Oh, the drama of it all!

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Stuart Ballard — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 03:02:39 GMT

I'm of two minds about the OOXML standards process myself. I consider myself part of the FOSS community so I was outspoken when I defended OOXML on my blog (only to have some of my factual assertions about ODF readily disproven, and then see Microsoft bloggers like Brian Jones and Jason Matusow continue to assert the same things for months afterwards, like "ODF doesn't address spreadsheet formulas"). I wanted to take issue though with one of your points.

You say:

'There are more ways to explain these types of collaborations than "somebody must be bribing somebody."'

I couldn't agree more.

But yet EVERY Microsoft post on the issue - including yours - continues to insist that the driving force behind opposition to OOXML is IBM.

Sure, IBM has an interest in ODF, as does Sun. But I don't understand how you (Microsoft) can't have figured out by now that the Open Source community is NOT driven by corporate politics? We defeated software patents in Europe (at least temporarily) despite enormous lobbying and plenty of corruption, without ANY large companies backing us, least of all the biggest patent holder in the world, IBM.

The opposition to Microsoft and to OOXML is massive and it's grassroots. The most rabid and irrational of all influential anti-MS advocates that I'm aware of is none other than PJ of Groklaw, who on every subject OTHER than Microsoft I admire greatly. But nobody could reasonably accuse her of being an IBM flunky.

Bloggers like Jason, Brian and yourself talking about the real issues COULD help to dispel some of the animosity - after all, Microsoft bloggers have radically changed MY image of the company from overwhelmingly negative in the past few years, and I know I'm far from alone. But as long as every post carries this air of "omg it's an IBM conspiracy, they're out to get us!", you're not going to change any minds.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

dmahugh — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 03:43:51 GMT

Hi Stuart, thanks for your comments. I appreciate your distinction between the open source community and IBM, and since some of my closest friends consider themselves part of the FOSS community, I hear that perspective pretty often.

As for your suggestion that every post contains a response to IBM or a suggestion they're out to get us, I don't think that applies here. I've done 90 blog posts this year (they're all listed here: http://blogs.msdn.com/dmahugh/pages/archives.aspx) and it looks like I've covered IBM's tactics once in August, once in July, and twice in January, for 4 total on that topic, and 86 total on other Open XML topics. Yes, there has been quite a bit of coverage of IBM's tactics on the Microsoft blogs this week, but they've really ramped up their attack as the voting deadline approaches and I think that's why you're seeing this trend. (An interesting counterpoint to your point is to take a look at the IBM blogs and measure the percentage of their posts that are about Microsoft and/or Open XML.)

You say that "the opposition to Microsoft and to OOXML is massive and it's grassroots." I'm not sure why you say that, but it doesn't match my experience. Yes, there is a general anti-Microsoft bias in FOSS communities in general. Microsoft is the world's most successful software company, and I'd expect that. But I've attended some FOSS events this year, and I've not found much anti-Open XML sentiment. There is suspicion of Microsoft, and a tendency to assume the worst about us in some cases, but I've not yet met a FOSS developer who shares the intense fear and distrust of Open XML that IBM and others exude in the anti-Open XML lobbying that's been going on.

You mention Pam Jones, but with all due respect I find it hard to take seriously a secret person whose true identity is hidden (and therefore their true allegiances are a mystery). Also, I've personally had my comments on that site deleted (and eventually just gave up posting there), and I've met several other people who have had the same experience. I have a lot of respect for the straightforwardness and candor of some of the FOSS people I know, and I sure don't put "Pam Jones" in the same league, based on that person's behavior. They may not be an IBM flunky, but if not that makes it even harder for me to understand the reason for a need for so much secrecy, deception, and censorship.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

BrianJones — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 04:15:00 GMT

Hey Stuart,

I'm confused by your statements around formulas in ODF. They don't support formulas.

The current ODF spec does nothing more than to define where formulas should go, and that they should be namespaced. The is no definition of the actual grammar for the formulas though which means there is currently *zero* interoperability.

There is an Open Formula working group that is aiming to get formulas into the 1.2 release of ODF, but they aren't done yet.

I've talking with Jody Goldberg who used to work on the open formula working group and it sounds like they have made some good progress. I believe they are pretty close to wrapping things up, but I'm not positive on what the timelines are.

From the looks of their mailing list though it appears they having a hard time getting folks to participate: http://www.oasis-open.org/archives/office-formula/200706/msg00000.html

-Brian

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Ben Langhinrichs — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 07:04:28 GMT

Doug,

I've got a possibly paranoid question first, then a more serious response to your comments about grassroots support.

