Ray Ozzie, Microsoft’s Chief Software Architect, while speaking today at the annual conference of the company Most Valuable Professional, has given some perspective about the relationship between Microsoft and open source, as reported by Todd Bishop. What I see as a dangerous problem, especially when you look at interoperability between applications and file formats (especially ODF and OOXML), is the fact that Microsoft ignores the open source community.
If we look at OpenOffice.org, the three markets where the open source office suite is competing most successfully with Microsoft Office are probably Germany, France and Italy, followed by other European markets like Spain and the Netherlands. In Italy, where I have the updated numbers, we are hitting today - maybe while I’m writing this post - one million downloads since January 1st, 2008 (over 350.000 since the announcement of OOo 2.4 in late March). Although we don’t have Microsoft figures for Office 2007, we estimate a maximum of 1.8 million licenses sold in 2008.
I already know the reply: “You can’t compare licenses with downloads…”. Of course, gentlemen, but do you really think that one million downloads in slightly over one hundred days (at an average of over 9,200 downloads per day) still equals to a few thousands users? Do you really think that a small bunch of people, just the same small bunch of people, can get all these downloads? Come on, we’ve other stuff to do. Please, be realistic. We’re eating your pie, quickly. We’re hungry.
I don’t know the figures for Germany and France, but I’m quite sure that they are even better than those for Italy. The results in these markets are mainly due to the daily activity of the local community, while Microsoft - with the exception of Italy, where Associazione PLIO is recognized and respected - apparently ignores the reality. I am sure, for instance, that Microsoft’s Document Interoperability Initiative would greatly benefit from the involvement of the open source community.
Technorati Tags:
ooxml, open source, openoffice, microsoft, odf
I’ve tried to understand what has happened in Geneva during the Ballot Resolution Meeting, a very important step during the Fast Track process for the standardization of the Office Open XML document format.
I’ve gone through dozens of posts with the clear feeling that the report was biased, either in a sense or the other. Unfortunately, the voting process doesn’t help at all in 
understanding, as the effects of abstention - for instance - can be different from the norm, as they may express a vote.
At the end, I’ve found only two posts which are worth reading, as they try to be balanced in their opinion, although they’ve been written by people against OOXML: Tim Bray (Canada) and Yoon Kit (Malaysia). They try to give a feeling of the work done by delegates during the BRM, and of the short time available to achieve the huge task of going through over 1.000 comments.
They both underline their negative opinion on the Fast Track process in relation to a document format with a description of the size of OOXML, which is a whopping 6.000 pages (you can even find pictures of the printout).
I’ve decided to avoid linking the biased posts, which can be easily found Googling “BRM Geneva” or “BRM OOXML”. You can find the entire spectrum of marketing hype, from “it was an unbelievable success” to “it was a complete disaster”, and you can get a sense of the commercial interests behind document standards.
Tags: marketing, Open Document FormatOSS Groups
FSFE News: http://www.fsfeurope.org
IDABC: http://europa.eu.int/idabc/en
Linux OS Blog: http://linux.wordpress.com
No OOXML: http://www.noooxml.org/start
OASIS Press: http://www.oasis-open.org/news/index.php
ODF Alliance: http://www.odfalliance.org/blog/index.php
Open Doc: http://opendocument.xml.org
OSA Blog: http://blog.opensolutionsalliance.org/
OSI Blog: http://opensource.org/blog
OSI News: http://opensource.org/aggregator
OpenOffice
Charles Shulz: http://standardsandfreedom.net
Discovering OOo: http://openoffice.ozlady.com
Eric Bachard: http://eric.bachard.free.fr/news/
Erwin Tenhumberg: http://blogs.sun.com/dancer/
GullFOSS: http://blogs.sun.com/GullFOSS/
John McCreesh: http://www.mealldubh.org
Louis Suarez-Potts: http://ooo-speak.blogspot.com/
