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ISO Calls For OOXML Ceasefire
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Apr 14, 2008 11:58 AM
from the can't-we-all-just-get-along dept.
from the can't-we-all-just-get-along dept.
In response to the continued attacks on Microsoft's OOXML standard, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has called for a ceasefire. "Last week the ISO committee in charge of document standards, SC 34, met in Oslo to discuss the way forward for OOXML and ODF. The plenary session was marked by protests outside, largely carried out by delegates from a nearby open-source conference. The protesters were calling for OOXML to be withdrawn from ISO standardization -- something that could theoretically happen if a national standards body were to protest against its own vote within the next month or two."
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Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
We the undersigned wish to make it clear that the ISO fucked up and should never have made OOXML a standard, and that we will continue to attack ISO until it is revoked. Furthermore, we believe that this is for the ISO's own good, because allowing this result of obvious corruption to remain can only harm ISO's credibility as a standards organization. We also wish to remind the ISO that these so-called "personal attacks" have only become necessary in the first place because our technical objections have been entirely ignored. Finally, we note that the resolution to create working groups to maintain OOXML and "harmonize" it with ODF was stupid, because neither group would be necessary in the first place if the redundant, conflicting, and poorly-designed OOXML hadn't been approved in the first place!
Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
"Withdrawing OOOXML is not the only option... In theory, OOOXML could be turned into a reasonable standard so that is the other option. In theory."
Yes, but the problem is that the 6000+ page OOXML is so riddled with problems that it would take years to clean it up. Also, Standards are supposed to be open. OOXML is dependent on proprietary technology. So anyone that tries to implement anything from this standard can be sued by $M. If you trust $M, then you deserve to be sued.
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Funny)
Please, don't go there.
People nowadays get fat from vast amounts of chicken wings. Can you even begin to fathom how fat people would get from pig wings?
Some things were not meant to be. Or even meant to be thought of.
Now if you would excuse me, I have to go and blind my mind's eye.
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Option #1. (Score:5, Insightful)
WTF is ISO playing at when they take something that CANNOT be said to be a "reasonable standard" and still APPROVE it as an ISO Standard?
Fuck that! ISO is supposed to approve STANDARDS. Not approve crap and then try to turn it into a "reasonable standard".
ISO sold out and is now trying to play the victim in this.
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Re:Option #1. (Score:5, Interesting)
The normal process is designed to develop a reasonable standard from something that's not already suitable, hence why it takes longer.
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
But a standard is meaningless unless it is possible to determine whether you've complied with it or not. And for something like this, it should be possible to define a compliance test suite that everybody who wants to claim compliance has to pass. Sorry, "our product is the only compliant one because we're the only ones who knows what compliance means" doesn't cut the mustard.
If a neutral third party could not examine a product and determine that it is compliant, what you have isn't a standard, it's a brand dressing up like a standard.
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
The job of the ISO is not to approve the one -and-only-one standard for a given task. Its job is to be a repository of standards that can be followed by all those whose wish to comply with said standard.
Ideally the bulk of the ISO's work should be to only accept standards that CAN be followed by others outside of the original submitter.
There is nothing wrong with the market leader of that application (ie. Microsoft and its Word) setting the standard. As long as that standard can be followed by those OUTSIDE of Microsoft.
The reason some open source enthusiasts are opposed to OOXML is because they would like to create a market for ODF through legislation rather than through competition. While others, such as myself, would be glad to have a document file format that is described well enough to be considered a standard which can be implemented by anyone regardless of the standard's author. We (well at least I) oppose OOXML solely on the merits of its documentation and the method that Microsoft has used to push the inadequate documentation through the standards process. Once OOXML gets its documentation up to shape, I see no reason for it not being accepted by the ISO.
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Funny)
Well said!
There is no reason at all why we shouldn't have 5 different standards for 10mm fine thread nuts and bolts. The more the better!
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Interesting)
> ODF through legislation rather than through competition. While others, such as myself, would be glad to have
> a document file format that is described well enough to be considered a standard which can be implemented by
> anyone regardless of the standard's author.
You got that completely wrong. Those "some open source enthusiasts" are opposed to OOXML because it actually wants to kill ODF by killing competition.
ODF causes problems to Microsoft because:
- It *is* a real standard
- Large entities like standard compliant products
- Large entities have lots of IT budget
- Microsoft wants most of that budget
- Anyone can implement ODF, possibly better than Microsoft
- There is that damned C-word again, competition!
