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OpenDocument Plug-in for MS Office Released by Sun
July 10 2007
The Sun ODF Plug-In for MS Office has now been officially released. It enables users of Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint to read and write documents in the ISO-standard Open Document Format (ODF). It works on Windows in Office 2000, XP and 2003 and is a completely free download. http://www.sun.com/software/star/openoffice/index.xml read moreMicrosoft, patent infringements, and "sue me first"
May 19 2007
I’m sure everyone has heard about Microsoft’s patent-infringement claim against Linux and other Free and Open Source (FOSS) software, as described in Roger Parloff’s 14 May article in CNNMoney.com, Microsoft takes on the free world: “Microsoft claims that free software like Linux, which runs a big chunk of corporate America,… read moreOpenDocument Format: two years old
May 16 2007
A slightly belated “happy second birthday” to the OpenDocument Format. The OpenDocument v1.0 specification was approved as an OASIS Standard on 1 May 2005. (The OpenDocument v1.1 specification was approved as OASIS Standard on 2 February 2007.) More dates and links are available on the OASIS website and on GullFOSS. read moreGrace Hopper Scholarships for Celebration of Women in Computing
May 16 2007
This came in from the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology. The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing (GHC) conference is a program of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology (ABI) and is co-presented with the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), happening October 17-20, in Orlando, Florida. The… read morePro-OpenDocument petition in the UK
April 13 2007
This e-petition states: “We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to promote the use of Open Document Format within the UK government.” The deadline for UK citizens and residents to sign the e-petition is 19 May 2007. I had seen this mentioned in Simon Phipps’ SunMink blog and in Bob… read moreApril 13 2007
The OpenDocument Format Alliance’s April newsletter (PDF) is here, or if you’d like to read it in HTML, the OpenMalaysia blog has reproduced it. Rob Weir has published Part III of his excellent series on The Case for a Single Document Format. A comment posted to Groklaw on 6 April said, “I… read moreMarch 30 2007
On March 26, Daniel Carrera announced that the OpenDocument Fellowship now offers an ODF validation service, similar to the W3C validation service for HTML. You can use this service to verify a document’s compliance with the OpenDocument Format. read moreOpenDocument News, February-March 2007
March 30 2007
Keeping up with the rapid increase in governments embracing open standards and specifically OpenDocument is assisted greatly by the OpenDocument Fellowship’s annotated set of links relevant to decisions by government bodies around the world to adopt office software supporting the OpenDocument XML standard. The Fellowship’s news page is a good source… read moreSignificance of the responses to ISO on Microsoft's OOXML spec
February 08 2007
I recently referred to Andy Updegrove’s report on the responses. In the past few days, media reports and blog commentaries (too numerous to cite here) have speculated on the significance of the number of responses. Now, Rob Weir has blogged on an important point that many are overlooking. Here is… read moreResponses to ISO on Microsoft's OOXML spec
February 07 2007
Andy Updegrove reported on 6 February that “…an unprecedented nineteen countries have responded during the contradictions phase — most or all lodging formal contradictions with Joint Technical Committee 1 (JTC1), the ISO/IEC body that is managing the Fast Track process under which OOXML (now Ecma 476) has been submitted.” The… read moreOpenDocument v1.1 is now an OASIS standard
February 07 2007
On 1 February, Peter Korn reported: “The OASIS ballot for OpenDocument v1.1 has closed, and without a single dissenting vote, OpenDocument v1.1 has been approved as an OASIS Standard. This is another affirmation of the increasing participation of the disability community in developing technology standards… OpenDocument v1.1 is primarily the work… read morePlugins for converting between OpenDocument and Microsoft Office file formats
February 07 2007
Three plugins for converting between Microsoft Word (.DOC) and OpenDocument Text (.ODT) file formats have been announced in the last two weeks: daVinci (OpenDocument Foundation), Open XML Translator (Microsoft), and Conversion Technology Preview (Sun Microsystems). Here’s a quick summary; see also Andy Updegrove’s article And Now There are Two: Sun… read moreOpenDocument's Popularity Continues to Grow
January 29 2007
Many organizations and government bodies around the world have decided to adopt office software supporting the OASIS OpenDocument standard, and the number is growing all the time. Around 16 months ago (after the decision in Massachusetts, but before OpenDocument was approved as an ISO standard), the OpenDocument Fellowship began compiling… read moreGroklaw Team Exposes Serious Flaws in Microsoft's OOXML Specification
January 23 2007
Any doubts about the significant problems in Microsoft’s OOXML specification should be dispelled by the impressive list of objections in an article published today on Groklaw: Deadline Looms to Express Concerns about ECMA 376 Office Open XML. This follows on from an earlier Groklaw article that I mentioned on Monday. Rob… read moreRunning on ODF Inside of Microsoft Office
January 23 2007
Yesterday I wrote about the contradictions in Microsoft’s Office Open XML, and questioned whether the world needs two standards (especially when one — Microsoft’s — is so flawed). Later in the day, Sam Hiser posted two entries to the OpenDocument Foundation’s blog, about an ODF plugin for Microsoft Office. Rumors about… read more
