Matusow's Blog : Open Standards

A Simplified Discussion of “Open Standards” – Welcome to the Warehouse

jasonmatusow — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 00:33:14 GMT

My last post has driven some great discussion around what an open standard means. Heck, I think I was writing about “open” issues back in March of 2005. One could almost say it has become thematic.

Given the comments from my last post, I thought it would be useful to write out the analogy that was used to help my over-ripe grapefruit of a brain to understand the basics on standards. That way we’re all talking about the same thing. Here is how a very, very, very smart lady (thanks Michele) made a complex system into a simple analogy (paraphrasing of course).

The Warehouse

Think of standards organizations like a warehouse. There is a front door, interior workspace with many tables distributed around, and a loading doc at the back. People who want to work in this warehouse walk in the front door and find the table that interests them. Some of the people walking in the door have buckets full of ideas. Those buckets get brought in and dumped on the appropriate table and the people at that table use the contents of the bucket, plus their own ideas, as the basis for a discussion that ultimately ends up in a specification…a stack of paper that describes a technology. Once the spec is ready, it gets sent to the loading doc where anyone can drive up to the loading doc, pick up the spec and drive away to go build the technology (finally resulting in some software).

In this picture, the “warehouse” is really a legal framework that protects all parties in the process. The people walking in the door who want to participate, the people bringing contributions, the parties involved with the creation of the spec, and the people coming to the loading doc who want to implement. The framework creates a trust model that encourages contribution, participation, implementation, and long-term improvement of the specification. The warehouse allows competitors to work together and to feel comfortable that they are protected from the ideas shared being used against them, enables them to work together without running afoul of anti-trust laws, and creates the mechanisms of trust that encourage the implementers to implement as they are dealt within a uniform and consistent way by the contributors.

Every warehouse is different (lots and lots of standards orgs out there), some have strict rules, some more lax. But they all (in theory) have rules and restrictions designed to foster an environment where standards work happens.

Yeah?–So What

The point I was making in my last post is that this idealized “warehouse” works best when in balance. People seem to be very wrapped up in the discussion of royalties, but they make up only a part of this discussion. The analogy I used in my last post about limitation of scope is critical to this. The same is true for defensive suspension.

To dig deeper on that point, (I’m not a lawyer), my understanding of defensive suspension is that it creates a disincentive for litigation. Which is a good thing. But it is also a mechanism where the contributor (if sued) can revoke rights to the covered IP. So that breaks the idea of “open standards” = no limitations on IP.

The warehouse will work best when it is full of people, rather than when the front door is only opened to a few people. As I said in my last post, I think Rick was right to argue for the fact that standards orgs are better off with more participation. More people around the table, more interested parties willing to put their resources toward working on interoperability. More opportunities for people to go build great solutions thus leading to those standards having greater marketplace relevance.

The “so what” here is that the structure of the warehouses we all work in matter. If you only look through the lens of implementers, the system becomes hostile to contributors. If you only look through the lens of contributors, you end up with standards that no one uses, and the implementers will find other ways to solve their problems (probably with a good deal less interoperability). Microsoft is both contributor to and implementer of hundreds and hundreds of standards. The same is true for many software firms. It is better for everyone if both sides are considered when thinking about the future of standardization.

For the past 8 years the entire software industry has been moving to the middle on the hybridization of business and development models as everyone continues to look for the…dare I say…balance…between core assets, complementary assets, services, and the advantages of community. One of the more interesting (for industry wonks like me) by-products of that process is a clash between traditional standardization models and the modern meme of collaborative development.

Balance of Contributors & Implementers: A Blog Answer to Rick Jelliffe’s Post

jasonmatusow — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 14:00:44 GMT

I love reading smart people’s blogs – and Rick is definitely among that group. I have really enjoyed reading his post, “Standards media formats and licensing: JPEG vs. MPEG” and then the associated post, “Balance of Interest.” In the first one, Rick referred to my recent post “Contribution, Collaboration, & Implementation” and has spurred me to comment further.

