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Microsoft Expands List of Formats Supported in Microsoft Office | |
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| Time: 00:25 EST/05:25 GMT | News Source: Microsoft Press Release | Posted By: Kenneth van Surksum | ||
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Microsoft Corp. is offering customers greater choice and more flexibility among document formats, as well as creating additional opportunities for developer and competitors, by expanding the range of document formats supported in its flagship Office productivity suite.
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| #1 By 3653 (65.80.181.153) at 5/22/2008 6:36:03 AM |
| So, Adobe finally came around and allowed native pdf within Office. Wasn't that the source of their lawsuit a year or so ago? |
| #2 By 28801 (65.90.202.10) at 5/22/2008 6:52:25 AM |
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"customers will be able to open, edit and save documents using ODF and save documents into the XPS and PDF fixed formats from directly within the application without having to install any other code."
Could Latch have been any more wrong? |
| #3 By 88850 (221.128.201.9) at 5/22/2008 8:14:16 AM |
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In addition, Microsoft has defined a road map for its implementation of the newly ratified International Standard ISO/IEC 29500 (Office Open XML). IS29500, which was approved by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in March, is already substantially supported in Office 2007, and the company plans to update that support in the next major version release of the Microsoft Office system, code-named “Office 14.”
WTF! Does this mean anything else to anyone else except "To output ISO-compliant OpenXML, you'll have to upgrade to Office 14?" This post was edited by tuxplorer on Thursday, May 22, 2008 at 08:16. |
| #4 By 82766 (202.154.80.82) at 5/22/2008 8:16:19 AM |
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#1 - yes that was the source of their lawsuit... go figure!
#2 - hehe... lets just say "any of those paranoid, conspiracy theory, anti-microsoft people" are proven wrong, yet again. #3 - No it doesn't... because (full) OOXML abilities will be added to Office 2007 with SP2. See ActiveWin article "Microsoft boosts support for rival formats in Office". This post was edited by MyBlueRex on Thursday, May 22, 2008 at 08:23. |
| #5 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/22/2008 8:30:01 AM |
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#2: What's that again?
#4: No, MS will not add OOXML support in Office 2007 SP2. I'm not sure how much more clear MS can say it. With Office 2007, you get MSXML. The next Office suite will have the full implementation of ISO 29500. |
| #6 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/22/2008 8:57:16 AM |
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As usual, Groklaw has nailed it:
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080522012330406 |
| #7 By 28801 (65.90.202.10) at 5/22/2008 9:08:58 AM |
| #5: You were wrong! |
| #8 By 28801 (65.90.202.10) at 5/22/2008 9:09:24 AM |
| #6: Sour grapes. |
| #9 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/22/2008 9:27:36 AM |
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#7: While I'm more than big enough to admit when I'm wrong, and have done so in these very forums, I'm at a loss as to what the heck you're talking about. What is it exactly that I'm supposedly wrong about? Please clarify; otherwise, you're wrong about me being wrong.
#8: That's the usual level of refutation that I expect from AW. |
| #10 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/22/2008 1:51:26 PM |
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<crickets>
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| #11 By 92283 (64.180.194.13) at 5/22/2008 8:43:33 PM |
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I think the key quote from the Groklaw article is this:
"However, it's not a given that everything you can do in the Office UI is savable under ODF. As you're alluding to, there are things -- SmartArt, conditional formatting, things like that -- that we have in Office and that are popular features, where there is no way to save those in ODF, currently. " ODF is so deeply flawed the world needed a better document format. |
| #12 By 3653 (65.80.181.153) at 5/23/2008 1:54:00 AM |
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Smartart is popular. Wow, sometimes a statement just smacks me in the face. I'm so out of touch with the average Office user.
EU is investigating this. LMAO. if choice = 'a' run eu.investigate elseif choice = 'b' run eu.investigate endif |
| #13 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/23/2008 8:47:23 AM |
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Another interesting article:
http://lehors.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/my-take-on-why-microsoft-finally-decided-to-support-odf/ |
| #14 By 28801 (65.90.202.10) at 5/23/2008 9:31:40 AM |
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#13: From your link:
"One trick they could try and pull for instance would be to put just enough support for ODF to claim that they support it but not enough for people to really use it systematically. They could then tell customers who complain something isn’t working that it’s because ODF isn’t powerful enough, and if they want the full power of Office they need to use OOXML." MS doesn't have to play tricks with "partial" support. Look at your previous link; ODF doesn't support many features needed in a modern office product. By the time ODF does support these features, OOXML (and more importantly MS Office) will be entrenched globally. Sadly, this will indeed signal the end of planet latch. |
| #15 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/23/2008 9:59:17 AM |
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#14: I'm still waiting for you to tell me how I was wrong in your accusation in #2 & #7.
MS doesn't have to play tricks with "partial" support. Look at your previous link; ODF doesn't support many features needed in a modern office product. By the time ODF does support these features, OOXML (and more importantly MS Office) will be entrenched globally. Many features *needed* in a modern office product?? My company has managed to operate for years & years without SmartArt and conditional formatting. Considering that it's common knowledge that people vastly under-utilize the feature set in Office, I would guess that the majority of users would be fully served by ODF. MS (and its bots) are trying to distract with fringe cases that mean nothing in the real world of most businesses. You, parkker and the others can bleat on about how much ODF sucks, but at the end of the day Office 2007 will support ODF and not OOXML. How sweet is that? MS won the ISO battle through cheating but may very well lose the war. |
| #16 By 92283 (154.5.118.37) at 5/23/2008 10:09:20 AM |
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ODF is a flawed document format. OOXML is a superior document format.
