ODF Format for Danish Government Documents

According to Heise Media UK Ltd the Danish Parliament has agreed to use the Open Docuemnt Format (ODF) format for government documents, in preference to Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML format). politiken.dk says that this will not come into effect until April 2011 and that PDF/A (the archival version of PDF) will also be used. There was some detailed and technical discussion in the Danish Parliament as to the compatibility of different versions of document standards. There is also a detailed report available on the problems of converting between the formats: "Document Interoperability: Open Document Format and Office Open XML " (Dr. Klaus-Peter Eckert, Jan Henrik Ziesing and Ucheoma Ishionwu, August 2009). This doesn't really say anything not known from previous comparisons: simple documents convert but there are some problems with more complex ones.

Technical comparison of ODF and OOXML formats

For some lectures on e-document formats, I was looking to do a comparison of the technical features of the ODF and OOXML document formats. I came across an ODF/OOXML technical white paper by Edward Macnaghten. This is a useful comparison with good detailed analysis using the same documents marked up in the two formats.

Macnaghten points out that ODF makes more use of existing XML and other international standards, whereas OOXML tried to maintain compatibility with Microsoft Office features. An example of this is that ODF uses ISO standard format for dates, whereas OOXML uses an quirky Microsoft format. He also points out that ODF is more verbose than OOXML with its markup, but this makes for a more standard logical structure and the size of the file will be taken care of by the compression used by both formats.

However, I don't agree with the introduction which claims ODF was developed as a vendor neutral standard, whereas OOXML was by Microsoft. As explained later, ODF was derived from the format of Sun's StarOffice product. The details of how this was done are more visible than Microsoft's development of OOXML. But both ODF and OOXML were adapted from existing office product formats.

Both ODF and OOXML suffer from a lack of compatibility with the common web format: HTML. You can't simply open a word processing or presentation document in a web browser, it has to be converted in some way first. The obvious way to do this would be to base the word processing and presentation formats on XHTML. That way the documents could be made compatible with web browsers. It would be much more difficult to use XHTML for the spreadsheet format and there isn't a really good reason to do that.

New Applicaitons of Metadata and Electronic Document Management for Electronic Commerce

Each year I give lectures at the ANU on Metadata and Electronic Document Management for Electronic Commerce as part of Information Technology in Electronic Commerce ( COMP3410/COMP6341). While the principles don't change, and the technology does not change that much, each year I like to freshen up the course with some new examples. The area covered includes document representation, meta-data, data management, digital library, electronic document management and e-commerce.

It might seem surprising that the principles don't change, but e-publishing is much the same as publishing of books was, minus the paper. Similarly management of e-records is like managing paper files, without the paper. The difficult task with this is to convince computer scientists, software engineers and information systems students that it is worth worrying about the the details of policies and practices and that these are difficult topics.

Technologies have changed a little with XML being firmly established. This makes it important to point out to the students that there was a time before XML, HTML and the web and there will be a time after them.

One area worth looking at with recent developments are XML based office document formats. The controversy over ODF and OOXML as international standards has calmed down somewhat, and a detailed look at the similarities and differences, strengths and weaknesses of these (as well as alternatives) would be useful.

The examples used change most often. What last year was a complex challenge, such as how to build a global electronic publishing system for the world's ICT research has now largely been solved.

Some areas I was thinking of looking to for examples were:

1. In flight E-publishing for the airline industry
2. e-Courts
3. e-enabling carbon trading and energy reduction systems

Limited OOXML support in OpenOffice.org 3.0 Beta

OpenOffice.org (OOO) is offering limited support for Microsoft's OOXML format in the new 3.0 Beta release of OpenOffice.org. This will allow opening of files created by MS-Office 2007 and MS-Office 2008 for Mac in the OOXML files formats for word processor (.docx), spreadsheet (.xlsx), and Powerpoint (.pptx) .

There is no provision to save files from OOO in OOXML, just open them. The files can, of course, still be saved in the older MS-Office formats (.doc, .xls, .ppt), as well as OOO's native ODF format. This could provide a useful open source tool for those needing to deal with incoming OOXML files.

Curiously, OOO's announcement of the release does not mention OOXML, just .docx, .xlsx and .pptx. Perhaps OOO does not want to lend credibility to these formats, or just wants to avoid the controversy over their adoption as standards.

OOXML Misses ISO Adoption

According to media reports, insufficient members of ISO voted OOXML (Microsoft's Office Open XML format) to be adopted as an International Standard. Standards Australia has voted to abstain. Countries have the opportunity to reconsider their vote in a later round. I suggest Australia should change to vote "no", unless there are substantial chages to OOXML. ISO already has an international standard for office documents with the ODF format.

Text of Microsoft's OOXML Presentation

Microsoft's OOXML Presentation was included in the Standards Australia hosted forum on the proposed Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file format", 9 August 2007 in Sydney. I provided some excerpts and was asked to include the slide presentation. The presentation "The case for a positive vote for Office Open XML Standard (ECMA-376)", has similar content to the Microsoft OOXML web site. So rather than clog up the web with another slide show, I have just provided the text, without the graphics (available from the web site):

The case for a positive vote for Office Open XML Standard (ECMA-376)

Scope

• Not here to discuss JTC-1 process
  • Not here to debate minute technical details
• All specs have issues - resolved via process
• This is not a competing standard-just as ODF and PDF don't compete
• Question is: Does this spec have significant value for the Australian economy and citizenry?

