baggage. -- Use OpenOffice.org <http://www.openoffice.org> --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