First let me say that I agree with Rick’s essential premise that having greater representation in standards working groups is a good thing. There is no question that vendors tend to dominate most working groups quite simply because standards are an expensive game. Between travel costs and time that equates to opportunity costs, staying engaged with a standards working group can be…well…costly. In fact there are some interesting solutions out there (if I’m not mistaken, the Australia national standards body had a fund set up from the coal industry that they manage in a neutral way for ISO participation by smaller interested parties).

If you look at many orgs, the rules are structured so that the more participants one org may send, the more votes they have. Of course, the rules may say that the individual is a member rather than their company – but who is paying their travel? their salaries? I’m not saying this in a pejorative fashion – just pointing out the reality of the environment in which many standards are created.

So – onto the point that Rick was questioning me about. He and I are using “balance” in different ways. He is speaking of balance on committees for the standards-setting process. No disagreement from me there. I’m speaking of the balance in respect to the discussion of “open standards” meaning that there should be no IP restrictions in the standard in order for it to be open. This is different.

The vast majority of ICT standards are created based upon some original contribution from a commercial entity. These submissions are done in order to lay the foundation for a standard, and that decision to contribute is based on the idea of getting some return on the contribution. The return is NOT necessarily about royalties. The return may be that a product that includes the standard as part of it will do better in the marketplace because of the broader adoption of the baseline technology as a standard. The return might be in improved interoperability of a given product or service due to the adoption of that standard. There are competitive reasons for contributions – the hope may be to displace a competitor who is using a non-standardized solution. There are many, many reasons. And yes – some seek royalties from the IP included in standards. (For Microsoft, this is very, very rarely the case. There have been a few examples, but we almost never seek royalties from IP in standards. Historically we have primarily earned our money based on packaged products.)

The balance issue I speak of stems from the idea that many in the “open standards” discussion have placed an over-emphasis on implementers of standards – particularly those who want to implement under licensing that conflicts with patent terms. Essentially the simplified argument is that because those licensing models are not compatible with patent terms, then there should be no IP protections in the standards process so those implementers can implement. That is not balance – that is imbalance.

As a society, we want contributions to standards to continue. If you make the standards environment hostile to contributors…they will contribute less. I don’t think anyone who supports the current “open standards” arguments I have suggested above would like the idea that the contributors start relying more on SIGs than formalized orgs. Probably sub-optimal.

I have no problem with the concept of royalty-free patent licensing. In fact, nor does my employer (MS). I favor the idea the the organizations themselves, and their members, have the ability to choose which model makes sense. I think that things like defensive suspension are really important. Those terms have a dampening effect on litigation in a given sphere – that is a good thing. I think that limitation of scope is reasonable. If my contribution is about a given protocol, but it turns out that same technology is also the world’s greatest aphrodisiac (going for the over-the-top example here to make a point), then my royalty-free contribution should reasonably be limited to the protocol. I may well want to keep the super love-stuff (sorry – this is a really tortured analogy) to myself, or release it as a completely proprietary invention. I fundamentally still believe that innovations are opportunities…and that is a good thing (for the inventor and for society). But the “no IP restrictions” concept of “open standards” does away with too much. Out of balance.

Two final points: 1) There is no evidence to date that a GPL product can’t implement a standard with IP restrictions. There are many, many RAND standards implemented in GPL-licensed products today. 2) I need to write more about this, but I am all for the idea of “open standards,” but to me it is all about process and participation. I like Rick’s points about balance on committees, and am actively working on methods with my team to figure out how we can facilitate brining more voices to the table in a neutral context.

Thanks for the thoughtful posts, Rick. I really enjoyed reading them.

A Macro Question About Microsoft And Standards - Oh Yeah - And Is Microsoft Really Committed to Open XML?

jasonmatusow — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 04:35:29 GMT

A colleague of mine, Stuart McKee, sat on a panel recently during a Red Hat event. His comments have drawn some attention, and now some FUD that I really feel needs to be addressed.

First of all, you can see the coverage here, here, here, and here. But the one I most want to comment is this one from ZDNet in the UK.