The vote we are casting…

• We are deciding, is Ecma-376 a fair representation of the OpenXML file format?
• Will it bring clear benefits to consumers of software in Australia?
• Do we want to grant access to the data that Australian citizens and businesses currently hold in binary Office formats?
• Getting Aust government and business involved in future development of Ecma-376, ISO DIS29500.

Respecting EU / IDABC Recommendations

• European Union (IDABC)
  http://europa.eu.int/idabc/en/document/2592/5588

  "The use of open document formats, such as WordML, improves interoperability"

  "Microsoft should consider the merits of submitting XML formats to an international standards body of their choice"

Why OXML too?

ODF design goal - from the actual spec itself:

1. This document defines an XML schema for office applications and its semantics. The schema is suitable for office documents, including text documents, spreadsheets, charts and graphical documents like drawings or presentations, but is not restricted to these kinds of documents.
2. The schema provides for high-level information suitable for editing documents. It defines suitable XML structures for office documents and is friendly to transformations using XSLT or similar XML-based tools.

Why OXML too?

OXML design goal-from the ECMA spec

1. This Part is one piece of a Standard that describes a family of XML schemas, collectively called Office Open XML, which define the XML vocabularies for word-processing, spreadsheet, and presentation documents, as well as the packaging of documents that conform to these schemas.

2. Here is where OpenXML differs radically in its design goals from other formats:

   The goal is to enable the implementation of the Office Open XML formats by the widest set of tools and platforms, fostering interoperability across office productivity applications and line-of business systems, as well as to support and strengthen document archival and preservation, all in a way that is fully compatible with the large existing investments in Microsoft Office documents.

Multiple standard precedents

• Multiple standards for general purpose programming languages (C, C++, C#, FORTRAN, LISP, Eiffel, Pascal, etc
• Multiple standards for XML schema languages (SGML DTDs, RELAX NG, Schematron, Namespaceaware, DTDS, etc.), -have the same use.
• standards for both the POSIX ABI and Linux ABI; both have the same use

Office Open XML Formats

• Mature (>20 years) deep, broad set of characteristics used by billions of documents and millions of users - XML design and translation started 9 years ago
• Designed to represent all information of .doc, .ppt, .xls in XML
  • 100% compatibility with .doc, .ppt, .xls
  • All format characteristics, styles, content, options in binary formats represented in open XML formats
  • Default format for Microsoft Office from now on
• Billions of existing documents to be converted to XML
  • Free add-ons for past versions
  • Default file format for Office 2007
  • Bulk converters for documents

The Document Type Spectrum

ODF

Narrative Transactional

OXML

The Role of XML with Documents

Demanding Interoperability

Evolving Document-centric Customer Needs

Scenario	Example
Document Assembly Server-based or user-assisted construction of documents from archived content or database content	Create sales reports from financial and forecast data stored in a CRM system
Content Reuse Much easier to move content between documents, including different document types	Apply content stored in Word documents to Web pages quickly and efficiently
Content Tagging Add domain-specific metadata to document content to enable custom solutions	Tag presentations using a specific taxonomy to improve knowledge management efficiency
Document Interrogation Query document repositories based on custom data, content types or document metadata	Search for all documents containing a specific company name or sales contact
Document Sanitization Remove unwanted content like comments or embedded code from your document when appropriate	Remove all tracked changes and comments from a Word document before it is published

OpenXML-Custom Schema Support

Traditional document capabilities:

Facilitating a publishing process - Authoring, collaborating, sharing, printing etc

The new direction for documents:

Facilitating person-process interoperability

interoperabilityLinking user’s publishing activities and structured business data as part of business process – all in one XML document.

Example: XBRL and Open XML

User works on document with structured data from a back end system - document to update the system - all within a familiar Office environment.

Broad Industry support for OpenXML

Windows:

• Altsoft XML2PDF server 2007
• AltViewer documents preview
• Altova XML
• Spy Corel Office
• Create Word 2007 documents without Word installed
• doxc to RTF
• Madcap Flare
• Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP and Office 2003
• Microsoft Office 2007
• Mindjet's MindManager
• Monarch V.9.0 from Datawatch
• ODF-Converter
• OOX-UOF Converter
• Open ERP Software
• Open XML Translator
• Open XML translator for OpenOffice (for Linux and Windows Versions of OpenOffice.org)
• Open XML Writer PythonOffice (Python API to read and write Excel XML documents from within Python programming language)
• Sourceforge Project to allow .NET(C#) developer to have component that will interact with Open Xml file
• Special Templates for Master Thesis
• Word 2007 Map Editor for Mindjet MindManager
• Xpertdoc Studio 2007 reporting solution

Mac OS X:

• DOCX convertor for the Mac
• docx to html Konverter
• doxc to RTF Konverter
• MacLinkPlus Deluxe version 16 by DataViz
• Microsoft Office 2008
• Neo Office 2.1
• Sun Open XML import filter for spreadsheets
• Word Counter 2.2.1
• Apple iPhone

Linux:

• Gnumeric - open source Spreadsheet
• Open Office ..Novell edition
• Open XML translator for OpenOffice (for Linux and Windows Versions of OpenOffice.org)

Other Operating systems or Operating System independent:

• Docx2Doc Web Service
• DOCX convertor on Palm handheld devices
• OpenXML4J - Open XML framework for Java
• OpenXMLDeveloper.org (hundred of developers, multiple platforms)
• PHPExcel - Web Development (PHP)
• WebService with mailing of Document, docx to HTML
• Word 2007 file(docx) construction using Java

Change Creates Challenges

• An immense wealth of information is written in existing Microsoft Office formats
• Millions of users created Billions of documents over the past 20 years

Migration to XML could be damaging if not undertaken with due care for the practical reality

• Users mandate backward compatibility with existing documents and products
• Anything less could be massively disruptive to users and risk unacceptable loss of content

Migration to XML should not compromise performance or potential functionality

We have some precedents...

