Comments on: OpenDocument Format Has Solid Foundation in the World Wide Web

By: Roy Schestowitz

Roy Schestowitz — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 01:26:24 +0000

Well, OOXML isn’t a standard yet . But with the help of GNOME, Miguel de Icaza, and such they’ll get there.

I’m always reminded again and again why I replace the “Oh Oh” in OOXML with a couple of coins. Last reminder came just half an hour ago.

Microsoft uses its moneyflow to protect that same moneyflow. Isn’t there some law against such practices? It’s the equivalent of “dumping” or “selling at a loss” in the businesses sense (to suppress and eliminate competition). This is related to Intel/Microsoft sabotage of OLPC (covered here just days ago).

By: Jim Powers

Jim Powers — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 23:30:03 +0000

Well, OOXML isn’t a standard yet . But with the help of GNOME, Miguel de Icaza, and such they’ll get there. Then Microsoft will abandon it for OO-Silverlight or some such, leaving FLOSS developers no choice but to reverse engineer this new abomination and get more threats of patent infringement. Sounds fun!

I’m guessing that most folks with fill 2007 Office are still forced to save in .doc format because they need to interact with other folks who cannot read OOXML files yet.

Well, about the flat curve, I’m not completely comfortable with the idea that the flat curve is representative of the total number of OOOXML documents. In the exact same way that I don’t think that the number of Adobe PhotoShop files indexable by Google are is representative of the total number of PhotoShop files in circulation. There aren’t a lot of OOXML files out there because there isn’t a critical mass of people running software that can read/edit that format (just like the PhotoShop files above). I’m not trying to be contrary, I’d like nothing more than for OOXML to fail miserably and be forgotten in the annals of history, I’m just not convinced that we should take *that* much comfort in these results.

By: Rob Weir

Rob Weir — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 23:13:46 +0000

Note that if we think OOXML adoption is actually high, but my chart artificially shows it as flat because these documents are all behind firewalls, then we would also then need to assume that the % of OOXML document that are placed behind firewalls has been increasing over time. In other words, that the probability that a given OOXML document is behind a firewall has increased over time, and at such a rate that it exactly compensates for OOXML’s adoption rate. That would be an amazing coincidence if true. But is there any evidence or a motivation for such a change in user behavior?

The more natural assumption (Occam’s Razor, etc)., is to assume that aggregate user behavior is constant over this 12 month period and that X% of documents will appear on the web and 100-X% will be hidden behind firewalls. But if document adoption causes the overall base of users saving to that format to increase, it would raise both counts by the same percentage. So the stark flatness of the OOXML curve is the key indicator here.

You can talk firewalls all you want. But fewer than 2,000 OOXML documents on the web a year after the format was made a standard? That is hard to explain away.

By: Roy Schestowitz

Roy Schestowitz — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 21:08:48 +0000

I said:

Looking at the comments, Microsoft has not yet found a response or a decent rebuttal. The silence speaks volumes.

Thanks, Sam, for reminding us that no ODF file has even been served behind a firewall. (sarcasm)

By: Jim Powers

Jim Powers — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 21:07:08 +0000

Certainly the number only reflects documents that can be reached by Google crawlers. Also, sad to say, there are probably a lot more OOXML documents out there, orders of magnitude more. Remember Vista ships with a 25 use Office 2007 install that only saves in ooxml. My parents just got a new laptop and after I lost the fight to get Linux on it I at least got OpenOffice on it and uninstalled the 25 use Office 2007 “teaser”, but the vast majority of people like my parents are sheep and victims of whatever crap vendors and Microsoft decides to pile on a new PC. Seriously, we HAVE to get rid of bundled PCs. All machines should be purchasable naked and you can add an OS (of your choice) during the checkout process. Also, any “bundled” software should not be pre-installed, including Office. S.O.Bs

By: Sam Hiser

Sam Hiser — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 20:51:40 +0000

Rob’s not getting the .docx’s behind the firewall.

It’s a pure guess how many are there. Quite a few if Office 2007 numbers are true.