This really is the case of a tempest in a tea pot that has boiled out into the general discussion. Stuart is a great guy, very bright, and was on a panel that was demanding. Okay, no big deal. However the inaccuracies came about, either through misconstrued comments and/or simply misspeaking on something, they are none-the-less inaccurate.

The first set of stories focused on whether or not MS is still committed to Open XML. It is - it will be - and we have never said anything different from that. Check out Gray Knowlton's blog as he is in the product team, and the group, that is working on this exact issue. We have always advocated choice in the marketplace, and yes - recently we announced that we would support ODF in Office. That does not mean we are stepping away from Open XML in the least. In fact, it is more of a statement of a deeper commitment to XML-based document formats...but that is a discussion for a different day. I'll leave the rest of this discussion to Gray.

The bigger issues come from the ZDNet article. Has Microsoft been working on standards before Open XML? Has the company done work on standards in the past? Will we work on more standards in the future? The answers are yes, yes, and yes.

Every big software producer works on standards as they relate to the products they are producing. There are essentially three scenarios on a given product. First, to implement a standard. Second, to work on a specification that is in process of becoming a standard. Third, to contribute a technology specification to a standards body so that it may become a standard. Microsoft has been doing all three of these across THOUSANDS of standards for decades.

More than eight years ago, a corporate standards organization was formed in the company to help product teams be better participants in standards orgs, to make more strategic decisions about what and where to contribute specifications, and how to deal with the legal issues surrounding standards bodies (there is an entire specialization in the legal field for this kind of work believe it or not).

Currently, the standards organization at Microsoft has more than 25 full-time employees in it and is focused not only on standards, but how the company thinks about interoperability and standards as a whole. What's more, because we are active in more than 150 standards orgs at any one time, and more than 400 overall - we have more than 600 product team and field employees who have been internally certified for standards work (and most of them are active in some committee or other). Our products have supported literally more than 10,000 standards and we have contributed specifications in the areas of development languages, runtimes, networking protocols, systems management, hardware, mobility, document formats, security,...the list goes on.

Anyone close to the industry knows that Sun, Apple, Microsoft, IBM, SAP, Adobe...any of the big players have people sitting in dozens to hundreds of standards organizations at any time. Companies in the hardware space like Toshiba, Sony, Intel, Samsung, Nokia, Phillips, Siemens...they have even greater standards engagement. There is a reason they are known as industry standards...it is because industry is the major factor in behind the investment of engineering resources to work on these issues. There is often close communication/collaboration with academia on standards-setting as well, but the big money and people investments are from industry.

I think it is very important that we take a step back from the self-perpetuating cycle of reporters and bloggers quoting each other to really think through what is being said. There are big differences in opinions about the role of standards, about the future of certain technologies, about the balance between IP protection and "openness," about the types of technologies that should be contributed...and more...but to work under the assumption that Microsoft (or any other big software company) is not committed to long-term investment in standardization is simply incorrect.

Open XML, ODF, PDF, and XPS in Office

jasonmatusow — Wed, 21 May 2008 22:04:00 GMT

Clearly the Press Announcement today from Microsoft will bring about another wave of discourse on the future of document formats. The really short version of this announcement is that Office is going to support ODF, PDF, and XPS in the product directly and Microsoft engineers are going to join the OASIS working group on ODF, participate in the future of PDF in AIIM, stay active in the Ecma working group for XPS, and of course, remain active in JTC 1 SC34 where Open XML (and hopefully ODF) will be maintained over time. Also, when released, Office 14 will update the already substantial support for IS29500 in Office 2007.

While this is a big deal announcement for the Office product team (check out Doug Mahugh's blog), my take on it is predictably focused on the longer-term interoperability factors. Each aspect of the actions being taken by Microsoft fit into a very logical progression.

For years, I have vocally disagreed with the notion of a single document format as being the answer – the oft quoted Highlander line, “there can be only one.” My reason for this is very simple – document formats are representative of the innovation in the applications that use them. If you mandate a single document format – or even worse, a single version of a document format – you are effectively saying that you want to constrain application innovation to the limitations of a given format. I think this is bad news for consumers and producers of technology alike.