Path to ISO:

Open XML: Microsoft -> Ecma-> ISO (via fast track: FAST TRACK)

ODF: SUN -> OASIS -> ISO (via fast track: PAS)

IP:

Open XML: : Microsoft -> OSP and CNS

ODF: SUN -> OpenDocument Patent Statement

Voting "YES" with comments:

Open XML: Tech issues raised through ballot -> BRM

ODF: Tech Issues raised by 8 countries

Office Open XML Cosponsors

• Apple
• Barclays Capital
BP British Library Essilor Intel Corporation Microsoft Corporation NextPage Inc. Novell Statoil ASA Toshiba The US Library of Congress

List of Applications with Office Open XML

Windows:

• Altsoft XML2PDF server 2007
• AltViewer documents preview
• Altova XML Spy
• Corel Office
• Create Word 2007 documents without Word installed
• doxc to RTF
• Madcap Flare
• Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP and Office 2003
• Microsoft Office 2007
• Mindjet's MindManager
• Monarch V.9.0 from Datawatch
• ODF-Converter
• OOX-UOF Converter
• Open ERP Software
• Open XML Translator
• Open XML translator for OpenOffice (for Linux and Windows Versions of OpenOffice.org)
• Open XML Writer
• PythonOffice (Python API to read and write Excel XML documents from within Python programming language)
• Sourceforge Project to allow .NET(C#) developer to have component that will interact with Open Xml file
• Special Templates for Master Thesis
• Word 2007 Map Editor for Mindjet MindManager
• Xpertdoc Studio 2007 reporting solution

Mac OS X:

• DOCX convertor for the Mac
• docx to html Konverter
• doxc to RTF Konverter
• MacLinkPlus Deluxe version 16 by DataViz
• Microsoft Office 2008
• Neo Office 2.1
• Sun Open XML import filter for spreadsheets
• Word Counter 2.2.1

Linux:

• Gnumeric - open source Spreadsheet
• Open Office ..Novell edition
• Open XML translator for OpenOffice (for Linux and Windows Versions of OpenOffice.org)

Other Operating systems or Operating System independent:

• Docx2Doc Web Service
• DOCX convertor on Palm handheld devices
• OpenXML4J - Open XML framework for Java
• OpenXMLDeveloper.org (hundred of developers, multiple platforms)
• PHPExcel - Web Development (PHP)
• WebService with mailing of Document, docx to HTML
• Word 2007 file(docx) construction using Java

The Path to Standardisation

• Documentation prepared by Microsoft and submitted to Ecma, based upon the Office 2007 file format and well documented customer requirements.
  • Need for backward compatibility and fidelity with billions of existing documents
  • Need for the file format to fully represent the features of the Microsoft office platform as a starting point
  • Ability to use the file format as a developer tool, enabling new types of data led applications
• Entities within Ecma worked on the standard, requesting and adding much more information;
  • Including… Apple, Barclays Capital, BP, The British Library, Essilor, Intel, Microsoft, NextPage, Novell, Statoil, Toshiba, and the United States Library of Congress
• Ratified as Ecma-376, a global published standard in December'06.
• Submitted to ISO for approval as DIS 29500
  • Contradiction period (looking at the role of this standard and the overlap with other existing standards) - approved to progress to a technical ballot
  • Approval by country ISO committees based upon technical merits of the standard
    • Yes (with or without comments)
    • Abstain
    • No (with comments, and suggest resolutions)
  • Ballot resolution meeting is the next stage, where those voting no, or simply wanting to discuss comments are invited to meet in person and resolve any outstanding issues in the spirit of positive collaboration.

The Evolution of ECMA 376

2005: ECMA International starts work on Office Open XML
• Founding members of ECMA TC 45:
  • Apple, Barclays Capital, BP, The British Library, Essilor, Intel Corporation, Microsoft, NextPage Inc., Statoil ASA, Toshiba
• Goal of ECMA TC 45:
  • create ECMA Office Open XML Format standard
  • contribute ECMA Office Open XML Format standard to ISO/IEC JTC 1 for approval and adoption by ISO and IEC
  • To steward future evolution of Office Open XML
• Open process
  • Technical Committee open to any ECMA member. Novell, US Library of Congress joined TC45 after creation
• Initial draft, about 2.000 Pages
• Work Progress/Transparency:
  • Weekly conference calls
  • Meeting regularly
  • Initial and Interim drafts posted publicly on ECMA web site
  • External feedback - SC34 experts, others
• 7. December 2006: ECMA General Assembly
  • Overwhelming positive vote
  • Approval to Submit to ISO Final
• Standard about 6.000 Pages (through changes and supplements in TC45)

SourceForge ODF Converter

• Microsoft is funding and providing architectural guidance to build ODF plug-in
• Set of open source tools on SourceForge under a BSD license
• Read and "save as" functionality of ODF in Office 2007 and previous versions (via compatibility pack)
• Tested for EU Document conformance
  • Eg. round-trip interoperability with a translation bureau working with ODF

