Microsoft Puppet countries are leaving the P membership. Lebanon, Turkey, Cyprus, and Trinidad & Tobago have already dropped out. All those countries voted Yes without comments to OOXML.
The countries stayed there not only for the September 2007 vote, but for the second one at the end of March 2008 too. Now that it's all over, just a month after the announcement from ISO, suddenly they drop out again ("back to normal, business as usual"), having just accomplished their mission, so to speak. Assignment completed.
It's mildly amusing actually because Microsoft's puppet don't even try hard enough to cover their tracks by lingering on and sticking around for a while longer. It's very revealing. Don't believe us? Ask the man who was in charge before being replaced by another Microsoft puppet. Here is what he said:
"This year WG1 have had another major development that has made it almost impossible to continue with our work within ISO. The influx of P members whose only interest is the fast-tracking of ECMA 376 as ISO 29500 has led to the failure of a number of key ballots. Though P members are required to vote, 50% of our current members, and some 66% of our new members, blatantly ignore this rule despite weekly email reminders and reminders on our website. As ISO require at least 50% of P members to vote before they start to count the votes we have had to reballot standards that should have been passed and completed their publication stages at Kyoto. This delay will mean that these standards will appear on the list of WG1 standards that have not been produced within the time limits set by ISO, despite our best efforts.
The disparity of rules for PAS, Fast-Track and ISO committee generated standards is fast making ISO a laughing stock in IT circles. The days of open standards development are fast disappearing. Instead we are getting “standardization by corporation”, something I have been fighting against for the 20 years I have served on ISO committees. I am glad to be retiring before the situation becomes impossible. I wish my colleagues every success for their future efforts, which I sincerely hope will not prove to be as wasted as I fear they could be."
--Martin Bryan, ISO 'Escapee'
Formerly Convenor, ISO/IEC JTC1/SC34 WG1
Some others take a more pragmatical approach, but even that one is very much telling about the whole OOXML farce. In this category, we find the OpenOffice.org project. Despite what Microsoft will tell you, OpenOffice.org does not and will not provide OOXML €« interoperability €» . It will however provide an import filter that users will be able to use in order to import documents formatted in the format used by Microsoft Office 2007 and 2008 that bears the name of Microsoft Office Open XML(OOXML). What this means is that the OpenOffice.org project has to work directly on the files edited and created by MS Office 2007 and 2008 in order to provide compatibility and does not use the OOXML specification, as it is not implemented by MS Office 2007 and Microsoft Office 2008. So much for interoperability. The jury is still out, by the way, on the search for OOXML implementations. The ones that exist are either broken or else very limited (even the famous Novell plugin).
Once piece of welcome news is that Adobe is releasing the Flash Player 10 beta for all major platforms — Windows, Mac and Linux. Adobe has even upped the Linux ante with a new installer specially tailored for Ubuntu users. Barclay says that Adobe considers Linux a major platform and will continue to make all Flash releases simultaneous across platforms.
Twhirl is built on Adobe AIR, which has a lightweight client library that allows Web developers to use familiar tools and languages to build first-class desktop applications. Software created with AIR is fully interactive and network-enabled, with a rich UI. But unlike traditional Web applications, AIR apps gain the immediacy and user engagement that come from running outside the browser window.
Both Otte and Savoye do see some limited good coming out of the Open Screen Project. Otte suggests that the growing openness of Adobe might help to reduce the reservations in the free software community about working to reproduce proprietary technologies, as well as "the general 'flash is evil' attitude" that prevails in the community."
Moreover, both Otte and Savoye see the announcement as a hopeful sign. "I think Adobe will open up Flash in the end, or at least the Flash player," Otte says.
Software maker Adobe announced Thursday that it would drop many of the licensing requirements attached to its Flash technology, which is used to display video and audio content on the web.
I would hope that Zemlin will encourage Adobe to now treat Linux as a first class citizen as opposed to an afterthought for release after Windows.
I hope Zemlin will pressure Adobe to finally actually make Flash -- not just the player -- but Flash CS3 Professional, (the core Flash development tool) available for Linux as a fully commercially available and supported product. It is somewhat ironic in my opinion that Adobe can join the Linux Foundation, claim to support Linux and yet not offer its flagship Flash development tool on Linux.
Comments
Alex H.