There is a continuum of thought related to interoperability reaching back many years based on the growth of Microsoft’s enterprise business, all of which has been affected by the regulatory activity in the U.S. and Europe. This is overlaying the real-world issues customers face as the world continues to progress toward network ubiquity and the desire to exchange an ever-increasing range of data electronically. In particular, governments are pressing hard to realize eGOV scenarios where they are seeking to effectively connect just about every type of information processing technology ever created. Thus, we end up in an ongoing conversation about interoperability.

There are some points to keep in mind when considering the news about the expanded set of document formats in Office.

This is not about any one document format “winning” – it is about enabling customers to evaluate and use document formats that make the most sense for them. Just as the MS deal with JBOSS didn’t mean we were saying that J2 was better than .NET – it is that we want our customers to have the most positive experience possible when using our product.
Nothing in this announcement removes existing commitments regarding document formats. Microsoft will continue to support the open source translator projects. Why? Because we started them in good faith with customers looking to use that mechanism to achieve interop, because other developers are picking up the platform agnostic projects and implementing them, because the collaborative development in the OSS projects has been educational for people on all sides of the interop issue. (Witness the work of DIN – the German national standards body – and their move to have those translation technologies become ongoing work in JTC 1 SC 34 WG6).
The Data Portability aspects to the Interop Principles will continue to move forward. For example, the API that will allow ANY document format to register itself with Office and be set as the default will be made available as planned. Additionally, the work with DAISY and other specialized document formats will move forward as well.
The documentation of client/server protocols for Office-related technologies (such as SharePoint and Exchange/Outlook communications) will remain available to the public.
Microsoft will continue to listen to customers about specifications’ version numbers and look at the practical nature of software implementation as we make decisions about what to implement. Office is NOT implementing ODF 1.0 from ISO. That spec is not representative of the marketplace today, it is not what is implemented in OpenOffice, it is not what IBM is using for Symphony, and it is not referenced in the Massachusetts ETRM policy. We are looking carefully at the business, customers, marketplace and competitive issues for each of the specifications and the MS implementation work will depend on those considerations.
Participating with quality engineering capacity in Open XML, ODF, PDF, and XPS working groups will pay dividends for our customers over time. I know that the skeptics are going to spin theories about MS participation in these groups – but the reality is that we want the specs to continue to improve over time and facilitate interop so that our customers are happy with the value they receive from our solutions. Clearly product competition is always a factor in this discussion, but that is the exact reason standards bodies exist – so all parties (even direct competitors) have a neutral forum in which to work on specifications.

The next 12 to 24 months are going to be extremely telling in the world of document formats. The myopia around the standardization process of Open XML will fade as software producers continue to invest their development budgets in the creation of solutions. The specification itself is only the start; it is the implementations, and the competition in the marketplace of broader solutions that will continue to matter more. In my opinion, the continued interest in innovation presented by those solutions will speak much louder than the formats themselves.

Participation in standards...

jasonmatusow — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 10:18:25 GMT

Just a quick note today. I am on the road meeting with MS people and later this week doing a bunch of external outreach work in South Africa as well. During the last few months there has been a good deal of rumblings about participation in committees, about countries moving from o- to p- status, etc. The more I ruminate on this, the more I think people are missing the point.

Standards are supposed to be inclusive rather than exclusive in nature. The increase in participation during the past 12-18 months is positive overall. Even more so that some countries with emerging economies chose to elevate their status in either SC 34 or JTC 1.

I've been spending some time talking to folks in some of these countries and have found examples of places where the political decision to move to p-membership was to amplify a yes vote and elsewhere to amplify a no vote. While certainly within the constructs of the rules, my personal take is that is not a great reason for the elevation of status.

But, in every other case I've looked into, the governments are genuinely looking to increase the footprint of ICT work in their countries. They are looking for opportunities to be more involved in the international ICT discussion. I think that is extremely encouraging.

As many people continue to ruminate on the state of standards following the adoption of Open XML, this topic should take a prominent position. The fact that so many people had opinions on the standard, and were willing to participate to even the most minor level (letters sent in, vs. attending meetings etc.) all the way up through attending committee meetings and traveling to the BRM etc. had a real impact on the process.

