Bonum Certa Men Certa

Freiburg Should Use ODF Only, Just Like Portugal

Freiburg



Summary: OOXML helps Microsoft derail Free software adoption in the German public sector while Portugal's goes ODF-only

So the news says that Freiburg will return to Office after failure to properly communicate with those who understand lock-in. IDG covered this almost exclusively and wrote: "According to the organisations, no open source experts were consulted in the process. Therefore they hoped the council would still consider a migration to a current version of LibreOffice or OpenOffice."



Calling the Free Software Foundation Europe an "open source group" is bad, but we saw that in previous reports on the subject. The matter of fact is, a lot of issues have already been addressed:

Open source developers have already fixed three of the five major problems that are limiting support by open source office suites for Microsoft's proprietary document format OOXML, reports Matthias Stürmer. The Swiss Ernst & Young IT consultant is one of those improving the open source office tools. He hopes better support for OOXML this will "help to successfully complete and maintain migrations towards open source office suites."


Notice how OOXML always stands in the way, as Microsoft intended. Here is the call for Freiburg to stay with ODF:

Five civil groups advocating the use of free and open source by public administrations urge the German city of Freiburg to continue to use the Open Document Format as its default format for electronic documents. "Free office suites are making progress. LibreOffice today has over 60 million users worldwide."

This week's Tuesday evening, Freiburg's city council is voting over a proposal to end its floundering migration of OpenOffice and to stop using the Open Document Format. Instead of ODF, the city board wants to default on Microsoft's alternative, OOXML.


Some people who oversee Microsoft OOXML start following me in Twitter, so I guess Microsoft watches us ODF proponents very closely. Andy Updegrove has great news from Portugal:

According to a press release issued today by the Portuguese Open Source Business Association (reproduced in full at the end of this blog entry), the government of Portugal has decided to approve a single editable, XML-based document format for use by government, and in public procurement. And that format is not OOXML.


Here is a news report in English. After those Portugal OOXML scandals we sure expect some corruption from Microsoft. Here are some observers who should keep an eye on Microsoft's thugs. A timely reminder from Portugal:



Other Microsoft irregularities in Portugal can be found in:



ESOP says: "We must stress the importance of the whole open standards adoption process and declare our explicit support for the way the interoperability regulation was designed. On one hand, there is some pragmatism to be noticed: the list of open standards is relatively short with priority given to functions where interoperability problems are a large concern. On the other hand, pragmatism didn’t mean lost of insight: there is no more than one open standard per functional category. This is something ESOP has always defended, as a measure to prevent incompatibilities that could bring the adoption process to a failure."

Related to this, also see:



Keep on open eye on Microsoft Portugal.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Writing and Coding Isn't Always Enough
Last year we had to assume a role we didn't have before: litigants
Autumn Has Come
Autumn should be exciting in all sorts of ways; it'll also mark our anniversary
 
Slopfarms Already Peaked, They Will Die When Slop Companies Run Out of Money to Borrow
slopfarms will lack an actual "engine"
“Sideloading” Never Killed Anybody
There are many online discussions this week about the misnomer "sideloading"
Slopwatch: Google News as FUD Vector Against Linux and Plagiarism Enhancer, Serial Slopper (SS) Uses LLMs to Googlebomb "Linux"
Slop destroys the Web not just by screwing with search engines and helping plagiarists. It's also responsible for de facto DDoS attacks...
Links 01/09/2025: "Attacks on Science" and China's "Soft Power" Grows
Links for the day
Links 01/09/2025: Fresh Backlash Against Slop and "Norway’s Electricity Crisis is About to Hit Britain"
Links for the day
Links 01/09/2025: Catching Up (Mostly via Deutsche Welle), "Windows TCO" Effect in UK
Links for the day
Gemini Links 01/09/2025: Linguistic Barriers and "Web 1.0 Hosting"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, August 31, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, August 31, 2025
The UEFI 9/11 - Part IV - External Interference
They all seem to be playing a role in crushing Software Freedom and self-determination for users
Links 31/08/2025: Baggage Claim Scams, an Insurrectionist’s War on Culture, and a Sudden Robotics Hype
Links for the day
Gemini Links 31/08/2025: Reviewing Netsurf and Slightly Less Historic Ada Design
Links for the day
IBM Has Taken Control of GNOME
Don't expect a successor to be found any time soon
Links 31/08/2025: Google Gmail Data Breach and LF Puff Pieces for Pay
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, August 30, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, August 30, 2025
This is What Google News Has Become
Moments ago
The Slopfarm WebProNews Has Turned Google News Into a Laughing Stock Full of Plagiarism by Slop
If Google News dies of neglect, that's one thing. It's starting to seem like active neglect by Google is a form of participation.
Do What is Moral, as What's Legal Isn't Always Moral
Do what's objectively moral, no matter the costs and the risks
Slopwatch: Google News Assisting Plagiarism and Anti-Linux FUD, Serial Slopper Rips Off Linux-Centric Journalists
This makes the Web a much worse place and lessens the incentive to do journalism
Links 30/08/2025: NVIDIA Fakes Results to Hide a Bubble Already in Implosion Phase, Data Breaches Galore, Important Win for Workers' Union in Canada
Links for the day
Representing and Speaking for Animals
If I ever choose to take this matter to tribunal with animals-centric NGOs on my side, it'll get some press coverage for sure
The UEFI 9/11 - Part II - Campaign of Censorship and Defamation Against Critics
In dictatorships, humour serves an important role. It's tragic.
In Kazakhstan, Yandex Estimated to be 20 Times Bigger Than Microsoft
Bing is measured as down this month
Shutterstock Not Enough? The Register MS Uses Slop Images in Articles (Seemingly More and More Over Time)
Cost-saving trajectory amid office shutdown?
Gemini Links 30/08/2025: Games, PostmarketOS, and Slop
Links for the day
Links 30/08/2025: Imgur Uproar and Many Ukraine Updates (Mediazona Reports Over 200,000 Russians Died for Putin)
Links for the day
How Not to Build Software
code forges that need a Web browser perhaps fill some 'niche' demand
GAFAM and "MATA"
The use of dark humour there hopefully helps illuminate what a lot of "modern" technology became like and how it interacts with human civilisation (to what ends and whose gain)
Birds Are Not "Pests and Vermin", Privacy is Not a Crime, and GNU/Linux is Not 'Hacking Platform'
I could not help but think of Free software analogies
The Sites Should Be Very Fast Again
That issue is now resolved
Flying in 2025
worse than ever before
Activists, Including Technical Activists, Need Not Pursue Affirmation
Techrights doesn't play or participate in a "popularity contest"
The UEFI 9/11 - Part III - Chaos is Scheduled to Happen Second Thursday of September (No Matter What the Microsofters Tell You)
The clock is ticking
Downplaying the Impact of "UEFI 9/11" is a Losing Strategy
we won't publish much whilst on holiday
Government Sites Should Run Free Software
Not proprietary bloatware with buzzwords
LLM Slopfarms Take No Breaks
When people run sites by bots they don't need to worry about "breaks"
GNOME Having a Meltdown Again
Thanks and farewell to Steven Deobald
Gemini Links 30/08/2025: Low Tech and Hunchbin 1.0.6
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 29, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, August 29, 2025