Here is the paranoid question: You state quite clearly what the Microsoft policies are. You make it quite clear that you believe that a Microsoft employee in Sweden on his or her own initiative and without any authorization offered to compensate partners who joined SIS and voted "Yes" to offset the cost of membership. Assuming that you believe that this was completely isolated and without authorization, and completely against Microsoft policies, how can you possibly assert that there is no smoking gun in the U.S.? You have absolutely no way of knowing. You yourself were not sure of the policy before asking, but you are certain that no other Microsoft employee in the U.S. (and there are quite a few, remember) went out on their own and made the same sort of offer. Again, how could you possibly be sure?

OK, enough paranoia. Here is the question about IBM and grassroots support. In your post above, you mention IBM twelve different times, continually referring to an "IBM mantra" and "IBM lobbyists" and "IBM has set the stage". Regardless of what you have posted elsewhere, you imply over and over that this is an IBM campaign. Now, I don't know about Pam Jones being a secret identity, but I think you will find that I, Ben Langhinrichs, an independent software vendor, have been speaking out about Office Open XML for about a year, vehemently opposing the stress on getting OOXML through at any cost, pointing out issues in OOXML before Rob Weir and others, despite the fact that I am not associated with IBM (except as the lowest level of partner, which I am with Microsoft as well - no dues or anything) and have not been solicited by IBM in any way or pressured by IBM in any way. I am a real person without a secret identity. I think you will find that Andy Updegrove, whom you reference above, is also a real person not associated with IBM. You may have read some of the inciteful and incendiary remarks from Stéphane Rodriguez, whom I fully believe to be a real person unassociated with IBM. I can continue, but I challenge you to stop repeating the Microsoft mantra, which it certainly seems to be, that IBM is behind all opposition to OOXML.

And in case it comes up, I am not a proponent of open source software or part of the free software movement or any of those things. I make commercial software, which I have sold to companies in 46 countries in the past ten years. Some of my software is aimed at IBM customers, some is aimed at Microsoft customers moving away from IBM, some is aimed at operating with both together.

I am not anti-Microsoft, but I am increasingly anti-OOXML, because it is a pain in the butt to use and is badly written and badly described, alternatively overdocumented an underdocumented, and containing many redundant and annoying artifacts of previous implementations (e.g., VML) that make a developer's life hell. Since I am not a proponent of FOSS, your experience with an anti-Microsoft bias there would be irrelevant.

So does this prove that there is a massive grassroots effort? No, but I have seen little evidence for the massive effort you suggest by IBM to alter the votes of various countries. No smoking gun memos, no rush of members joining to vote "No", no signs of vast lobbying except for the repetitive drumbeat of Microsoft proponents saying it is so. Aside from Rob Weir and Bob Sutor, and perhaps Ed Brill, can you name two IBM bloggers who have written about OOXML more than once or twice? Where is the evidence for the massive effort by IBM, and if it exists, are they so inept as to be unable to turn out the partners the way Microsoft has? I just don't see any signs of it other than reflected in Microsoft paranoia.

- Ben Langhinrichs

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Andrew — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 08:19:36 GMT

A win for OOXML is a loss for consumers as they will be forced to continue to purchase a product with no real alternatives. I also think a win for OOXML would ultimately be bad for Microsoft as the lumbering beast would continue to become complacent and inefficient.

Higher and higher prices for an inferior product... not something to fight for in my book.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Alan Bell — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 11:35:08 GMT

Most ISO standards are designed to be "good". Most people want standards to be "good". Microsoft want a standard which is "theirs" and they won't let ethics get in their way.

"immediate action to correct it" doesn't mean finding a scapegoat after you got caught.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Chris Clark — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 12:32:32 GMT

Doug,

Sweden switches Vote to Abstain

The Swedish board invalidated the OOXML vote citing a voter irregularity - someone voted twice. It's now Abstain...

As you say - drama.

Chris

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

hAl — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 12:32:56 GMT

[quote]But nobody could reasonably accuse her of being an IBM flunky.[/quote]

Strange as many people have done just that in the past. If there is any doubt about Groklaw neutrality it has always been about links to IBM.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

nest — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 15:19:44 GMT

I have a question for you: If Microsoft cares about interoperability and open standards, why doesn't it just publish the full specification of Office 97-2003 binary formats so that billions of documents around the world can be read properly by competing software?

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

hAl — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 17:11:37 GMT

@nest

You can just send an email to Microsoft and then you get the Office 97-2007 binary formats specifications. And that includes a covenant not to sue so you or anyone else can implement them !!!

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/840817/en-us#

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

dmahugh — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 17:47:54 GMT

Ben,

I agree with your point: I can't know for sure whether there's a smoking gun as Rob speculated, just as he can't know for sure whether there's a similar smoking gun that explains the last-minute appearance of Red Hat and Oracle members in V1 who were there simply to vote against Open XML and have never contributed to any of the actual technical discussions. However, I was right in the middle of the whole situation, as both a V1 member and the person who contacted some of the people who got involved in V1, so I think if there were a smoking gun, I'd be likely to know about it.