Many of the most developed nations' national standards bodies have dedicated at least some resource to capacity building for emerging countries. Furthermore, finding a way to address the idea that international standards take such heavy financial and people resources has merit as well. For example, I found out that in Australia the coal industry uses a blind trust mechanism from industry to enable participants to work on ISO standards - even if they are from smaller firms or academia where travel budgets can be very hard to come by.

Food for thought for sure.

IP, RAND, Standards, OSP, ISP - the conversation continues...

jasonmatusow — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 06:14:00 GMT

There have been numerous comments to my last blog posting, as well as a long response from Groklaw. Overall I am encouraged by the conversation as a whole because I think it is touching on some foundational issues.

One of the most challenging aspects to the threads I've been reading in the responses to my post (and I see this in the Groklaw post as well) is that many issues are getting squashed together - and that is the very basis of misunderstanding these issues. One more thing, there are a few people who put some really excellent stuff in the comments to my last blog post, and I recommend them as reading. Andy Updegrove’s comment is probably the most thoughtful and thought provoking of the lot.

I’m going to try to pull out some of the most commonly touched on points and themes. This is long...sorry.

Standards and business models

At the core of the discussion both on this blog and over at Groklaw is the question of how evolving business and licensing models blend with the existing standards world. The fact that Free Software as a concept has been around since the mid-late ‘80s (if I remember correctly) is not particularly germane. It was really only following the massive commercial investments of the early 2000s that we see the growth of some very fundamental issues in software business models. (I know there was significant dev work happening in the 1990s – but this is a meta point about the industry.) The hockey stick effect of OSS adoption and real business momentum has brought about the discussions about RAND, GPL, covenants not to sue, etc.

You will get no argument from me on the point that the adoption of FLOSS in big business and small are changing the face of the software industry. But by the same rational point of view, the growth of the overall software industry continued to be fantastic during that same period of time. My concern has always been with people who argue that because the Free Software approach is predicated on certain beliefs, and that it is being used, that everyone should have the same beliefs. I think it is ultimately unhealthy for the industry for everything to shift to a single approach – we are all better off with choice of business models, choice of licensing models, and choice of solutions to acquire for addressing business needs.

(Caution – major simplification here) Standards bodies are meant to be the place where all parties come together in an environment that is safe and beneficial for all participants. And where even those who were not involved in the process, may utilize the output from the process in a safe and beneficial way. Additionally, it is in all parties’ best interests to see sustained contribution of innovations into the various standards orgs (no matter what model they were developed under). Moreover, it has been considered highly desirable to have both standards and solutions compete in the marketplace which pushes innovation and opportunity even further.

So in the discussion of RAND and GPL and even in the case of Open XML and the OSP – I think it is worth considering how it is that GPL implementations may be done. But I disagree if the argument is that they should be done regardless of any consequences to those who do not share the same model. There are ways of building bridges between models – to me, that is the most important place to start.

Free Software Licensing and RAND

I do not want to belabor this point. Groklaw pointed out, as have many others, that Free Software licensing conflicts with RAND. Not just on royalty terms, but on sub-licensing and limitation of scope as well. This is not the end of the world, nor is it a show-stopper (obviously – Unicode, for example, is shipped in Linux I believe). So the question then becomes how do software producers who have an interest in seeing their technologies broadly adopted (even in Free Software implementations) find ways to bridge the gap. Of course, it would be good to see the Free Software community seek to meet in the middle with all parties – consensus helps (IMHO).

ISO and RAND vs. Terms From Vendors

Throughout the comments people are still saying that the JTC 1 RANDz declaration for Open XML is somehow different than other JTC 1 RANDz declarations. It is not. The same rules apply to all specifications – uniformly. ODF and PDF and others are under the same terms. The assertion that Microsoft could somehow “wield” the JTC 1 declaration in a means different from any other contributor to an ISO spec is false. What’s more, the Open Specification Promise goes significantly further than the JTC 1 RANDz declaration and was created to enable the full spectrum of implementations. (Notice Gnumeric has included Open XML support even though it is GPL licensed.)