Malte Timmermann: http://blogs.sun.com/malte/
Pavel Janik: http://blog.janik.cz
Solveigh Haughland: http://blogs.sun.com/oootnt/
Analisti
Alex Fletcher: http://alexfletcher.typepad.com/all_bets_off/
Anne Manes: http://apsblog.burtongroup.com/
Caos Theory: http://blogs.the451group.com/opensource
Craig Roth: http://knowledgeforward.wordpress.com
Gordon Haff: http://www.cnet.com/8300-13556_1-61.html
Guy Creese: http://creese.typepad.com/pattern_finder/
James Governor: http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor
Michael Coté: http://www.redmonk.com/cote
Stephen O’Grady: http://redmonk.com/sogrady
Vinnie Mirchandani: http://dealarchitect.typepad.com/deal_architect/
OSS Press
Desktop Linux: http://www.desktoplinux.com
eWEEK Linux: http://www.eweek.com
Groklaw: http://www.groklaw.net
InfoWorld OSS: http://weblog.infoworld.com/openresource/?source=rss
ITtoolbox: http://blogs.ittoolbox.com
Linux News: http://lxer.com/
Linux Watch: http://www.linux-watch.com
LWN: http://lwn.net
NewsForge: http://www.linux.com/feature
O’Reilly Blogs: http://weblogs.oreilly.com/
O’Reilly GMT: http://www.oreillygmt.co.uk/”
O’Reilly Radar: http://radar.oreilly.com/
OSS Watch: http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/rss/
The Pulse: http://www.pulseofoss.com
ZDNet OSS: http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source
Microsoft
Brian Jones: http://blogs.msdn.com/brian_jones/default.aspx
Gray Matter: http://blogs.technet.com/gray_knowlton/default.aspx
Jason Matusow: http://blogs.msdn.com/jasonmatusow/default.aspx
Mary Jo Foley: http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft
Microsoft Clips: http://www.mclips.it/default.aspx
Port 25: http://port25.technet.com/default.aspx
OSS
Alan Lord: http://www.theopensourcerer.com
Alex Fletcher: http://alexfletcher.typepad.com/all_bets_off/
Amanda McPherson: http://www.linux-foundation.org/weblogs/amanda
Andy Astor: http://andyastor.blogspot.com/
Andy Updegrove: http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog
Anthony Gold: http://anthonygold.blogspot.com/
Arnaud Le Hors: http://lehors.wordpress.com
Benjamin Horst: http://www.solidoffice.com
Bob Sutor: http://www.sutor.com/newsite/blog-open
Christopher Keene: http://www.keeneview.com/
Derek Rodner: http://rodner.blogspot.com/
Digital Divide: http://digitaldivide.garuti.it
Doug Levin: http://bduck1.blogspot.com/
Finalmente Libero: http://finalmentelibero.ning.com
Gianugo Rabellino: http://boldlyopen.com
Glyn Moody (1): http://opendotdotdot.blogspot.com/
Glyn Moody (2): http://www.linuxjournal.com/blogs/glyn-moody
GNUband: http://www.gnuband.org
Ian Howells: http://blogs.alfresco.com/ianh
Ian Murdock: http://ianmurdock.com
IBM Linux: http://www.ibm.com/press
James McGovern: http://duckdown.blogspot.com/
Jason Stamper: http://www.businessreviewonline.com/os/
Jeff Waugh: http://perkypants.org
Jim Kern: http://www.linuxwins.com
John Cherry: http://www.linux-foundation.org/weblogs/cherry
Jonathan Schwartz: http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/
Leif Lodahl: http://lodahl.blogspot.com/
Marco Caresia: http://www.didawiki.org/wordpress
Mark Hinkle: http://socializedsoftware.com
Mark Radcliffe: http://lawandlifesiliconvalley.blogspot.com/
Mark Shuttleworth: http://www.markshuttleworth.com
Matt Asay: http://blogs.cnet.com/8300-13505_1-16.html
Open Malaysia: http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/
Palle Pedersen: http://www.inside-open-source.com/
Rob Weir: http://www.robweir.com/blog/
Roberto Galoppini: http://robertogaloppini.net
Sam Hiser: http://fussnotes.typepad.com/plexnex/
Savio Rodriguez: http://saviorodrigues.wordpress.com
Seeing Both Sides: http://bostonvcblog.typepad.com/vc/
Shaun Connolly: http://connollyshaun.blogspot.com/
Simon Phipps: http://blogs.sun.com/webmink/
Stephen Walli: http://stephesblog.blogs.com/my_weblog/
The Pulse: http://www.pulseofoss.com
Walt Hucks: http://lnxwalt.wordpress.com
Zack Urlocker: http://www.theopenforce.com
Tags: desktop linux, gnu, Linux, Open Document Format, open document format, openoffice, softwareToday, we have decided to follow yesterday’s Microsoft announcement with an open letter to the company. This is my translation into English of the text (unfortunately, some of the extra care put in each word gets lost, but the meaning is there).