Peaceful Coexistence

• ODF Converter for Microsoft Office
  • http://sourceforge.net/projects/odfconverter
• Open XML support for OpenOffice.org released by Novell
  • http://download.novell.com/Summar yFree.jsp?buildid=ESrjfdE4U58~
• Gnumeric spreadsheet software supports OpenXML
• Next version of Corel WordPerfect will support both Open XML and ODF (Mid 2007)
  • http://www.networkworld.com/news /2006/112906-corel-odf.html

Improving current position:

• Already in market:
  • growing base of users - Windows/non-windows
  • Massachusetts now endorses OpenXML
• Gaining ISO standard benefits all those users.
• Co-existence of format already:
  • Translator projects building a technical bridge between Open XML : ODF
  • Operational support for binary->XML (Office Migration Planning Manager)
  
  

Text of Rob Weir's OOXML Presentation

Rob Weir's OOXML Presentation was included in the Standards Australia hosted forum on the proposed Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file format", 9 August 2007 in Sydney. I provided some excerpts and was asked to include the slide presentation. The presentation "Some Thoughts Concerning DIS 29500 “OOXML" by Rob Weir, IBM, has similar content to his Blog. So rather than clog up the web with another slide show, I have just provided the text, without the graphics (available from his blog):

Some Thoughts Concerning DIS 29500 "OOXML"

Rob Weir
IBM
robert_weir(a)us.ibm.com
http://www.robweir.com/blog

(c) 2007 IBM Corporation

What is a Standard?

"[A] document, established by consensus and approved by a recognized body, that provides, for common and repeated use, rules, guidelines or characteristics for activities or their results, aimed at the achievement of the optimum degree of order in a given context

NOTE Standards should be based on the consolidated results of science, technology and experience, and aimed at the promotion of optimum community benefits."

-- ISO/IEC Guide 2:2004, Definition 3.2

FastTrack V Ecma's "value"

OOXML: a rushed standard

The technical case against DIS 29500 / OOXML

OOXML does not satisfy the criteria commonly used to define standards :

Standards should be repeatable, optimal/best practices and interoperable
Ref. ISO, British Standards Institute, ISO/IEC JTC1 Directives

1. NOT Precise, Repeatable, Common

"Compatibility Settings" of WordProcessingML, such as "autoSpaceLikeWord95", do not provide for repeatable practices. Many other properties are undefined.

2. NOT aspirational and a consolidation of best practices

Very little use of the consolidated best practices of the industry such as XForms, Xlink, SMIL and MathML

3. NOT Interoperable and Portable

Heavily tied to Microsoft Office applications and Windows, to the detriment of interoperability and portability. Example: clipboard only supports Microsoft formats, such as EMF, and WMF. Supports Internet Explorer, but not Firefox, Opera or Safari.

4. LACKS Cultural and Linguistic Adaptability

Example: NETWORKDAYS() defines a weekend in a way that will be improper in most parts of the Middle East.

Recommendations

• Vote "No, with comments," which is the JTC1-prescribed way of indicating "conditional approval" (JTC1 Directives, Section 9.8)
• Recommend that OOXML be resubmitted as normal working item in JTC1/SC34: V Split into a multi part standard: WordProcessingML, SpreadsheetML, DrawingML, Office Open Math Markup, VML, etc. V Have each part progress independently, at its own speed, within normal ISO processing stages V Encourage participation from OASIS to identify opportunities for harmonization with existing ISO 26300 "ODF"
• OOXML, as the default format in MS Office, is important. But as a standard it is full of inconsistencies, omissions, inaccuracies and errors. No standard is perfect, but OOXML, in its current state, does even not meet the minimum requirements.

Comments to Standards Australia on OOXML

Here are the comments I submitted to Standards Australia on the proposed Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file format". Please note that these comment are as an individual IT professional and do not necessarily represent the views of any organization I may be associated with:

The British Standards Institute have taken the innovative step of using a Wiki to help prepare input on how the UK should vote on ISO ballot on Office Open XML/OOXML ( DIS 29500). There is a set of very carefully prepared detailed UK comments on the draft standard.

The UK comments typically are suggesting that proprietary and obsolete Microsoft features in the standard be replaced with non-proprietary and more up to date ones. An example is to replace an old hash algorithm from Excell with a more robust one.

The comments get a little cheeky at times, such as suggesting a "doWrongDateCalculationsLikeExcel" tag. But as far as I can see these changes are feasible and would make the standard better at the cost of causing some minor inconvenience to Microsoft. However, if OOXML needs changes to make it suitable as an international standard, then its major feature (compatibility with Microsoft Office) is lost.

There is already an XML based international standard for office document formats: OpenDocument ISO/IEC 26300:2006. ODF has similar functionality to the proposed OOXML.

There is work already underway to provide translation between OOXML and ODF. When such a translation available, Microsoft Office users can then use the existing international standard format. There would therefore be no need top adopt OOXML as an international standard.

Both OOXML and ODF are derived from existing legacy proprietary software packages: OOXML from Microsoft Office and ODF from Sun Star Office (later adopted for OpenOffice.Org). ODF is based on newer software and so has fewer quirks. Both are based on XML formats, but neither is directly compatible with web browsers or other web software.

A better approach would be to base the word processor, which is the most used part of the office document format, on a modern web XML standards, such as XHTML 2. Work on the Integrated Content Environment (ICE), Digital Scholar's Workbench and ACS Digital Library show some of the possibilities. Have shown the feasibility of this for word processing documents and to a limited extent with presentations.