Vendor Promises – OSP/ISP/CNS

The vendors who are making promises, or covenants, on their IP separate from the terms directly associated with the specification are doing so to build the bridge I spoke of earlier between the traditional IP-holder structures and the Free Software model. We can (and probably should) debate the merits and drawbacks of each of these, but you should first take a step back and recognize that these promises are a positive step in the direction of enabling the highly divergent licensing models to coexist. It is also important to note that while a few of the big players have taken this step (logical because they are the ones holding more patents or who have more directly involved product interests), it is not common practice in the software industry. There are thousands of rights holders who participate in standards, whose contributions merit great respect, and who wish to maintain control of their intellectual property. For smaller software vendors whose business model is dependent upon the direct commercialization of their software, a mandate to exhaust their patent(s) (forget royalties – there are other issues worth considering here) will act as a disincentive for contribution.

Is the OSP from Microsoft global?

I saw this questioned a bunch of times so I think it is worth clarifying. The OSP is a global promise – to everyone, in every country, and in every line of business or personal interest. People are confusing whether or not there is legal recognition of software patents with the reach of something like the OSP. Those are different concepts and worth separating in your thinking.

Should standards orgs change their policies to accommodate free software?

This is a decision that each and every one of the hundreds of standards organizations who handle software standardization will need to consider. There is absolutely nothing inherently bad about working with it or not – it is a choice based upon the charter and membership of that organization.

In many ways, my answer there is a punt, but it is true. My opinion is that effective bridges need to be found, and done in such a way that things remain fair for all parties. Companies that sell software directly must clear their product for patent royalties and other IP considerations before selling it into the marketplace. The standards bodies have IP policies so that their output too is copasetic in regards to IP before people begin to use the specifications (thus the concern about trolls). There is no reason that orgs commercializing Free Software should not respect other’s IP as well.

I think an interesting way to consider this is to take a logical extreme of the argument – what if every standards body mandated Free Software-compliant (not MPL, not EPL, not MsPL...only GPL) licensing terms. What would happen? Some might say we would be one step closer to nirvana as a race. Some might choose to drop completely out of the standards game and seek individual licensing agreements and/or cross-payments etc. to bring their product to market with interop features. Certainly there would be those who would be forced to fracture their product (again, good/bad...all depends) and ship some components separate from others to stay compliant with the source license. Others might pursue a whole raft of SIGs (special interest groups) that are exclusionary and outside of the standards world. Still others...I could go on. To me, that is not a good outcome. I think we are in a better state if standard bodies continue to serve their purpose and be a place with highly competitive parties can come to the table to collaborate on specifications even if they have diametrically opposed business/licensing models. Ultimately, the marketplace will speak louder than licensing mandates.

Should there be multiple licensing schemes?

This is an extrapolation on my part from what I’ve been reading in the comments of my last blog. I’ll first say that it is a moot question because there are and will be multiple licensing schemes. How many OSI licenses are there? And why is that? Because IP holders all have strong opinions about how their IP should be handled. Secondly, I am always a fan of choice...and am nervous when zealotry begins to suggest that any alternate choice is heresy. This leads to a very scary place.

Conflict of reciprocal licenses – was I speaking correctly?

I spoke of the fact that Linux ships with code that has conflicting licensing agreements. And many people asked me to “prove” it. I’ll let you all tell me if I’m nuts. All reciprocal licenses by definition conflict with each other. The GPL claims to cover the “aggregate” product, the CPL/EPL the “component,” and the MPL the “file.” In all cases though, if there are conflicting terms they all say you can’t distribute. So – is there any mingling of GPL, MPL, EPL code in Linux? How about the rest of the licenses purported to conflict with the GPL?

By the way, this is also true for the point that I made about RAND terms on code shipped with Linux today – how about Unicode for example? Last I check, IEEE 1394 Firewire was similarly licensed. There are literally THOUSANDS of RAND-covered specs out there used commonly in operating systems throughout the industry.

Now, on to the leap of faith on the part of my critics – I did not raise this point to spread FUD about Linux. Why can I say that? Because this point has been raised in public events in the past...and it continues to not matter. So my point is something else entirely.