So, what Microsoft decided was to create a so-called standard, namely OOXML, that while formally a standard (and thus the decision makers of above mentioned large entities will like it), in practice nobody can implement it but Microsoft. This guarantees the continuation of the monopoly position for Microsoft while pleases the governemnts and corporate management. If it costs money, so be it. If it costs the reputation of ISO, who cares. Microsoft is not a charity organisation (although, if a little charity buys good PR, then they might even spend some money on that), they a business and they don't give a damn about standards - standards mean interoperability, competition and a possible revelation of their technical inferiority. No, they do NOT want a real document standard *especially* because it would open up competition.
The geeks are the one who want interoperability and competition - hence ODF is a real standard. Microsoft is the one that wants to avoid both with religious zeal, hence their refusal of implementing ODF (an open standard) and caming up with OOXML, a "standard" specifically designed to be unimplementable and then rammed through ISO using loopholes, bribes and everything else that was needed.
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
The greater concern for me is having ECMA stripped of its ability to push a standard through the fast-track process (Class A Liaison status, IIRC) and changing the fast-track process to be substantially less able to be abused, even if this means taking some or all of the "fast" out of "fast track".
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"signed" (Score:5, Insightful)
ISO got gamed, ganked and pwned. At this point, Microsoft are teabagging their corpse [wikipedia.org].
What ISO need to do right now is to grow a pair and admit that they're gagging on sweaty Ballmer-balls, rather than putting their fingers in their ears and going "La la la, the process is perfect, la la la, there's nothing wrong."
I doubt you'd find any unbiased informed observer that believes them, although I'm sure you'd find a few who would happily say that in return for a free upgrade of their corporate Office installs. The emperor has no clothes, no matter how many procedural boxes they tick off to try to hide their ding-a-ling dangling in the wind.
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Replace them (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Replace them (Score:5, Insightful)
"ISO has just launched the new ISO Standards collection on CD-ROM â" Materials for the production of primary aluminium. It contains the full collection of 108 ISO standards for materials used in the production of primary aluminium, including standards for alumina, pitch, coke, electrodes, ramming paste and fluorides."
Since of course aluminum smelters the world over will be abandoning the ISO en masse for Certified Open Dot Com.
By the way, openness != standardisation.
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OOXML Ceasefire??? (Score:5, Interesting)
If they really want an OOXML "Ceasefire", then they should offer a compromise with the opponents of OOXML.
Namely: revoke the standard and allow it to continue to be reworked.
I doubt anti-OOXML activists would take issue with letting OOXML be re-evaluated a year or two fromnow. We would even let the ISO get away with NOT re-evaluating its processes that allowed brand-spanking new member countries to vote with as much power as long standing members.
In the meantime, Microsoft (and whoever else is interested) can address the technical issues with OOXML and revise the specification so that it meets the communities requirements for openness.
At the same time, I think it is accurate to say that there are "features" that customers require in OOXML that are not in any approved ISO standards (for instance, I believe OOXML has collaboration features, whereas ODF does not). Thus, the anti-OOXML community might attempt to code an "Open" standard which addresses those features. Call it the "ODF Extension" and empower it to combined with the original ODF standard to give an identical set of features as are specified in OOXML. If this were achieved and OOXML truly would not bring any added value to the Office/Productivity software standard, then it could officially be flushed down the toilet.
That said, there cannot be a "Ceasefire" as long as OOXML is still recognized as a Standard...
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Re:OOXML Ceasefire??? (Score:5, Interesting)
(note: I fully support ODF... and to date I have not found any features that ODF/OpenOffice lacks which Microsoft Office provides)
That said, I think it is naive to assume that OOXML and ODF each specify an overlapping set of features, and I think it would benefit the overall quality of Office Productivity software to itemize the features in OOXML that are lacking in ODF and do an evaluation on whether they would provide a benefit if they were added.
Similarly, an evaluation of the features in ODF that are duplicated in OOXML would be good, so that they can be stricken from OOXML and reduce the chances of having "competing standards" or unnecessary duplication.
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Re:Slashdot calls for ISO cessation of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)
SC34 is totally controlled by Microsoft. And it invited ECMA to the group!
SC34 will play a role in the maintenance regime for OOXML and they announced to corrupt ODF.
Outside the SC34, the Norwegian committee took the streets.
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Way forward on ODF? (Score:5, Informative)
The only issue is that cluster-fuck of submarine proprietary technology posing as an open standard called OOXML.