I understand that you and Stephane are not associated with IBM, and I didn't mention either one of you in the post above. But I'll be honest, Ben: I wouldn't call either of you an objective non-aligned participant in the conversation. You criticize and analyze Microsoft's actions often, but have either one of you ever criticized IBM's actions in this matter? By your own acknowledgment, IBM has at least two people working full-time to oppose Open XML and trying to influence the ISO process: do you believe that they've never misrepresented anything in those efforts?

As one of many potential examples, do you agree that Rob's post about "OOXML Fails" in the US was a fair and accurate statement of the facts, and was clearly not an effort to influence the vote in other countries? If you do agree with statements like that, I think you'll have a hard time convincing others watching this debate that you're a truly objective and non-aligned participant. And if you don't agree, then why give IBM a free pass? Why don't you hold them to the same standards of integrity and professionalism that you (rightfully) hold us to? As for your statement that there are no smoking gun memos from IBM, are you saying that their authorship of Kenya's contradiction comments was less important than the memo about the Microsoft employee in Sweden? At least we stand up straight, look people in the eye, and say "yes, that was bad judgment" when one of our people makes a mistake.

@Nest, we give the binary formats away to anyone who wants them. As part of that process you sign a license agreement that basically says you acknowledge that any file corruption you cause is your own responsibility. Surely you'd agree that Microsoft shouldn't have to support those situations. Per the conversation with Ben above, I'm curious ... do you ever ask IBM the same question about Notes's proprietary format?

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Luc Bollen — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 18:00:51 GMT

Dough, if I follow correctly your way of thinking, IBM is indeed a lot worse than Microsoft (close to 2000 times worse) : while Microsoft influenced only 20 votes in Sweden, IBM bought more than 39000 votes for the NoOOXML petition...

Just be serious. It will be of no help for Microsoft to "put oil on the fire" as we say in French. All you will get is a backfire.

Just face all the technical problems in the OOXML draft, and prepare a better version. This will be a lot better for Microsoft than their current marketing tactics.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Ben Langhinrichs — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 18:52:53 GMT

Doug, I criticize IBM fairly frequently, actually. For instance, last Wednesday, when I was fairly obnoxious about IBM's idiotic handling (or lack thereof) of nested tables, both in Notes rich text and in the new Productivity Editors, but also over the years I have criticized IBM's marketing, heavy handed tactics with customers, etc. In fact, I have criticized IBM a great deal more than I have ever criticized Microsoft. It is Open XML I don't like, not Microsoft, although your shenanigans around Open XML are starting to make me question that, and have led to a few fairly obnoxious posts recently. But those are a result of Microsoft's recent behavior, and hardly warrant a claim that I am "aligned".

As for your snide comment to Nest, do you have any idea what you are talking about? The Notes rich text format which underlies almost all Notes data, as well as all the other Notes storage formats, are documented completely in the Notes C API toolkit, which is available for free and without any particularly restrictive agreements, and has been since Notes was first released. IBM has never made any effort to hide it, and goes to a lot of effort to promote it. You could download the Notes C API toolkit today and see. Some of it is so nasty it would make your hair curl, but it is documented. Aside from that, the only other storage formats used are MIME (widely documented) and ODF in the Productivity Editors (obviously widely documented). The question appears awfully close to FUD when looked at with that information, but perhaps you don't expect people to have that information?

- Ben Langhinrichs

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

dmahugh — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 19:22:15 GMT

Didn't have that information myself, Ben -- thanks for sharing it. So it sounds like Notes wasn't a good counter-example, since that format, like BIFF, has widely available documentation. I'll not use Notes as an example again.

I still don't understand why this topic of access to binary formats comes up so often, since they're freely available. It seems we agree there's nothing there to talk about.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

quark — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 19:30:37 GMT

The war for OOXML is not about the war of MS vs IBM!

Not at all!!!

It is about the true nature of OOXML, if you don't know what I am talking about please visit http://www.nooxml.org/ and if you can contest the disadvantages of using OOXML shown there (with true facts!), than I'll believe you OOXML is a good thing for whole mankind and there is a world wide IBM conspiracy.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Ben Langhinrichs — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 20:07:01 GMT

Doug - I completely agree that there is nothing to discuss regarding the BIFF format. My understanding has always been that you could get access to them if you wanted to, and I have never wanted to because I have been neck deep in other arcane binary formats. It took a new paradigm such as the XML formats to make it worth moving into the documents arena for me personally.

And I agree that it is FUD of a sort in reverse to push Microsoft to reveal what it has always been quite willing to reveal. I wish it were even possible to stay on topic in these sorts of discussions, but human nature is what it is.