Office is superior to alternatives because it has a richer feature set and uses a superior document format. Latch prefers inferior formats and programs because he hates Microsoft. |
| #17 By 2201 (78.32.103.51) at 5/23/2008 10:17:08 AM |
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#15 actually Latch, it's been said that most people only use 10% of Word's features. However, that doesn't say that they all use the same 10% of Word's features. So yes, people do under-utilise Word, but they don't all necessarily use the same features. We can therefore reasonably conclude that every feature is useful to at least ONE person.
If ODF can't support all the features of whatever application uses it, then what is the point of it? I think we will find that the majority of people will simply stick with the status quo in that case, which is DOC files. |
| #18 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/23/2008 10:50:29 AM |
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Can someone give parkkker a kick? His needle's stuck.
#17: actually Latch, it's been said that most people only use 10% of Word's features. However, that doesn't say that they all use the same 10% of Word's features. So yes, people do under-utilise Word, but they don't all necessarily use the same features. We can therefore reasonably conclude that every feature is useful to at least ONE person. I agree, and my post did not contradict that. There will always be someone who uses the most obscure feature of any app. One size does not fit all, but it can fit most. If ODF can't support all the features of whatever application uses it, then what is the point of it? I think we will find that the majority of people will simply stick with the status quo in that case, which is DOC files. I think you have it backwards. The onus is not on the format to support every application but the other way around; the app should fully support the format to the best of its ability. Standards should not be tied to any particular application or you end up with the same vendor lock-in you were trying to escape. By your logic, Office should not support any formats other than its own since only MS formats totally encapsulate the full functionality of Office. |
| #19 By 3746 (72.12.161.38) at 5/23/2008 11:01:02 AM |
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#18
So are you expecting MS to drop features from it's programs even though Office existed before ODF. It is one thing for a standard to appear before something and expect the programs after it to stick to it. It is another to expect MS to drop features in order to fit in with a new standard. MS office is the standard office app. It is up to ODF to make sure that it's format works with all of the features that currently exits it it. Then moving forward MS could support it properly. |
| #20 By 23275 (68.186.182.236) at 5/23/2008 11:18:05 AM |
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Our customers love "Smart Art" - in fact, they love all the new ways to create very rich documents easily and quickly. We train them to use these features and show them how to leverage them and the ribbon UI. The demo we run takes only a few moments and we have them select a document that they had already produced. We then use these tools to reformat it using the new features. It takes about 10 minutes - just long enough to make them familiar with the new tools. The response has been great and people really like having the ability to dress up their business documents.
Since these may be saved as .PDF using the free plug-in for Office 2007, they can as easily share them with people who do not have native support for XPS (MSXML), or Office and soon to be OXML (with Office 2007 SP2). MS will then also support .ODF. While .ODF does not support features like Smart Art, or enhanced image effects, it will be an option for O2K7/SP2 users - people will just have to produce less compelling documents. Free XPS viewers are available for Office 2003 users and users are prompted to install them when they open an XPS formatted document. |
| #21 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/23/2008 11:34:01 AM |
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#19: So are you expecting MS to drop features from it's programs even though Office existed before ODF.
No, I never said anything of the sort. MS is free to develop Office as they see fit, barring their usual antitrust missteps. I expect MS to do the only logical thing they can do in that scenario, to warn the user that something will be stripped or approximated if they save as ODF. That's all they can do. The hope is that they won't use this as an anticompetitive weapon. Again I will reiterate that it is not the job of a standard to constantly move with applications. The standard evolves separately and it is the job of the app to support the standard, not the other way around. You'll notice that TXT, RTF, PDF etc are not updated whenever MS (or any other software vendor in the world) releases new versions of their products. |
| #22 By 28801 (65.90.202.10) at 5/23/2008 11:36:43 AM |
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#15: "My company has managed to operate for years & years without SmartArt and conditional formatting."
Stop it! Just because your trivial, little company has no use for these features doesn't mean the rest of the world doesn't. Your attempt to speak for the rest of the world only demonstrates your pomposity. I'll answer your question when you tell your company that you are connecting to their network with illegal software. |
| #23 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/23/2008 11:58:56 AM |
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#22: top it! Just because your trivial, little company has no use for these features doesn't mean the rest of the world doesn't. Your attempt to speak for the rest of the world only demonstrates your pomposity.
How is it that I'm speaking for the rest of the world when I specifically say "My company"?? And, for the record, I deal with several of our business partners and end-user customers, and none of them are using Office 2007. If your documents absolutely have to have proprietary MS Office 2007 stuff in them, use Office 2007 formats to save. It's that simple. If you're mandated to use open formats, then you will have to not include proprietary MS features in your document. I'll answer your question when you tell your company that you are connecting to their network with illegal software. That's weak and you know it. You know, you could just man-up and say something like "I misspoke" or "I misread/misunderstood you" and that would be that. Instead, you're stooping to parkkker-esque levels of silliness to avoid having to admit you were wrong. Everone makes mistakes and I won't think less of you for saying it. |
| #24 By 15406 (216.191.227.68) at 5/23/2008 1:29:23 PM |
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More analysis from Groklaw:
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080523130503456 |
| #25 By 92283 (154.5.118.37) at 5/23/2008 4:26:09 PM |
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Latch, while I appreciate a chuckle reading the Groklaw tinfoil hat brigade propaganda, I see nothing where they are arguing the superiority of ODF over ISO 29500.
All I see is a bunch of whining and hate directed at Microsoft and anyone who stood up to the Sun/IBM stooges by voting for ISO 29500. This post was edited by NotParkerToo on Friday, May 23, 2008 at 16:26. |
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