Keep OOXML, or reject that POS like they should have to begin with, the only effect that has on ODF is in the purchasing decisions that may be swayed by MS also having a "standard".
Re:Way forward on ODF? (Score:5, Insightful)
That is the major effect though. I think that most unbiased observers would conclude that Microsoft's main goal in having OOXML rushed through is to allow .govs to tick the box that allows them to keep purchasing Microsoft Office. I have no faith that Microsoft will adhere to OOXML in letter or spirit, and in fact that having it 'controlled' by ISO makes this even less likely. Microsoft will not approach ISO to have new features included, they'll just binary-blob them in.
I say this as someone whose job it is to implement editors for previous (binary) versions of Office formats. The (new) guys working on our OOXML version are super stoked because (they say) it's much clearer. Sure, I tell them, but wait until Office >=2009 starts saving out documents with big embedded proprietary binary blobs. They'll still be OOXML 'compliant', for all the good that'll do us.
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Re:Way forward on ODF? (Score:5, Insightful)
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I bought the Red Car so that I could dismantle it (Score:5, Insightful)
Another version reads: "Two standards good, One standard better!"
Or perhaps summed up clearest: "Embrace, extend, extinguish."
- Roey
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Formulas in spreadsheets (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Formulas in spreadsheets (Score:5, Informative)
(1) ODF wasn't rammed through a "fast track" process against the wishes of many committee members, unlike OOXML, and
(2) ODF can actually be implemented by third parties as written. Good luck doing that with OOXML...
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Re:Way forward on ODF? (Score:4, Informative)
On the contrary, if resumes are required in OOXML format there will no longer be a requirement to reverse-engineer the Word format in order to achieve that. Since every word processor has to be compatible with Word in any case to be marketable the job of producing a compliant open source implementation has become rather easier.
As for ECMA, it has always been a joke. They were a joke when they accepted Netscape's original JavaScript proposal without any changes. Netscape chose ECMA because they wanted a forum they could just ram something through without any opportunity for comment from any other party. It only took another six years before usable implementations started to turn up in browsers. Early on the <object> tag was known as the 'crash my browser' tag. The specification was at least as baddly written as the code. But the modern Javascript specs are starting to look pretty good.
The reason that Google has been able to make so much out of AJAX and previous companies have not is not because nobody saw the potential before, its because the JavaScript implementations could not possibly have supported modern apps without crashing. Try connecting to GMail with an early version of Netscape and you will either see it turn off the JavaScript or crash.
People are completely missing the point of standards work here. You only get from a standards process what you achieve along the way. Its like a university degree, the certificate is probably the least useful output.
ODF and OOXML are both examples of an obsolete way of document preparation. They are both embedded in the internal data structures of ten to twenty year old systems. I would take an entirely different approach to producing a modern office suite. I would not cobble it together from components.
Neither format allows you to create an equation in math notation and use it in the spreadsheet.
This whole argument is like arguing whether gas or oil is better to fire a power station. They are both legacy technologies.
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Re:Way forward on ODF? (Score:4, Insightful)
And HTML is the most widely used XML schema so really it's a twofer.
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ISO f$cked up, and can't stand the heat ... (Score:5, Insightful)
They deserve to be taken to the woodshed for a good spanking.
The ONLY ones who will benefit from a "cease-fire" are the ones who have the criticism coming to them. Let them admit they screwed up, that the processes behind their handling of MSOOXML are fatally flawed, and that a redo is necessary to preserve^Wrestore the integrity of ISO.
What's the ISO standard for Irony? (Score:5, Insightful)
Um no it won't stop (Score:5, Insightful)
right now there are several MSFT P member countries that will no longer vote on anything because they are no longer being paid by MSFT to work with the ISO. These countries are deadlocking other standards and forcing them to fail because they refuse to vote on anything not OOXML. Those countries should have their votes discarded until they start attended and voting on things other than OOXML.
So why should the attacks stop? Has the corruption stopped yet?
Re:Um no it won't stop (Score:4, Insightful)
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Location, Location, Location (Score:3, Funny)
Appeals (Score:3, Interesting)
Does this mean that Norway and Great Britain haven't submitted their appeals yet? I believe both technical committees stated they would appeal. Does anyone know the status of them?