The way offices work and use documents is changing. The idea of a static monolithic document, which is a facsimile of a printed document is changing. Documents are becoming collections of links to data at different locations. Traditional office formats will not be usable in this environment. Work on modular document formats, incorporating techniques such as Microformats will allow more flexible documents. These can then incorporate new ways of working, such as social networking.

From: Message to Standards Australia, Tom Worthington 21 August 2007.

Notes from OOXML Standards Forum

Standards Australia hosted a forum on the proposed Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file format" on 9 August 2007 in Sydney. The notes from the event have been circulated by SA. With more than a little irony, the document was circulated as a Microsoft Word document (".DOC") embedded in a Microsoft Transport Neutral Encapsulation Format (".DAT"). For those who did not receive the message, or were unable to read it due to the formats used, here are some excerpts:

Draft International Standard (DIS), ISO/IEC 29500
Information technology — Office Open XML file formats

9 August 2007
Standards Australia, 20 Bridge St, Sydney

Introduction

Alistair Tegart (Standards Australia Program Manager, Forum Chair), opened the forum at 10am and welcomed the participants to the Standards Australia ad-hoc forum on ISO/IEC 29500 Information technology — Office Open XML file formats. The purpose of this meeting was to provide a forum for discussion by interested parties to advise Standards Australia in the development of its submission for approval by the Communications IT & eCommerce (CITeC) Standards Sector Board. Invitees to this meeting included industry, government, academic and other interested parties.

Alistair Tegart outlined the aim of the forum, which was to gather information and explore creative ways to provide a uniquely Australian consensus position. Standards Australia will utilise the forum as one of the mechanisms to formulate a recommendation to the CITeC Sector Board. He also outlined the process that needs to be followed for providing written comments by 21 August 2007. The Standards Australia CITeC Sector Board will consider all the feedback and comments received when formulating a submission and position which will be forwarded to ISO/IEC JTC 1.

Background

The European Computer Manufactures' Association International (ECMA International) adopted and published the Microsoft Open Office XML specification as ECMA 376 late in 2006. ECMA approached ISO/IEC JTC1, the international standards organisation for information technology, seeking to use the fast track process to elevate its standard to an International Standard status late in 2006. The JTC1 enquiry process opened on 1 January 2007, for a 30 day period.

In accordance with the JTC1 Directives (their process rules) Member countries were asked to list any apparent contradictions with existing standards (including ISO/IEC 26300: Information technology - Open Document Format for Office Applications. Some 19 countries did this, including Australia. The Standards Australia Communications, IT and e-Commerce (CITeC) Standards Sector Board (SSB) developed and approved Australia’s contribution.

ECMA provided a response to all contradictions raised and subsequently JTC1 made the document available as ISO/IEC DIS 29500 Information technology - Office Open XML file formats standard for actual balloting by the ISO/IEC member nations.

Voting options available to Australia

As a Participating Member of JTC1, Australia has an obligation review and submit a vote on the document. The options open are:

• Approve

• Approve with comment

• Abstain

• Disapprove with comment - disapproval of the DIS (or DAM) for technical reasons to be stated, with proposals for changes that would make the document acceptable (acceptance of these proposals shall be referred to the NB concerned for confirmation that the vote can be changed to approval)

The final vote will be submitted by Standards Australia by 2 September 2007.

Discussion

Rick Jelliffe –

Rick Jellife provided a broad overview of the working mechanisms of ISO and specifically his long involvement with ISO JTC1/SC 34 – Document Description and Processing Languages. He also discussed in broad terms ISO/IEC 29500 Information technology — Office Open XML file formats.

Karen Koomen -

Karen Koomen provided feedback and spoke briefly on behalf of the case for not ratifying ISO/IEC 29500. Karen stated she would like to add to her comments by providing further feedback from Rob Weir via a presentation (attached).

IBM pod cast slides:

Greg Stone-

Greg Stone articulated the case for a yes vote on the document (presentation attached), and had the following individuals state the case for a yes vote as part of his presentation.

Danika Bakalich (ComTIA)

Richard White (CargoWiseEDI)

Microsoft presentation slides:

Other contributions-

All participants at the forum were given an opportunity to speak publicly and present their positions. There were views expressed which supported the ratification of the document, and other participants supported a no vote on the document.

There were significant views expressed by the representative of Standards Australia Committee IT-019 (Computer Applications – Information and Documentation) and IT-019-01 (Information Technology for Learning, Education and Training), and National Archives of Australia. They voiced their concerns in the document being ratified at the ISO level.

Closing comments

Alistair Tegart thanked all the participants for contributing to a constructive and productive discussion. He invited participants to submit written comments by 21 August 2007, and reiterated that all the comments received by Standards Australia and the discussions at the forum will be utilised to formulate the submission that will be presented to the Standards Australia Communications, IT and eCommerce (CITeC) Sector Board.

The Standards Australia CITeC Board will discuss and formulate the final position from Standards Australia, which will be submitted to ISO/IEC JTC1 before the ballot closing date of 2 September 2007 .

Alistair Tegart stated that all the participants would be informed of the final position (vote) that will be submitted by Standards Australia.

Written comment closes COB 21 August 2007.
Mail to: michael.langdon(a)standards.org.au

The Forum closed at 1pm.

From: "Standards Australia DIS 29500 discussion forum record", message from Michael Langdon, STandrads Australia, Fri, 17 Aug 2007 11:29:51 +1000

Attached to the word processing document was a list of attendees, plus PDF of presentation slides from IBM and Microsoft. The presentation "Some Thoughts Concerning DIS 29500 “OOXML" by Rob Weir, IBM, has similar content to his Blog. The Microsoft presentation "The case for a positive vote for Office Open XML Standard (ECMA-376)", has similar content to the Microsoft OOXML web site.