Welcome, Microsoft.
Following yesterday’s announcement, we are ready to co-operate at the promotion of open formats in order to support this new endeavour in the area of office suites. We are ready to co-operate, but we will criticize you for every uncertain or false step.
Inside interoperability there isn’t any space left for tricks: interoperability means that you have chosen to be on the same side of the users.
We believe in your good faith more than the European Commission does, as they have told the world that this is the fourth time that Microsoft makes an announcement about interoperability, without any impact - until today - on the company strategy.
We sincerely hope that this time, for a number of reasons - including our proactive opposition to the fast track standardization of Office 2007 file formats, which will go on until all the necessary changes will be made, the chances that mere words are going to translate into facts are higher than in the past.
At the same time, we invite all the companies that support the ODF format together with us - and those that belong to the OpenOffice.org community: Sun, IBM, Novell & Red Flag - to work for a full interoperability, as the technical and legal obstacles are going to disappear soon.
Users should be able to exchange transparently Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org documents, in both directions.
The software industry, which is not based just in Redmond, must demonstrate a true commitment to make ODF a more widespread format.
If this will happen, users will win, and the market - i.e., all of us - will win.
Associazione PLIO (Italian National Linguistic Project OpenOffice.org)
We know that many inside the community have a different opinion. Of course, we have carefully evaluated the pros and the cons of such a statement, and are quite sure that this is the right attitude for this specific time in the history of computing.
Tags: office suite, Open Document Format, open document format, openoffice, softwareA few old news articles that I’d nevertheless like to catalog here today:
InformationWeek writes, in mid-January, of Lenovo preinstalling Linux:
“Starting Jan. 14, the T61 and R16 Centrino ThinkPads will have the option of shipping with SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10, with OpenOffice.org included. A news item over at DesktopLinux.com revealed that the T61 will sport a Core 2 Duo T7205 2.0-GHz processor, 1 Gbyte of DDR2 RAM, an 80-Gbyte 5400 RPM hard drive — all for $949.” (Incidentally, choosing Linux will save a buyer $20 over Windows on the same hardware.)
Erwin Tenhumberg writes a status report on ODF that he titles “Dispelling Myths Around ODF.”
A very thorough article that debunks some of the FUD Microsoft has been spreading around ODF (though personally, I have not seen as much MS FUD as I expected–maybe their energy isn’t what it once was).
My favorite section is where Erwin lists some of the prominent applications that use ODF as their default, or one of their primary, formats. These include KOffice, OpenOffice.org, StarOffice, IBM Lotus Symphony, Corel WordPerfect, Apple TextEdit, Google Docs, and plenty more.
Tags: Linux, Open Document Format, openofficeShort Answer: When it becomes manipulation. And before some of the Microsofties coiled in their upscale building of the rue de l’Université in Paris start to wonder if they should not be doing something about me, let me just point you to this link: The now famous Plamondon Files, one of whose is adequately named “Evangelism is War”. Too late for the Schadenfreude, my dubious friends.
I am afraid Microsoft has embarked in a journey where manipulation and astroturfing will be the longitude and latitude they will use to set their path. But let’s dive into the specifics.
The OOXML controversy has now reached a new stage. This stage could be labelled as the stage of confusion. The Ecma has answered to 3522 comments (and 3522 unique comments that should be dealt with appropriately, not by grouping hundreds of them because they seem to be the same) in a way that could be considered as positive at first glance. However, any deeper analysis of just a handful of these answers show that most of them have simply not been adequately answered. Aside the mention “Agreed” by the Ecma, we have several, not to say hundreds and hundreds of answers that worsen the existing flaws, contradict each other, or propose solutions that avoid any kind of common path with the existing ISO standard, ODF. That’s just the issue with the comments that have been answered to; others have been ignored. The French convergence proposal has been flatly rejected by the Ecma on formal grounds. Namely -strap yourself- the convergence proposal cannot be properly addressed in the course of a Fast-Track process. What the Ecma forgets to mention here is that it’s precisely the reason why OOXML should not be approved as an ISO standard, since discussions and proposals on convergence or mentions of conflicts with existing standards do not seem to matter.
