What Happens Next on the US Vote on OOXML

Andy Updegrove writes "As you may know, V1, the INCITS Technical Committee that had charge of the US vote on Microsoft's OOXML, failed to reach consensus on either approving or disapproving the specification. As expected, Microsoft has turned to the full INCITS Executive Board in an effort to salvage the situation. Between now and Labor Day, a complicated series of fall-back ballots and meetings has been scheduled to see whether the Executive Board can agree to approve or disapprove OOXML, in either case "with comments." A vote to approve would mean that addressing the comments would not be required for the US vote to stand, while a vote to disapprove would hold the possibility of US approval if the comments are satisfactorily addressed. The bottom line is that a vote to approve (either in the US or in many other nations around the world) does not appear likely, due to the sheer number of technical issues that have been raised with OOXML, and the expedited schedule upon which Microsoft has insisted throughout the process."

A friend in need ...

[Anonymous Coward]

is a friend indeed, as they say.

Following the report by V1 that it had failed to achieve consensus, Microsoft requested a place on the agenda at the Executive Board meeting held in California on July 18 - 20, in order to make a short presentation on the V1 events. That presentation occurred on Thursday of last week. However, after giving the brief overview, the Microsoft representative made a motion not provided for on the agenda (which was immediately seconded by the Apple representative) that the Executive Board consider a written ballot of "Approval with Comments," with the comments in question being the 96 issues that the V1 members had succeeded in agreeing upon before ending their deliberations. That would have meant that some 400 additional comments (the more difficult ones upon which consensus had not been reached) that V1 had received from various sources would not have been submitted to ISO/IEC JTC1 if the ballot passed.

Interesting, although unsurprising, to see Apple following the money here.

Re:I, for one, am for choice

[Ai Olor-Wile]

Maybe you should read about the actual OOXML specification before saying that kinda thing.

http://www.robweir.com/blog/2007/07/formula-for-fa ilure.html [robweir.com]
http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2007/07/mathematic ally-.html [openmalaysiablog.com]
http://www.noooxml.org/ [noooxml.org]
http://ooxmlhoaxes.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com]
http://blog.janik.cz/archives/2007/07/18/T18_02_54 / [janik.cz]

Read these. Then decide if you really, really believe that making this specification a standard will do anything good for the environment. The spec is simply too big and poorly-defined for anyone else to come close to implementing. If it was worth the paper it was printed on (and if you see the last link, that can be quite a lot) Microsoft wouldn't be trying to fast-track it--specifications should speak for themselves in terms of quality. Anything reasonable would have no trouble getting written into an ISO-accepted standard, no matter what company it came from.

Pop quiz: Why the hell is fast tracking with this kind of system possible? Emergency economic situations?

Re:Is there anything we can do...

[MightyMartian]

Is there anything we can do to get this thrown out the window for being a horrible standard as it should have originally?

It's looking more likely than ever that Microsoft isn't going to be able to win this one. Even with its attempted stacking of the deck, this unusable "standard" couldn't get quick approval.

It's a minor point, sadly. There's nothing requiring Microsoft to follow any standard. They have built their software empire in part on avoiding all such things. The one thing that looks to be shaking the foundations of their dominance is the fact that most of the people I've talked to have looked at Office 2007 and do not like what they see.

Re:I, for one, am for choice

[Ai Olor-Wile]

Well, no, I would say that's a simplification. OOXML is an attempt at vendor lock-in, whilst appearing to be friendly. Seriously, the point of a standard is to make it easy to implement and to make sure everyone follows it. But no one can implement all six thousand "AramaiacSmallCapsLikeWord6.2ForTheMacWhenRunningU nderSystem7.2.5" features, so only Microsoft gets to claim complete compatibility. Realistically, like PL/I was in the sixties, no one will implement it. However, it'll still be a "standard," and Microsoft will use that to force things down people's throats.

Also, if you are under the impression that this is equatable to some sort of religious or vi-vs-emacs holy war, you're quite mistaken. Look into these: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_documents [wikipedia.org]

See, Billy G. and Stevie B. really, genuinely are corrupt, horrible monopolist pigs who eat babies. Why do you think that antitrust suit exists?

Re:I, for one, am for choice

[Rudisaurus]

Another suggestion (not mine; I've seen this elsewhere -- e.g. on Groklaw [slashdot.org]): MS-XML instead of OOXML. I believe in calling a spade a spade, and that's what OOXML is: Microsoft's own internal (proprietary) format, not an open standard.

Re:I, for one, am for choice

[CowboyCapo]

Here's a possibility, one that might do the trick for the format name in question...

MS'OO'XML

Sure, it's a little longer, but it says who, in truth, the format belongs to, and the quotes around OO would indicate some falsity to the naming of the format, much in the same way that the CIA should have their middle initial surrounded by quotes as the sarcastic little bit of bullcrap that it is.