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Unix Group Takes UK Standards Body To Court Over OOXML
Posted by
Soulskill
on Thu May 01, 2008 09:01 PM
from the you-didn't-think-it-was-over-did-you dept.
from the you-didn't-think-it-was-over-did-you dept.
superglaze writes "Halfway through the two-month window of opportunity during which OOXML's ISO standardization can be derailed by a formal objection from a national standards body, the UK Unix Users Group is trying to force the British Standards Institution to do just that. According to the Unix Users Group, the BSI used a flawed decision-making process when they chose to approve OOXML in the ISO vote. 'The UKUUG is also folding in many other complaints about Office Open XML (OOXML), such as unresolved patent issues and a lack of completion in the specification's documentation, and is calling for the High Court of Justice to force a judicial review of the BSI's decision.' This is not the first time a country's ISO vote has been challenged."
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[+]
Technology: Norway's Yes-To-OOXML Is Formally Protested 324 comments
An anonymous reader writes "Norway's yes-to-OOXML may tip the vote in favor of accepting it as an ISO-standard, but the committee chairman just faxed a formal protest to the ISO. 'I am writing to you in my capacity as Chairman (of 13 years standing) of the Norwegian mirror committee to ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 34. I wish to inform you of serious irregularities in connection with the Norwegian vote on ISO/IEC DIS 29500 (Office Open XML) and to lodge a formal protest. You will have been notified that Norway voted to approve OOXML in this ballot. This decision does not reflect the view of the vast majority of the Norwegian committee, 80% of which was against changing Norway's vote from No with comments to Yes.'"
[+]
ISO Approves OOXML 435 comments
sTeF writes in, with the hope that this is an April Fools joke. Doesn't look like it though. An article up at Intellectual Property Watch claims they have obtained a document (PDF) enumerating the vote after Microsoft's OOXML won ISO standard status.
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At least SOMEBODY is doing something! (Score:3, Insightful)
haha (Score:2)
hehe (Score:2)
Anyone else (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
That's nice, dear. Why don't you go look at some nice kittens [cuteoverload.com]?
Now if you don't mind, those of us who do give a shit would like to discuss this latest development.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Anyone else (Score:5, Insightful)
Because those of us that have and are sent Word documents in email give a shit.
Because those of us that go to school and are told to type our papers in Word and to turn in .doc files give a shit.
Because those of us who take online classes and have to download Word documents give a shit.
Because those of us that work in governments and want to be able to exchange information with other agencies give a shit.
Because libraries that believe in open and easily accessible information give a shit.
Because those of us that don't want to use MS Word give a shit.
Because those of us that can't afford MS Word give a shit.
Because makers of other office suites give a shit.
Because those of use that use FOSS give a shit.
Because historians don't want to rely on a MS rosetta stone give a shit.
Because I give a shit.
Parent
first line correction (Score:2)
Forgot to type 'jobs' for the first sentence. It should be:
Because those of us that have jobs and are sent Word documents in email give a shit.
Forgive the reply to self...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The blatant visible corruption of the international standards will only lead to substantially increased costs to validate goods and services across international borders as ISO would have to be abandoned due to the fear that any nonsense standard to be used as B$ mark
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I don't. It's got to die eventually, but I doubt this will have anything significant to do with it.
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Ah, but this is not all about Microsoft. It's about having standards that are actually fit for purpose, and about not having the international standardisation process corrupted to serve the short term purposes of a single corporate entity at the expense of everyone else.
Microsoft like to frame the argument as a plot to destroy the Redmond giant because then they can go telling everyone how
on the flip side (Score:2)
Where are the mods? (Score:3, Interesting)
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The least ISO could do is drop ODF (Score:3, Insightful)
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Microsoft will not be able to stand much longer for a few reasons. One is that they have to alway's be on the defensive and eventualy they have to cave in. Another reason why they wont is that there too anti-competitive. They have already lost 4 antitrust lawsuits to the EU and a fith one is still pending. Also there is that the opposition to microsoft is soo strong and vast that they can't keep on doing what they are doing. Again there is the fact that there competing with the ultimite OS, Linux, and windows dosn't have the power in anything to be able to surpress in any way shape or form.
1. Being on the defensive isn't a problem when you basically have de facto control over the entire industry.
2. So far, it seems like Microsoft has only been getting slaps on the wrist. Nothing has yet threated to actually end their monopoly.
3. There are plenty of people who still love Microsoft and practically worship Bill Gates, and a much larger percentage of people (everyone else) who could care less.
*NIX on a differnt scale: Mostly Harmless (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
No way (Score:3, Insightful)
OOXML is such a foul, repugnant anti-standard, and it will be pushed so hard, that if it's accepted it will severely damage the whole idea of interoperability standards.
ODF implementations have been written for countless office apps. Getting that out is not mutually exclusive with fighting OOXML.
Re:No way (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:This molehill is gigantic! (Score:5, Insightful)
It's called teamwork. While one group is building the tools you mention, others are putting themselves in the path of an 800 lb. gorilla. It's not just the heroes who save the day, but all of the little people in red shirts that buy them time.