2008-05-15 15:31:35
Ok. So if we say that Microsoft Office doesn't output OOXML, we can then say OpenOffice.org doesn't support OOXML because it's only designed to work with files that come out of Office. Nice piece of logic.
I'm somewhat saddened that you continue to misrepresent what Miguel said, though. He rightly criticized the deal to use non-free video codecs in Moonlight.
It's also sad that you continue to boost Flash, which has *exactly the same* non-free codec problem as Moonlight. Actually, worse: you can leave the non-free codecs out of Moonlight and use free ones. The Adobe Flash player is entirely non-free, and there's still no open spec. for Shockwave.
Sad also that you boost Adobe AIR, which again is totally non-free. Can we even create a free version? The EULA says "Adobe has the right to impose reasonable conditions and to request a reasonable fee before providing such information." - http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/eula/air.html .
First class citizen indeed.
gggggg
2008-05-15 19:16:45
I’m not at all surprised that you continue to misrepresent what Miguel said, though. Because that is not what he said at all. But go ahead and continue to spread disinformation.
He didn't criticized anything. He, like the hypocrite that he is, tried wash out the "blame", "guilt" whatever you want to called it. Put the responsibility on others for things that he has done and continue to do.
Isn't he a Vice President? Yes, he is!
"Vice President of Developer Platform"
Of course, no responsibility at all. A pawn.
He has no right to criticize anything, because he agree with it freely.
If he didn't agree with the terms of the agreement he should have said so at that time. Not an year after. Why does continue to work there? Why does he continue to work and promote something that he disagrees?
Why does he continue to develop and promote "Moonlight" and "Silverlight" if he doesn't agree with license terms and that he views that agreement as harming Open Source?
The answer to all that? He is an hypocrite! And so you are!
That is no surprise at all!
You make me sick. You and your brothers Microsoft' puppets.
Niklas (sic!) Koswinkle
2008-05-15 19:20:48
Note: comment has been flagged for arriving from a possible incarnation of a known (eet), pseudonymous, forever-nymshifting, abusive Internet troll that posts from open proxies and relays around the world.
Niklas (sic!) Koswinkle
2008-05-15 19:21:34
^_^
Note: comment has been flagged for arriving from a possible incarnation of a known (eet), pseudonymous, forever-nymshifting, abusive Internet troll that posts from open proxies and relays around the world.
gggggg
2008-05-15 19:25:52
GET A GRIP!
Adobe, Flash and Adobe AIR are as Open as Fort Knox!
Adobe is a proprietary company, with proprietary products.
It's not a "knight in shining armor".
If you want to "defeat" Microsoft and Novell, PROMOTE OPEN SOURCE PRODUCTS. STOP WHINING!
Flash is utter crap. Silverlight/Moonlight can not be worse than that!
JavaFX is vapourware. It will not go anywhere!
The prospect of having instead of only one application eating all memory and CPU time, having several of them doing the same is wonderful.
And their "RICH UIS". Yeah, right! Adding crappy window decorations like "Windows Vista" and the new KDE4 will certainly make these things better than "sliced bread".
Again to the guy that writes this blog!
GROW THE F+++ UP! NOW!
gggggg
2008-05-15 19:30:42
"I" don't need to be taken seriously. I am not a prophet.
What I wrote is the truth. If you don't agree, provide rebuttal evidence.
I'm sorry that you don't how write "shut". You'll learn. You're on the right track already. The first step to be an hypocrite is to lie to yourself.
I wish you all the best in that journey.
Niklas (sic!) Koswinkle
2008-05-15 21:38:45
Note: comment has been flagged for arriving from a possible incarnation of a known (eet), pseudonymous, forever-nymshifting, abusive Internet troll that posts from open proxies and relays around the world.
Roy Schestowitz
2008-05-15 22:23:31
Victor Soliz
2008-05-15 23:59:15
Very nice.
Alex H.
2008-05-16 11:05:46
Miguel has no problem with the licensing terms of Moonlight; neither does anyone else.
Miguel was criticizing the deal to support non-free codecs from Microsoft for video and audio. Nothing to do with Moonlight's licensing; you don't need the codecs for Moonlight and there is a non-Microsoft free software solution also available instead.
Dan O'Brian
2008-05-16 14:02:18
</sarcasm>
Colin
2008-05-16 18:30:20