At the Afnor meeting we had last Friday, the refusal of the Ecma was discussed; Microsoft and its proxies were trying all sorts of arguments to convince us that the Ecma had not exactly rejected the proposal. They were trying to make the point that the Ecma had already answered the convergence -the harmonization as they call it- in an answer made to the committee of New Zealand. The problem is twofold here, but Microsoft obviously intended to blur the lines and confuse the committee:
-The proposal by the Afnor implied a roadmap and a sanitization work to be made on OOXML. With all due respect to the standards board of New Zealand, its own proposal never contained such a project.
- Most importantly, the Afnor proposal did clearly imply that OOXML would never become an ISO standard (see here). OOXML could become an “ISO-TS” (Technical Specification) but there again the Ecma decided on vague formal gounds that the JTC-1 simply could not do it. I know for sure that there are other similar options and titles for the contentious OOXML if it were to follow that path. But the Ecma answer to New Zealand was implying in turn that harmonization could be possible if OOXML became an ISO standard.
I could also mention the odd attempts to push VML back into the OOXML spec… But there are more cunning aspects that have the obvious effect to confuse people in this story. And when I mean people, I mean ISO delegates, journalists, pundits, laymen, strawmen… and ultimately, customers. Because customers do pay attention to what’s going on with the OOXML issue and what will happen in Geneva.
On a legal point of view, the growing uncertainty on patents and intellectual property related to OOXML has gone unnoticed mostly because of the efforts made by the Ecma and Microsoft to alleviate those concerns, mostly through throwing incomplete, half valid protective claims on OOXML. I clearly remember that my company filed a comment pertaining to the legal gaps of the Open Specification Premise and the RAND agreement covering OOXML. Too many points inside the OOXML specifications are left uncovered by them, thus making it hazardous for anybody to implement OOXML. Another, very important point, is Microsoft’s refusal to make the OSP apply to GPL. That pretty much says it all on Microsoft’s will to open up the competition. The ODF Alliance has published a very good paper on this issue, but if you want more background on this, I suggest you read the excellent article by Roy Schestowitz.
In short, the confusion around intellectual property is so overwhelming that one is left unconvinced at the ability of the ISO to do its homework properly when it comes to patents and more generally IPR. Others have explained that all this was due to Microsoft’s will to “drown the fish” as the French saying goes, but I guess wondering about that at this stage would be beside the point.
Where confusion is obviously the result of a strategy devised by disingenuous people is the case of the Office Binary translation project. After the bombastic announcement by Microsoft that it was to release the “documentation on its office binary file formats”, one could have thought that it would be able to receive the full binary specification and perhaps (an immoderate hope), perhaps the actual source code of those binary blurbs. You can always hope, “ain’t gonna happen”… All what is available is the same old documentation, most of it having been available until 1999 where it was taken off line from MSDN. This documentation is thoroughly incomplete, acutely inadequate and riddled by legal traps at least as bad as the ones carried by the OSP that covers these files. You will notice the subtle art of confusion that speaks of documentation but carefully avoids the words “full specification”.
Now the Office Binary to OOXML translator is one of those projects that actually makes OOXML irrelevant as a standard. If this project ever comes to fruition, which is at the moment not the case, anybody -or so one might hope- could use this software to convert its binary, proprietary files from Microsoft Office to the controversial OOXML. But then why did we have OOXML in the first place? What about the advertised ability of OOXML to “faithfully represent” the behaviour of past applications? I guess this project should have somehow been included in the OOXML spec in the first place, because it does defeat the purpose of OOXML in the first place.
That’s one more contradiction for Microsoft to handle. But as I wrote the other day, “nevermind the money”…
Tags: Open Document Format, softwareI think my trip to Geneva is going to be exciting. Exciting and interesting at the same time. There will be surprizes, laughters, and laments. But mind you, Geneva does not matter. It never mattered. The OOXML camp is trying to lure you into thinking that anything bad that could happen in Geneva during the BRM sessions will be caused by the likes of IBM (including my company; I’m rolling on the floor laughing.) What they hold to be much more important takes place after the BRM, during the month of March, when every national standardization board will have to cast a ballot, once again (this time will be the final ballot) on the proprietary OOXML. Expect pressures and moves behind curtains of all sorts coming from the OOXML camp. They have the might, they have the money, and they have the clout. But will it be enough?
What is wanted out of that quite concerted campaign involving a former chairman of Ecma International is the banning of any form of communication between the delegates and the conference on open standards. I understand that the JTC-1 delegates need quiet, reflective seclusion, but as Rob Weir pointed out himself, why didn’t the JTC-1 react in the light of so much contacts between the national standards bodies and Microsoft (the original author of the contentious Ecma specification) during the ballot period? Why did the ISO’s JTC-1 never react when insistant rumours -not to say evidences- of collusion and corruption started to appear? The past cannot be undone. But each of us can learn from our mistakes, including the ISO.