Parent
Parent post is a troll. Mod it down (Score:3, Informative)
You're damn right. But OOXML is not a standard. A standard has to be documented properly and (which is more important) completely. OOXML satisfies neither of these conditions. So it's not a standard.
> Standing around crying because Microsoft bought a standard...
I'm tired of people like you. Look buddy, we're crying not because "Microsoft bought a standard". We're crying because a half-baked specification got recognized as a stan
Re:This molehill is gigantic! (Score:4, Insightful)
And it's not mutually exclusive with fighting OOXML.
The alternative is to say nothing, which would be seen as tacit acceptance -- and then we would actually be forced to implement this "standard". So we're damned if we do, and damned if we don't. At least this way, there's a chance we'll get the decision reversed.
Because I care a lot more about actually working with ODF (and not working with ODF) then looking good by cooperating with OOXML in any way.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
The reason you see it as whining is because your on microsofts side so it appears to you as whining where as on our side its fighting the good fight.
The key problem here is that you should have to fight to have your standard approved. If you can not defend your standard. If you can not close the holes in your documentation to shoot down all the challenges then you dont deserve to have it pass standardization.
Also you
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
So because you can't win, you will complain until your technically superior solution is accepted?
Well, this is how we win.
Put another way: No, we can't win by throwing large sacks of cash around, the way Microsoft is. You found us out -- we simply cannot compete.
I, for one, would much rather win on technical merits. But technical merits can't buy people the way money can. The best we can do is take away their ability to simply throw large sacks of money around, by calling them on it.
Oh, and "suing" is not "whining" by a long shot. Suing is doing something about it.
Re:This molehill is gigantic! (Score:5, Insightful)
I thought the advantage of standards was to reduce divergence in systems. The more implementations of particular items, such as screws, conform to a standard, such as phillips head, the better it is for the people who use screws.
Energy has/is being focused on implementations of another standard and there are already good implementations of the formats you mention from numerous sources including Microsoft.
The problem with OOXML is that it cannot be implemented by anyone other than a single vendor because the format as defined contains references to specific behavior without actually specifying said behavior.
Where a vote has been passed on an obviously incomplete specification and through such blatant corruption, it should be challenged. This is the duty of anyone who values freedom and democracy - and for people intelligent enough to appreciate the importance of the the rule of law. The fact that the format was pushed through by Microsoft in particular is irrelevant to this point.
The UKUUG taking legal action over the corruption in the vote doesn't make them look like whiners. It makes them look like learned elders who are about to take a stick to a bunch of delinquents. And all power to them.
Protest against the standardization of OOXML doesn't appear technologically backwards when conducted in an appropriate forum and it portrays OOXML as the backwards step it truly is.
As the web makes it possible for more devices from more vendors to inter-operate seamlessly, along comes a format which is only really implementable by one vendor. If someone was to try this with heads or threads, they'd be totally screwed. Microsoft needed to pay to have this pass and by highlighting that at every step of the way, the more money they pour into this, the more corrupt they appear and the more they blacken their own name.
Oh nonononono. Silly little monkey.
This is not about a product. This is about a format to be implemented by anyone who can read a specification
A reasonable open standard already exists.
Using the judiciary to defeat corruption wherever it exists is entirely correct. That is one of the reasons for it's existence.
Toss pot
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
I ask the following question not as a troll, but as someone curious about this whole thing. I've heard this statement several times, and I was wondering if you could point out a concrete example of it. (I'd like to have such an example to point out to those who ask the same question as a troll =) )
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Care to give an example?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Standing around crying because Microsoft bought a standard is only counterproductive and makes you come off looking like a bunch of whiners.
This is the important bit, I think: M$ is trying damn hard to get people to believe that all this whining is simply because of *them* instead of their flawed standard or corrupt practices. And they are succeeding, unfortunately. "You are against OOXML? Oh, you are just another rabid Microsoft hater then" --> at that point you have already lost that discussion; no argument of yours will be listened to.
The question is of course, how to counter this?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The only valid point against OOXML is that it contains unclear and/or unimplementable aspects, thus denying others from the ability to create supporting implementations. However, if this is the case, and MS is unwilling to create OOXML implementations for non-MS/Apple platforms, how successful do you really expect the standard to be?
Which in and of itself is a reason ISO should've rejected it in the first place, based on their own requirements... that a proposed open standard have a fully working implementation. No such thing exists for OOXML.
No, it looks like they are whining over a decision that didn't go their way.
No, it makes them look like they've looked at the ISO procedures, requirements, etc, and said, "Hey, this is completely out-of-the-ordinary!"
No, it just says to onlookers that Microsoft's standard is so advanced that even the best and brightest of the computing world can't implement the difficult parts of it.
OMFG, do you even believe what you're posting? Anything that's too advanced for anyone to implement has no business being in a standard. A standard sho
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I can think of at least two office suites (possibly three) off the top of my head which either use ODF as their primary document formats, or plan to in the n
Re:This molehill is gigantic! (Score:4, Insightful)
We don't want to be forced to use that inferior format, simply because microsoft bought and paid for enough people at standards boards, as this will hurt the industry as a whole. It's only microsoft who stands to benefit from OOXML, everyone else loses in one way or another.