- Ben Langhinrichs

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

James — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 21:17:25 GMT

people and technical committees all around the world (not only IBM) are only despising OOXML because it completely lacks any technical merit as a standard as it currently is. I will say again, technical merit is the question. there is no worldwide conspiracy against the corporation, only a massive refusal of accepting something defective.

basically, OOXML is defective by design. see for instance http://ooxmlisdefectivebydesign.blogspot.com/ . there is no doubt about that on anyone's mind, so OOXML should not be made a standard by ISO, very simple to understand.

instead of keeping going on about pushing this defective standard, Microsoft would do much better PR and receive much better marks from the technical community if it just helped develop the already existing ODF format. If you believe ODF could be improved, instead of forcing OOXML through, just improve ODF through the correct channels at ISO, in harmony with the rest of the world. everybody will benefit, inclusive Microsoft.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

hAl — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 21:21:26 GMT

@quark

Simultanously putting 'true facts' and nooxml.org in one senctence actually made me smile.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

nest — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 02:38:33 GMT

@hAl, @dmahugh

I admit I was not aware of http://support.microsoft.com/kb/840817/en-us# .

I am about to email Microsoft and ask them for a copy of the specs for their binary documents. I am a bit worried however about what they call "initiating the agreement signup process" (wtf!?). They also ask for my company/agency name, mailing address, city, state or province, zip code or postal code, country, contact name, contact title and contact telephone number....

They really make it almost as easy as getting a PDF from a web server...

We'll see how successful my request is...

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Antoin O Lachtnain — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 21:22:44 GMT

Is there a mapping between the binary file formats and the OOXML formats? That would be very useful.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Charles Robinson — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 18:34:40 GMT

"I still don't understand why this topic of access to binary formats comes up so often, since they're freely available."

They were freely available then the SDK was either removed or access was limited. I don't remember the exact timing or specifics of that, but I do remember it causing issues for some colleagues when it happened. They are freely available now, but many people who used to use the SDK and found other workarounds aren't aware of it.

When a vendor giveth, then the vendor taketh away, very few people expect to see the vendor giveth again. :-)

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Mike Brown — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 02:20:49 GMT

@Doug

"a few months ago I asked that very question internally: can we offer to help partners cover the cost of participating in their countries' technical committees?"

Why did you feel the need to ask such as question in the first place, Doug?

Cheers,

- Mike

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

W^L+ — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 04:24:01 GMT

I have both Bob Sutor and Rob Weir on my feeds list. I don't get these repeats. It doesn't mean that edits aren't happening. It just means that the post does not repeat (on Google Reader) if or when it happens.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Rick Jelliffe — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 12:37:15 GMT

'When a vendor giveth, then the vendor taketh away, very few people expect to see the vendor giveth again. '

Which is why it is good to have a standard, so they cannot take it away if the winds of business change.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Ben Langhinrichs — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 17:11:30 GMT

Out of curiosity, does the license agreement you need to sign for the binary formats really say you can't use the information to work on a product which competes in any way with MS Office? While I understand why it might, it certainly means something very different than making it freely available.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Alan Bell — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 19:01:38 GMT

well looks like your prediction of "more scandals" is dead right. Care to elaborate on Microsoft's role in the U turn from Poland?

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

hAl — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 01:04:40 GMT

@ben

I do not see any such restrictions in the PDF with the licensing agrement that you find on that site.

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

dmahugh — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 01:18:33 GMT

@Quark, I have indeed visited nooxml.org. Looks very authoritative and professional. I loved this page, of course: http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-18198/doug-wants-drama

- Hug

@Antoin, I don't know of such a mapping. The concept has been much discussed, but I think an even more useful mapping for the future will be one between Open XML and ODF, as DIN has started organizing a group to work on: http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/fokus/fokus/presse/meldungen_fokus/2007/05/DIN-E.pdf

@Mike, I felt a need to ask because I had talked to a Microsoft partner in Europe who has Open XML development experience and was interested in joining his local technical committee, but he was concerned about whether his manager would approve of the costs involved.

@W^L+, that's interesting you don't get repeats with Google Reader. I use Bloglines, and get a repeat every time there's an edit.

@Ben, it's my understanding that we used to have some verbage like that, but it has been removed and now we license them to anyone who wants them.

@Alan, I don't know anything about Poland, so I can't elaborate. Did something scandalous happen?

re: Oh, the drama of it all!

Ben Langhinrichs — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 05:10:29 GMT

Doug - Thanks. Good to hear. I hope that that whole debate is put to rest now.

Also, Rob Weir and Bob Sutor both have blogs that report edits way too frequently. I have done tests to see if they actually changed content, and in most cases they had not. Bob Sutor's reports a change every time there is a new comment, which is a horrendous design, but has no evil intent. Rob Weir's edits seem more random, perhaps just when there is a link back, but I can't see the pattern. In any case, I have yet to catch either updating or changing any information except typos (I change those myself) or updates that are noted.

Alan - What is the scandal about Poland? Is this about the switch of committees at the last minute or something else?