Legal snags like the ones I mentioned only matter if someone presses it in a court case. No one can say if these issues will ever become an issue but that has never stopped a single person from using Linux. So, when people then say that the MS OSP, or IBM’s ISP, or RAND terms, or whatever means that Free Software developers can’t develop something, I find it hard to take seriously when the intent, and all of the materials surrounding these actions speak of building bridges and enabling...not shutting down or threatening. Those same developers are willing to take those exact same issues as no concern on one hand and then scream foul on the other. It’s worth thinking about a bit.

Ending this long post...

Too much here already – thanks again folks for the good comments. We are at an inflection point in the industry...and that is exciting to be a part of. If you are going to comment – let’s shy away from the zealotry, and stay focused on lucid arguments.

More Open XML Discussion - more misunderstandings about standards and IP

jasonmatusow — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 08:28:58 GMT

There is much to talk about based on what has been happening in the discussion of Open XML these days. First, ISO has posted a FAQ about 29500. The approach taken in the FAQ is both direct and simplified. The rabbit hole on standards goes deep indeed, and any such FAQ must simplify to make it digestible for the layman reader.

An example of someone misunderstanding standards and IP issues would be Groklaw in this post. The post displays many of the misunderstandings about IP in standards that I see echoed around the blogosphere.

I will say that the author of the Groklaw post got it right when they wrote that, "Patents and Linux and FOSS don't mix." But the author jumps off the tracks completely when the observation is followed up with, "So RAND terms in Microsoft's hands are discriminatory."

I think it is important that anyone offing an opinion on the OSP should first ask him or herself a question: do I really understand IP licensing in the world of standards? I'd suggest that the author the Groklaw post didn't ask this question up front and would benefit from some boning up - it would help get the story straight.

Here are some things I think may be helpful in this discussion. By the way, my answer to the question I just posed in the previous paragraph is, "sort of."

1) RAND (reasonable and non-discriminatory) did not originate with software. It is a commonly used acronym but has different meanings in different standards bodies. It has many parts - more than just patent rights, more than royalty terms...my understanding is that it is a framework designed to provide both incentive for contribution and implementation. The reason I agree with the statement about patents and Free Software not mixing is that there have been terms written into GPL licenses that explicitly conflict with software patents. Okay, that is the choice of the authors and users of those licenses. But the fact that those licenses were written does not mean that the RAND terms that have evolved over the past century of standardization are suddenly invalid.

2) The ISO/IEC JTC 1 patent policy is applied uniformly to all standards in the ISO/IEC JTC 1 arena. The idea that the RAND declaration regarding Open XML is any different than a RAND declaration for ODF or for any other ISO Standard (such as...oh I don't know...how about PDF just for fun. Remember the huge list of patents that Adobe used to put on the welcome screen of the Acrobat reader alone?). The terms provided for the Microsoft patents in Open XML are legally irrevocable. They are global. Since they are broader than the RAND declaration for JTC 1, the attempt at FUD by the Groklaw post should be recognized for what it is...FUD.

3) The various covenants not to sue or similar promises from a few (mind you, this is hardly common practice in the software industry today) of the big vendors are all born of the same desire - to help bridge the gap between Free Software and software patents used in specifications. Forget the philosophical and ontological debates about software patenting for a moment and just deal with the fact that the law in a number of countries recognizes software patents as valid IP today. And, judging by the continued pace of patent filings, it would seem that more than a few people out there are seeking to use software patents as a legitimate means for protecting their innovations. Heck, even some of the long-time Free Software advocates are looking at the positive implications of patenting software as a means to encourage greater innovation. Yet all of these bridges run into some snag or another on various points. So the question that comes to mind is how important are those snags?

Before you get your hair in a knot over this, consider for a moment that all Linux distributions come with code licensed under reciprocal licenses that conflict and (in theory) should block the distribution of the software. Oops, no one seems to care about that snag. Okay, Linux also ships with code that implements standards specifications covered by RAND terms from many parts of the industry that should block the distribution of the software. Oops, no one seems to care about that snag either. Hmmm - I'm wondering if those complaining about the OSP understand the nature of IP terms in standards to begin with, since they don't seem to mind these other, potentially more-serious issues.

