I'm in Kuala Lumpur this week for TechEd, and it's my first trip to Malaysia. The area near my hotel is really modern and spectacular, with lots of shops and bars and restaurants, and the Microsoft office and the convention center are both a short walk away. The photo here shows the view from in front of my hotel.
Yesterday we put on an Open XML workshop for a group of developers representing ISV and government agency perspectives. It was a very interactive all-day session, with many good questions. It's always great to brainstorm with developers about what they'd like to do with Open XML.
I have several technical posts nearly ready for the blog, but since I'm on the run this week I'll probably start posting those next week from Redmond. Meanwhile, here are a few Open XML blog posts that caught my eye today ...
Oliver Bell's latest post discusses Subhashish Gangopadhyay's view of the file-format debate around Open XML and ODF. As Oliver points, multiple standards broaden the market for outsourcing and create more niches for emerging economies. That accurately reflects the perspective I hear most often in these developer workshops I've been doing. And Subhashih, I love the use of "fox" as a verb. :-)
IBM has joined OpenOffice.org. Learn more from the press release, or for some spin check out Andy Updegrove. Given IBM's strongly stated opinions about numerous details of the Open XML specification, it will be interesting to watch how ODF addresses the same issues going forward.
Rick Jelliffe's "on error rates in the draft of standards" compares the number of comments submitted for DIS 29500 with comment counts for other large standards. He repeats the same sentiment he has shared with me in the past, that the ISO process "will continue calmly on, disappointing the bullies and the racists and the cartel-izers and the sour-grapers and the parrots, and deliver a good initial version of the standard."
Julie Watson has a slide show entitled "[Compatibility Mode] Confusion in Office 2007." It's hard to tell whether the editorial complexity and clumsiness of this document is intentional satire or not, but Rob Weir seems to have completely recovered from the grammar-police tendencies he exhibited in V1 the last few months. I agree, it's best to "ignore intuition" when you read this one.
Wouter is back from vacation, and it looks like he had a great time. Turkey will never be the same.
PingBack from http://msdnrss.thecoderblogs.com/2007/09/11/open-xml-links-for-09-11-2007/
As far as I was told IBM's move was a response to the MS fast-trackin' campaign
Beautiful picture Doug! Still waiting on those photography lessons...