How to submit comments on OOXML ISO/IEC 29500

Following last week's forum on the Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file formats", Standards Australia have invited written comments by 21 August 2007:

Attached is the ISO template for comments for DRAFT INTERNATIONAL STANDARD ISO/IEC 29500, Information technology - Office Open XML file formats. Please insert your comments in this template.

Comments will be collated in a master template. The master comment template will be updated on a daily basis until COB 21 August 2007 which is the close off date for comments, after which collated comments will be provided to the Standards Australia Communications, IT & eCommerce (CITeC) sector board meeting.

Please note the structure of the ISO comments template. There are three types of comment: ge = general, te = technical, and ed = editorial. Comment type can be listed in column 4. Comments can also list a clause number(s), paragraph, figure, table or note number. Insert comments and list the proposed change in the next column.

Email the template back for addition to the master comment template. Please do not email other Standards Australia employees, or email lists, this as the comments just come back to me for compilation anyway: michael.langdon (a)standards.org.au ...

From: Michael Langdon, Project Manager, Commerce, Standards Australia, 14 Aug 2007

A copy of the draft ISO/DIS 29500 is available from the Standards Australia web site, at the Communications, IT and e-Commerce Sector Board. However, the draft is in the form of a 46 Mbyte Zip file. The text of the standard is 5220 pages of PDF.

Here is the text of the comment template, for information. If you want to submit a comment you should request a copy of the template from Standards Australia:

Template for comments and observations

Date: Due to Standards Australia by COB 21Aug 2007

Document:DRAFT INTERNATIONAL STANDARDISO/IEC 29500 Information technology - Office Open XML file formats

1	2	(3)	4	5	(6)	(7)
MB1	Clause No. / Subclause No. / Annex (e.g. 3.1)	Paragraph / Figure / Table / Note (e.g. Table 1)	Type of comment2	Comment (justification for change)	Proposed change	Observations on each comment submitted
AU

ps: I note that SA are distributing the template as a 34 kbyte RTF file. If converted to the international ODF format, it reduces to 11 kbytes.

The ODF standard (ISO/IEC 26300:2006) is 728 pages (14 Kbytes) of PDF from ISO and costs CHF 342.00 (about $US285). At this rate, the OOXML standard will cost $US2,000 a copy. ;-)

Making Standards Online

The recent controversy over the ISO ballot on Office Open XML/OOXML ISO 29500 highlights a problem caused by innovation in standards development. The ballot is for the adoption of the OOXML format of Microsoft Office as an international standard, alongside the existing ODF standard. The issue has caused concern amongst IT professionals worldwide for lack of transparency in the process. But much of that concern is due to the assumption that the tools developed for Internet and web standards are used for ISO standards.

IT professionals now routinely using the Internet and the web for the development of standards. Unfortunately the international and national standards making processes have not kept up with these developments. The result is that standards development in increasingly taking place outside the formal national and international processes. There is a need to incorporate these new ways of working online into the formal processes, otherwise ISO, SA and other bodies will cease to be relevant to standards making for IT. As the same online methods of working are adopted by other professional areas this will result in the breakdown of national and international standards process.

A few small changes needed to standards working processes to allow for meshing with an online work process. Standards Australia has made some moves in this direction with its "Consensus Builder" web based application. However, more needs to be done. New XML based web developments will make this process a lot easier. It will also reduce the cost of administering the standards process. Australia is one of the leaders in development of technology in this area and could lead the world in standards development.

Accessibility Problems with Microsoft Office Open XML

Stephen A. Hockema and Jutta Treviranus from the Adaptive Technology Resource Centre have written a thoughtful analysis of accessibility issues for the disabled with the Microsoft Office Open XML format. This is timely as OOXML is proposed as an international standard. Essentially Stephen and Jutta argue the world would be better off improving the existing ODF standard, than creating a new one. This is a point of view I agree with.

There are grave issues with respect to the accessibility of Office Open XML as a format and potential standard that should preclude its adoption at present. It may be the case that OOXML can be improved to ameliorate some of the more specific technical concerns, but it is most likely too late for the higher-level issues, especially those inherent in the process by which OOXML was developed. We suggest that energy would be better spent in the ongoing effort to improve the existing ISO ODF standard (with which OOXML would overlap and compete if it is adopted). In any event, decisions with respect to standardized document formats should be made in consultation with members of disability communities, disabilities experts and developers of assistive technologies, with universal accessibility as a core requirement as opposed to an ad hoc afterthought.

From: Accessibility Issues with Office Open XML, Stephen A. Hockema
Jutta Treviranus, Adaptive Technology Resource Centre, University of Toronto, 2007

Australian OOXML Standard Process

Standards Australia are hosting a forum on the proposed Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file formats" on 9 August 2007 in Sydney. Standards Australia have sent out an agenda for the meeting which details the decision process, which I was unable to find this on the Standards Australia website, so here are some excerpts:

Proposed Draft International Standard (DIS) ISO/IEC 29500 Information technology - Office Open XML file formats standard

Standards Australia Industry Forum ...

BACKGROUND

The European Computer Manufactures' Association International (Ecma International) adopted and published the Microsoft Open Office XML specification as ECMA 376 late in 2006. Ecma approached ISO/IEC JTC1, the international standards organisation for information technology, seeking to use the fast track process to elevate its standard to International Standard status late in 2006, as per its recognised status as a Publicly Available Specification (PAS) submitter. The JTC1 enquiry process opened on 1 January 2007, for a 30 day period.

