The fate of ODF if Open XML loses

Patrick Durusau is the project editor of ISO/IEC 26300 (the Open Document Format (ODF) specification), as well as the ODF Technical Committee Editor in OASIS . As such, he has highly respected, and relevant insights into the world of document formats and the standardisation thereof.

You would expect, as the person most technically aware of the ODF specification, that he would be an ardent opponent of Open XML. This is far from the truth, however.

Since February, he has been releasing letters calling for sanity around the FUD campaign surrounding Open XML. He has discussed issues ranging from the openness of Open XML to possible co-evolution with ODF.

He recently wrote about the impact on ODF if Open XML does not become an ISO standard, something which a lot of people had not considered previously.

He raises three very important points:

 

• OpenDocument currently lacks formula definitions for spreadsheets. (To appear in OpenDocument 1.2.) Many core financial functions in spreadsheets are undefined except for actual Excel output. That output varies by version and service pack of MS Office. What happens if OpenDocument and OpenXML reach different definitions of those functions?
• OpenDocument does not presently support legacy features of Microsoft formats. That will be easier with a formal definition of those features. Without OpenXML, OpenDocument has no authoritative definition of those legacy features. That delays OpenDocument supporting them in some future release.
• OpenDocument does not have a robust mapping to the current Microsoft format. That requires an OpenXML that has completed the standards process. If OpenXML is unclear, it must be fixed in order to create a robust mapping between the two.

The bottom line is that OpenDocument, among others, will lose if OpenXML loses.

It's interesting to be able see things at this level. He provides a view of the document format ecosystem, specifically how differing formats can affect each other, based on the needs of the industry.

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