The problem is not only file formats but getting the end user to realise that the features Microsoft adds to Office, such as Sharepoint, have negligible impact in terms of improved productivity and only, in the end, are tools to making Office more entrenched in the organisation. I have to admit though, although I do not like Microsoft all that much, I do have a deep seated hatred of Adobe due their arrogance towards non-Windows based operating systems – and their incessant whining over Microsoft’s monopoly but ignoring the fact that through their failure to support alternative platforms, they are in effect propping up the Microsoft monopoly on the desktop (and all the technologies attached to it (aka file formats, audio and video formats etc.)).Īs for how this helps – I personally think it’ll have negligible impact on it.
Right now, XPS (when compared to OOXML) is alot more open and well documented it also isn’t laced with legal gotchas, so it should make implementing it and distributing binaries a non-issue. Not too sure maybe Adobe realising that if they didn’t step down from their position, Microsoft would push XPS hard. However, Adobe threatened to file antitrust actions against MS if they didn’t remove it, so MS did. In fact, it shipped as part of Office 2007 Beta 2.
MICROSOFT OFFICE 2004 SAVE AS PDF PDF
Weird, MS originally wanted to include Save to PDF in Office 2007. I sincerely hope that all that scepticism is unjustified.Īs I said before: paradoxically if Microsoft were just to do a good honest implementation of ODF it would actually do more to stop open source adoption than fighting against open source would.Ī good honest Microsoft Office implementation of ODF would mean that everybody wins … probably even Microsoft themselves! “The ODF Alliance today greeted with scepticism Microsoft’s announcement of its intention to include support for the OpenDocument Format in the first half of 2009.” Well maybe they really start playing fair this time, but after all those years lying, sabotaging, blackmailing, bribing, stealing and deceiving it would be naive simply to take their word now. No one i know would still shovel 150€ towards Microsoft for their unsupported student version if they could get a really compatible Office suite for free. If Microsoft would finally be really playing fair in the Office place it would clearly hurt their sales. Microsoft was also a member of the OpenGL standards board, that didn’t stop them from the unholy things they did to OpenGL in Vista. This was actually what was intended for OpenDocument from day 1 … Microsoft were invited to participate, but refused to do so. If Microsoft want to participate in OpenDocument development … great! Fantastic! It means that everybody will be able to implement whatever goes into the format. That never happened with Java … Sun had control. It will also continue to work with the IT community to promote interoperability between document file formats, including Open XML and ODF, as well as Digital Accessible Information System (DAISY XML), the foundation of the globally accepted DAISY standard for reading and publishing navigable multimedia content.” The company will also be an active participant in the ongoing standardization and maintenance activities for XPS and PDF. Microsoft employees will also take part in the ISO/IEC working group that is being formed to maintain Open XML and the ISO/IEC working group that is being formed to improve interoperability between these and other ISO/IEC-recognized document formats. Microsoft will join the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) technical committee working on the next version of ODF and will take part in the ISO/IEC working group being formed to work on ODF maintenance. “Consistent with its interoperability principles, in which the company committed to work with others toward robust, consistent and interoperable implementations across a broad range of widely deployed products, the company has also announced it will be an active participant in the future evolution of ODF, Open XML, XPS and PDF standards. Microsoft have announced that they are joining the OASIS committee that designs ODF. I expect them to do the same attempt on OpenDocument.
After that, you could see how much MS really cared for Java: They removed their support and instead created the competing. Sun had to fight MS in court for years to stop this crippled “support” which was just another attempt to keep MS’ vendor lock-in. The result: MS’s “java” had several proprietary extensions which made it incompatible to the standard.
Microsoft told everybody about their great Java support and indeed included it in their development tools.
0 kommentar(er)