In accordance with the JTC1 Directives (their process rules) Member countries were asked to list any apparent contradictions with existing standards (including ISO/IEC 26300: Information technology - Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument)). Some 19 countries did this, including Australia. The Standards Australia Communications, IT and e-Commerce (CITeC) Standards Sector Board (SSB) developed and approved Australia’s contribution.

ECMA provided a response to all contradictions raised and subsequently JTC1 made the document available as ISO/IEC DIS 29500 Information technology - Office Open XML file formats standard for actual balloting by the ISO/IEC member nations.

PROCESS

As a Participating Member of JTC1, Australia has an obligation to vote on this document. The options open are:

• Approve
• Approve with comment
• Abstain
• Disapprove with comment (disapproval of the DIS for technical reasons to be stated, with proposals for changes that would make the document acceptable (acceptance of these proposals shall be referred to the NB concerned for confirmation that the vote can be changed to approval).

This contribution will be approved in advance by the CITeC Standards Sector Board by consensus.

The final vote will be submitted by Standards Australia by 2 September 2007.

PURPOSE OF THIS MEETING

The purpose of this meeting is to provide a forum for discussion by interested parties to advise Standards Australia in development of its submission for approval by the CITeC Standards Sector Board.

Invitees to this meeting include:

• Members of Standards Australia’s committees:
• IT-004 Geographical Information Systems
• IT-015 Software & Systems Engineering
• IT-019 Computer Applications – Information & Documentation
• IT-027 Data Management & Interchange
• IT-031 Computer Modelling and Simulation
• Members of the CITeC SSB
• Interested parties who have submitted comments since the beginning of the initial comment period in January 2007, by e-mail or letter.

Participants are invited to contribute their comments in writing following the forum by 21 August 2007 to ensure that they are considered in development of the submission to the CITeC SSB.

CONSIDERATIONS TO NOTE

Standards Australia is recognised by the Government as Australia’s peak standards body. It develops Australian Standards® of public benefit and national interest and supports excellence in design and innovation through the Australian Design Awards.

Standards Australia is Australia’s representative on the International Organization for
Standardization [ISO], the International Electrotechnical Commission [IEC], and the Pacific Area Standards Congress [PASC].

Participation in international committee work is dependent on our capacity to consult and respond through the Australian committee structure. The CITeC Standards Sector Board is responsible for this vote.

This forum is being conducted by Standards Australia as a courtesy to stakeholders. It is an extraordinary meeting that we are not required to hold, but do so to provide an open process. We appreciate your attendance and expect that you appreciate our effort in making this opportunity available to you.

Standards Australia values its vote as a participating member of all international committees, and does not exercise it injudiciously. We provide considered Australian viewpoints that are beneficial to Australian stakeholders, including industry, government, academia and the general community, through the facilitation of trade and the inclusion of clear Australian requirements in international standards.

The JTC1 process has established that the ECMA-376 document is not contradictory to existing standards and ECMA has responded to a number of technical considerations raised in the initial consultation period. This forum is not to debate the merits of the JTC1 decision making process or the validity of the ECMA response.

While technical comments are welcomed, it would be entirely counter productive to use this forum to reiterate technical comments that have already been raised and are likely to be debated in every JTC1 member body in some form.

We are looking for creative, positive contributions that emphasise our commitment to representing truly Australian views to the international community.

To ensure the best outcome for the meeting, we ask you to note the guidelines and agenda below.

GUIDELINES

• Standards Australia will document the meeting and will share with attendees/interested parties not able to attend. Discussion will not be recorded, in line with our general committee meeting policies.

• When general discussion commences, please limit your contribution to no more than five minutes.

• Speakers should be allowed to complete presentations, prior to inviting questions or comments. Responses, including questions, should be raised through meeting chair.

• When individuals do comment, they should state their name and organisational affiliation, if any.

• Respect others’ opinions.

AGENDA

10am Opening of the meeting and attendance (please sign attendance list)
10.10am Introduction - Standards Australia
10.30am Invited discussion openers
10.30 -10.40am General overview of the standards process
10.40 – 11.00am Objections to ISO/IEC adoption of DIS 29500
11.00 – 11.20am Case for ISO/IEC adoption of DIS 29500
11.20am 20 minute break
11.40am General Discussion
12.45pm Summary and next steps
1pm Close

Participants are invited to contribute their comments in writing following the forum by 21 August 2007 to ensure that they are considered in development of the submission to the CITeC Standards

Sector Board.

CONTACT

Please confirm attendance via e-mail to: michael.langdon (a) standards.org.au

Australia to decide on OOXML Stanadard

Standards Australia are hosting a forum on the proposed Draft International Standard ISO/IEC 29500, "Information technology - Office Open XML file formats" on 9 August 2007 in Sydney. OOXML is European Ecma standard 376 and is based on the format used in Microsoft Office 2007. The Forum is limited to 30 persons and seats can be reserved by email to: michael.langdon (a) standards.org.au Comments on the standard can be sent to: alistair.tegart (a) standards.org.au

The British Standards Institute have taken the innovative step of using a Wiki to help prepare input on how the UK should vote on ISO ballot on Office Open XML/OOXML ( DIS 29500). There is a set of very carefully prepared detailed UK comments on the draft standard.