Parent
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Frankly this is obvious to anyone who's read anything about this - I'm going to assume you're a troll if you're still asking the question.
Just in case you're not trolling; ISO standards should be independently implementable by anyone. OOXML cannot be independently implemented. Therefor MS should not have submitted & ISO body should not have approved.
Re: (Score:2)
OOXML can and has been independently implemented.
OOXML can and has been independently implemented. (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah, NOW I see what you mean. Why, in fact, I've just implemented the standard myself right here:
main(){exit(1);}
What do you mean my implementation doesn't conform? Neither does Microsoft's.
Parent
Re:I am lost? (Score:5, Informative)
Very likely bribed various national delegations so that they'd approve OOXML. In fact, quite a few third-world countries joined the standards process specifically to vote for OOXML, and then do nothing else. Bribery is the only plausible explanation, because approving OOXML otherwise goes strongly against their own self interest (because OOXML is unimplementable by anyone other than (and perhaps even including) Microsoft, and therefore they would be tying themselves to a "standard" controlled by a foreign corporation with no free implementation.
ISO let the bribery and committee-stuffing happen, fast-tracked the process when there was no good reason to do it and many good reasons not to, completely ignored its own processes and procedures during the approval process, gave woefully too little time for comments and debate, ratified the standard despite voting irregularities in several countries, and ignored the public when they pointed all this shit out!
Any other silly questions?
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
(1) Microsoft illegally maintains their monopoly on P.C. type commodity computers.
awe, fuck it. I can't write this one more time. Listen, if you have to ask the question it is most possible that the answer won't do you any good.
Secondly, if you have to ask the question, it is quite likely that you do not take responsibility for your opinions and treat the things you say with the same level of care that would be used by a parrot.
Re:I am lost? (Score:4, Interesting)
The second issue is ooXML allows large binary blobs of virtually any type to be encoded in the document. Binary in XML and in office documents is not all bad. Certainly for multi-media type things like pictures and sounds its appropriate. I would argue however that there should be limits on WHAT binary formats are allowed. Those should reference other standards. Being able to parse out the stucture of a document only to discover all the content is locked up in some binary format you have no idea what the stucture of is, is downright useless. The reason for standards is so that people can interoperate if you can't do that then the standard is broken.
Before people jump all over me about how being able to interoperate does not mean that you can display he document exactly as it is in Word or whatever let me say "I know that". The content should be accessible though. Rendering should be about how the user wants to display it. A blind person might want a text to speach enginge to read a document to them. The standard should allow them in all cases to dump out the text data from the document. It should be possible to run into the binary objects and have the software say "there is an image here" etc etc. That's usefull "Document, contains unkown data" is not.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
This is not just about the 800 pound gorilla protecting his turf, it is doing it in a way that s
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I think I get what you mean with irregular tables. Paragraph 8.1 says
Re:I am lost? (Score:5, Informative)
The fast track process is for existing "defacto standards" that are widely used and implemented, and only really need a rubber stamp. OOXML is not widely implemented nor widely used at this point, it should have gone through the normal process. Perhaps the recent standardisation of PDF as ISO32000 was through the fast track, and would have deserved being fast tracked.
According to ISO guidelines, standards should reuse existing standards, preferably ISO ones... OOXML does not, it does mostly the same thing as ODF but in a completely different way, it also stores dates in a way conflicting with existing ISO standards, stores country codes in a different way, stores measurements in a different way and more. Thus it is in violation of ISO guidelines and should not have been approved.
There are other more specific issues, plenty documented out on the web... But the 3 above show where they have violated ISO rules, which should at the very least be enough to kick ooxml off the fast track and into the regular process.
As for ignoring it, unfortunately microsoft are large enough that they can force their inferior format on the market, so it will be impossible to ignore. If the market were free, and people were able to choose products based on technical merit microsoft wouldn't be anywhere near as big as they are.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
--Joe
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
1: The entire coruption problem. Giving money and other benefits for people/companies so they vote for you is not ok.
2: The entire rush is a big problem. The right way for microsoft to design OOXML as a ISO standard for text documents, would have been to
start the ISO standard work at the same time they started their work on the format. That way Microsoft could have incorporated changes in the standard in their word 2007. Right now what Microsoft word 2007 call OOXML is not really the exac
Re: (Score:2)
That is simply not true. If OOXML opponents had stuck to criticism that was actually true, instead of blatant lies like the binary chunk claim, they would have had a better chance of winning.
Re:This is whiney nerd crap. (Score:5, Insightful)
My car is made by $COMPANY1.
I can buy tires for it made by $COMPANY2.
I can put them on wheels made by $COMPANY3.
I can tighten the weelnuts with a wrench from $COMPANY4.
You get the idea?
I'm sure that $COMPANY1 would just love to sell me everything to do with my car from the tires on up, but they can't because it's all STANDARD.
STANDARDS are good for consumers, Monopolies are not.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)