Re:Appeals (Score:4, Informative)
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SC29 has been a villain for quite some time. (Score:5, Informative)
"Personal Attacks?" (Score:5, Insightful)
OOXML is *NOT* worthy of ISO approval. Any rational review of the "standard," will show that it is incomplete, non-specific, and completely worthless as a blue print on how to implement a document reader for a document.
How this got approved is clearly worth a corruption investigation. It calls into question the integrity of the people and organization that approved it.
It is nothing less than an attempt to eliminate the ability to share documents without paying Microsoft and maintain Microsoft's monopoly. The very thing the ISO standard is supposed to fight. It is criminal that these bastards have subverted the standards process as they did.
Calling for the end of "Personal attacks" is nothing more than saying "fuck you." Public statements questioning the motives and integrity of these people is the only ration course of action given what they have done. They deserve every last bit of it. Jailtime if we can find a law to fit the crime.
From the ISO website... (Score:4, Interesting)
When products and services meet our expectations, we tend to take this for granted and be unaware of the role of standards. However, when standards are absent, we soon notice. We soon care when products turn out to be of poor quality, do not fit, are incompatible with equipment that we already have, are unreliable or dangerous.
When products, systems, machinery and devices work well and safely, it is often because they meet standards. And the organization responsible for many thousands of the standards which benefit the world is ISO.
Re:what is a one-sided cease fire? (Score:4, Informative)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I don't see a problem here. (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:I suspect that... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sadly, I think you underestimate the apathy of the public over this stuff.
Joe user will hear the words "ISO Standard", "voting" and decide they neither know nor care WTF this is all about. The mainstream news will know this, and won't both reporting it.
Us in tech will find yet another reason to loathe Microsoft and their business practices, but to the average user, they simply will not care about this. You can't easily make this an issue people will understand why they should care about. It's so far off their radar as to be non-existent.
Cheers
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Re:Cart before the Horse (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:This seems pretty backwards (Score:4, Insightful)
If they don't want to be called a microsoft lackey or corrupt, then they should have thought about that before hand.
Sorry, they can't whine just because people are exposing their corruption. Sucks to be them, but they brought it on themselves.
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Re:Guerrilla warfare (Score:5, Funny)
Fortunately they are able to apprehend them before the bombs go off because of the popup on their Windows Vista powered detonators, "Blow yourself up in a useless display of Microsoft loyalty, allow or deny?"
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Re:Fun to Hate MS, but OOXML is needed... (Score:4, Informative)
I call shenanigans. This may exist as some proprietary obscure standard (and it probably deserves to die).
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Re:Fun to Hate MS, but OOXML is needed... (Score:5, Insightful)
INK has no business being part of a document format. It's an image format. It should exist as a separate standard on its own. The document format need not know INK specifically but rather provide for a way of including 'images' which both OOXML and ODF do. Then their specs can say "We allow the use of ISO XXXX (aka INK)."
MS doesn't get it. You don't get it. ISO doesn't even seem to get it anymore. It's hysterical that a format that represents exactly 1 commercial interest and has no implementations is published as a "standard." ODF has its failings, but it's already being used as a standard (multiple parties implement it) and it is being evolved with multiple parties in mind. Like a standard or something.
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Re:thank you M$ (Score:4, Insightful)
Anyway, if you ever had to deal with ISO standards before, you'd realise that what Microsoft did is the least of your worries. ISO, W3C, OASIS, ECMA... they all suck. They're all organisations that make "standards" by comittee, and while that sounds great in theory, in practice its more like:
Member A: "I want our next standard to have feature X"
Member B: "No way, that would only further YOUR agenda and will destroy interop and/or makes its harder to implement for nothing! Instead, we should have feature Y, much better"
Member A: "Nooo! That would only further YOUR agenda. Its even worse than X!"
Member B: "Ok, what about this: you can have X, I can have Y, everyone's happy"
Member C: "Wh...what? X and Y are mutually -exclusive-, you'll make it hell for -everyone- if we have both"
Member A + B: "Two vs 1, we win, go to hell".
A lot of "standards", from all the stuff ISO has, to XHTML/XML/SOAP, stopping in between for things that are not so standards such as all of the accessibility acts and hell, the -law-, is made like this. And thats why it all sucks, and its all out of wack.
Compared to a lot of things that didn't cause so much of a stir, OOXML is a blessing... and thats not saying much. Point is, its nothing new, ISO, and most of the other standard bodies have always done this... this time it was just more visible because it was Microsoft... but anyone who tried to make a company ISO certified to various degree knows: you're better off going to IKEA for clear, sensible instructions.
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