The UK comments typically are suggesting that proprietary and obsolete Microsoft features in the standard be replaced with non-proprietary and more up to date ones. An example is to replace an old hash algorithm from Excell with a more robust one.

The comments get a little cheeky at times, such as suggesting a "doWrongDateCalculationsLikeExcel" tag. But as far as I can see these changes are feasible and would make the standard better at the cost of causing some minor inconvenience to Microsoft. However, if OOXML needs changes to make it suitable as an international standard, then its major feature (compatibility with Microsoft Office) is lost.

There is already an XML based international standard for office document formats: OpenDocument ISO/IEC 26300:2006. ODF has similar functionality to the proposed OOXML.

There is work already underway to provide translation between OOXML and ODF. When such a translation available, Microsoft Office users can then use the existing international standard format. There would therefore be no need top adopt OOXML as an international standard.

Both OOXML and ODF are derived from existing legacy proprietary software packages: OOXML from Microsoft Office and ODF from Sun Star Office (later adopted for OpenOffice.Org). ODF is based on newer software and so has fewer quirks. Both are based on XML formats, but neither is directly compatible with web browsers or other web software.

A better approach would be to base the word processor, which is the most used part of the office document format, on a modern web standard, such as XHTML 2.

UN on Standards for Electronic Documents

The UNDP have issued a five page overview on standards for office documents, which essentially sets out the case for the use of ODF and reports its adoption by governments:

In summary, this APDIP e-Note provides a brief introduction to the history of document standards, explores the different standards for electronic documents, and details the development of ODF. It also looks at how governments worldwide have started to adopt ODF in public administration.

From: Standards for Electronic Documents, e-Note 18, Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme, United Nations Development Programme, 2007

APDIP have a list of projects on content and knowledge management applied to development.

Web and ODF documents in PDF?

Getting acceptance for new document formats from users is difficult. If someone gets a file with an ODF or some other extension they have never heard of it will be a worry for them. But if they get a PDF file that is okay.

Perhaps PDF can be used as Trojan horse (in a nice way) for this. Some versions of PDF (such as PDF/UA) have provision for embedding data files. This could be used to include a Open Document Format (ODF) or web document and its associated formatting and images inside the PDF document.

The OpenOffice.org office suite could be modified to package an editable version of documents in a PDF file (and an equivalent addon provided for Microsoft Office). OO already creates PDF versions of documents, so to this could be added an option to include a copy of the original source document. The person receiving the document would see the PDF rendering by default, but would have the option to work on the original editable file and be offered a link to download a copy of OO, or a conversion tool for Microsoft Office, if needed.

Most of the space taken up by word processing documents is in the images, not the text. It should be possible to share the images between the PDF rendering and the ODF document. As a result adding the ODF document to the PDF may not make the document much bigger.

ODF is better than not having a standard format for office documents, but is not perfect. My preference would be to use XHTML 2 for word processing documents, so they could be directly rendered by web browsers. Word Processing programs are rapidly becoming just a way to create not very good web content and it would be better if they created well formatted web format documents directly.

Compatibility with existing products is a legitimate concern when setting a standard. As an example this was a major consideration in the standard for shipping containers, with discussion of what adaptors would be needed.

Standards based on something which has been shown to work are better standards. But this does result in some quirks, as an example shipping containers are stronger than they need to be (increasing costs) due to the need to meet some old European railway standards. The cords for some computers are rated to withstand high temperatures as the standard they are made to was designed for electric kettles. Putting office documents inside PDF files would be a bit like a computer cable you could use to boil water, but at least it would work.

Uniform Office Format from China

The topic of if China would be content to use western developed standards came up at the China New Media conference I have been attending in Brisbane. One I just noticed is that China developed an XML based "Uniform Office Format" (UOF), similar to the ODF standard. There would seem to be no good reason why the world would need another XML based office format, but then Microsoft have proposed one, so why not China?

Microsoft Office OpenXML to ODF Standard Transalation Software

Version 1 of open source software to translate from Microsoft Office 2007's OpenXML format to Open Office's standard ODF is available:

Open XML Translator provides tools to build a technical bridge between the Open XML Formats and Open Document Format(ODF). As the first component of this initiative, the ODF Add-in for Microsoft Word 2007 allows to Open & Save ODF documents in Word.

From: Open XML Translator: Release 1.0 now avalaible!, OpenXML/ODF Translator Add-in for Office, ollie_d, SourceForge, 2007-02-05 22:45

As well as an add-in for Microsoft Word, Powerpoint and Excell, there is a command line interface available. There is a detailed list of what is and is not supported:

The ODF-Converters (cooresponding to Word translator, Excel translator and PowerPoint translator) translate OpenXML documents, spreadsheets and presentations (.DOCX, .XLSX and .PPTX) to Open Document Formats - ODF 1.0 formats (.ODF, .ODS and .ODP respectively) and conversely, for Open XML processing applications.

From: Features, OpenXML/ODF Translator Add-in for Office

Unfortunately the software requires you to have Microsoft software installed. That is, the translation allows you to create OpenOffice documents, using Microsoft Office, without a copy of OpenOffice. But you can't create Microsoft 2007 OpenXML format documents from Open Office. So this is not as great an advance as it would first seem.

The OpenOffice software is free and runs on Linux and Apple systems as well as Microsoft Windows. It already supports the old Microsoft Office formats and so could be sued to translate from Microsoft to ODF formats. What would be handy is a standalone OpenXML to ODF translator. But that would be considerably harder than an Office add-on.