The reason why I feel Open XML is a true open standard has little to do with some guy building a PHP library for it. It is due to:
- Open XML being owned by a standards group which maintains it (ECMA)
- Open XML being fully disclosed and documented
- Having multiple implementations available

Safe to say I am not a purist, and absolutely biased (Microsoft gives me software which enables me and my customers most, I love it!)

Fact is however that he implied support by IBM for Open Office XML during his talk at DevDays.

I stand corrected on the point of him saying the specs were ‘open source’. He did not say that. I’m sorry, my bad, guess I typed too fast.
What he did say was it was that OOXML is a ‘truly open standard’ because some PHP project can work with Office 2007 XML files.
I think he’s aware that other projects that are Open Source can open and generate Office 97 documents, and this does not prove Office 97 documents to be an open standard.

Any proper XML-tool will be able to do something with any valid XML-document (including OOXML).

I wouldn’t have mentioned it here if I didn’t have the feeling he was making these two points to give his (technical) audience the feeling OOXML is an undisputed open standard that has the support of IBM, while he’s perfectly aware it’s not.

Once again, I didn’t misquote him on purpose, and I am sorry about that.

Please continue to mis-inform again.

“Beyond Microsoft, nothing else exists in his universe” I especially loved this one. Lol!

The media blitz started a long, long time ago. I can still vividly remember this unbelievable outrage. 800lb gorilla…

Now he’s a consultant specializing in how to integrate OOXML and sharepoint. Needless to say, this is perfectly in line with Microsoft agenda.

Enough said.

Nor an unbiased person ether:

http://blogs.code-counsel.net/Wouter/default.aspx

Beyond Microsoft, nothing else exists in his universe.

Last week was Burton Group childish attempt to tell the world what little they understand about OOXML, along with Brian Jones’s side-stepping the undocumented specs issue (making it impossible for anyone to formally verify Microsoft’s number one claim and stated goal that this new file format is done for backwards compatibility) by starting yet another empty and useless open source project (isn’t that the way Microsoft espouses a certain level of DeIcazafecalation of things?)

This week we have the IBM FUD, not that it’s new. I am sure we’ll have support for OOXML for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum very soon…

Microsoft Keeps Its Enemy Closer (and Away from GNU/Linux).

LUGs should be smarter than this. They should remember how Microsoft wanted to “build a bridge” with FOSS, only to start an extortion racket a few months later. This is the company that pays people money to sue Linux. It’s also the company that called a certain something a “cancer” and said that it has financial obligations, i.e. “you owe us money when you write your own code.”

http://www.slug.org.au/node/89
http://wiki.slug.org.au/microsoftquestions/faq