Oh, and there will be the dirty tactics and the cunning rethorics, too. There will be attempts to slip VML back into OOXML because it is difficult at this stage to have the problematic specification register as an ISO technical specification (ISO T-S, which is not an ISO standard). There will be attempts to confuse delegates, refusals to answer some good questions, just like the Afnor’s proposal for convergence was bluntly refused by the Ecma. Nonetheless, the Afnor should and will carry on, despite the procedural arguments that will be thrown against it: The Ecma wants to keep its record of being the sole industrial standardization agency that has never refused the standardization of any specification it was in charge of. Nevermind the money.
Last but not least, some measures have to be taken in order to ease the standardization of the controversial OOXML itself. There seems to be a need for its supporters to balance their lack of popularity. After all, it’s pretty hard to gather more than eighty thousands people signing against a controversial candidate for standardization. At the very least, it’s a pretty impressive score for a not so mainstream topic. So instead of amending their ways, (for some it’s too late) the OOXML proponents have devised this new -and probably impressiveto their own eyes- strategy of making the ODF camp look evil. I’m laughing once again, because it’s just pathetic. This monopoly is trying hard to make others look bad, using deceptive tactics and will fail to do so because it still has not understood that people always prefer the victims and not their torturer.
So here’s my message to the employees of Microsoft Corporation and the employees of all their Gold Partners who will attend the Geneva BRM: Try harder, you still ain’t there.
Tags: communication, Open Document Format, softwareThankfully, the EU’s antitrust office functions much more effectively than does the US DOJ’s!
Groklaw reports on a new investigation the EU has begun into Microsoft’s tactics in promoting its MSOOXML file format, in EU Commission Investigating Microsoft’s MSOOXML Push. Beyond that, Groklaw has collected a large number of resources following the ODF vs MSOOXML contest:
“Now that it’s making headlines in the mainstream press that the EU Commission is investigating Microsoft’s behavior in trying to get MSOOXML accepted as an ISO “standard”, I want to simply remind the world that Groklaw has a permanent ODF/MSOOXML page, including a chronology, where all the events can be tracked, month by month, since the Massachusetts events began in January of 2005.”
Groklaw links to Andy Updegrove’s detailed article of a similar title, EU Initiates Investigation Against Microsoft OOXML Push. When companies try to corrupt and interfere with government bodies, as Microsoft did to Sweden during the initial MSOOXML standardization attempt last year, it’s clear the EU will come to their defense.
Tags: Open Document FormatIBM is a staunch defender of open standards in IT these days, and has been one of the big supports of ODF (OpenDocument Format), the XML-based specification that should do for “office” documents what HTML has done for the web: make it totally agnostic to the software you use to create and consume data. ODF could break up another monopoly and bring a new wave of innovation to the realm of desktop and net-based computing.
Ars Technica reports on IBM’s announcement that ODF is superior to Microsoft’s MSOOXML:
“As governments around the world begin to establish IT procurement policies that favor open standards, the stakes in the document format dispute are rising. The trend towards mandatory standards adoption in government IT has led some to speculate that government agencies and companies that work closely with the public sector will begin to turn away from Microsoft’s deeply entrenched office offerings, instead adopting alternatives like IBM’s Lotus Notes, Sun’s StarOffice, or OpenOffice.org which use the OpenDocument Format (ODF). Microsoft has been seeking ISO approval for its own OOXML format in order to ensure that its software remains competitive.”
The strategic and market reasons are clear why an open standard (ODF) is better for customers than a closed standard, even one that masquerades as open (MSOOXML). But the issue is greater than that. The open standard, in this case, is also the technologically more advanced of the two.
“Citing technical and intellectual property issues, a growing number of critics believe that Microsoft’s standards are flawed, restrictive, not adequately aligned with existing standards, or not conducive to broad third-party support. They argue that Microsoft should adopt ODF rather than fragmenting the office document space with its own alternative.”
After years of dragging their heels, Microsoft has slowly moved toward supporting standard HTML, so we should demand the same with ODF. It’s best for customers, and any business that wants to thrive should do right by its customers.
Tags: Open Document Format, openoffice, software