4) Many of the terms included in standards IP licensing are there for a rainy day vs. for any practical use. In many cases, IP holders will provide RAND terms that include royalty terms yet never, ever collect a penny in royalties. Why, you might ask? Those terms are there as a defensive mechanism. This is true for the entire concept of defensive suspension and to a large degree the concepts around limitation of scope as well.

5) The concept of "discrimination" in the standards world of RAND is another one where you really need a lawyer to talk you through what it means and/or doesn't mean. I am not a lawyer, but to my understanding it has a great deal more to do with the uniformity of your application of terms to like parties than it has to do with any one party being able to take those terms or not. If there are lawyers reading this thread I'd love the input. Everyone should have the choice of what license they use - but there may be implications for the use of those particular terms as they will interact with the rest of the world.

Concluding this too-long blog post...

As you can see, looking at the real issues on the table about IP and standards is a good thing to do. I am on board with the idea that the established world of IP in standards needs to be looked at carefully in context with the amount of work happening under the concepts of reciprocal licenses. It would be helpful if folks who speak with a loud voice also seek to do so in an educated fashion.

I am a serious proponent of participation in the process - but that needs to be for all parties, large and small alike. But that means keeping an open mind while you are also advocating open standards.

Open XML - SC34 Maintenance Agreement

jasonmatusow — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:33:40 GMT

Throughout the months leading up to the BRM and then following it, there was discussion over the future maintenance of the specification. Rather than recapitulate the results of the last SC 34 meeting, let me just point you to Alex Brown's blog. For those of you who were not following all of the players so closely - Alex was the convener of the ballot resolution meeting.

I still hear patently untrue claims that MS controls Open XML - this wasn't true following the adoption of Ecma 376, and is now permanently a moot argument. Alex's blog title says it all:

ISO COMMITTEE TAKES FULL CONTROL OF OOXML

Does anyone know if the commercial interests in control of ODF would be willing to take the same step?

Texas Legislature - Electronic Documents Hearing

jasonmatusow — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 08:29:58 GMT

On Wednesday April 9, the Texas House of Representatives Government Reform Committee will be hearing testimony regarding electronic documents.

The notice for the hearing states that the committee is looking to hear about:

Research, investigate, and make recommendations on how electronic documents can be created, maintained, exchanged, and preserved by the state in a manner that encourages appropriate government control, access, choice, interoperability, and vendor neutrality. The committee shall consider, but not be limited to, public access to information, expected storage life of electronic documents, costs of implementation, and savings.

Following last year's multi-state lobbying campaign to enact hard procurement preferences through legislation of mandates for ODF, I am expecting that the same tune will be sung by IBM, Sun, Red Hat, and Google. If they choose to go down the same path of advocating a single format (ODF) rather than taking the time to listen to their customers, it will be a reminder of their single-minded drive to use document formats as a competitive wedge for their products rather than for meeting their customers' needs.

In every single state where there was a hard preference discussion, governments opted to look for first principles appropriate for codification in statute rather than using their legislative powers as a means to pick winners in the marketplace. MA, TX, MN, CT, CA, OR...and not just in the US. This was true all over the world.

First Principles:

The most basic frame for the discussion of electronic documents is simply that all states are seeking to accomplish the provision of services through the use of technology while obtaining the greatest value for money. Within that context the State wants to address the needs of communication with constituents, transacting government business, implementing effective archival policies…all based on the efficient use of resources (people & dollars).

A) Within the context of document formats, constituents want to communicate with the State using many formats – older binary formats, newer XML-based formats, non-modifiable formats, web formats, specialized industry formats (e.g. insurance, healthcare, financial services, etc.), etc. etc. The State will not mandate what products or formats their citizens use.

The best option for the State is to apply a first principles approach that focuses on the top-level goals while leaving maximum room for innovation and competition. For document formats, this would mean establishing statute that says any procured solution must provide effective support of document formats that enable communication with constituents. The State does this today by making information available and receiving information in PDF, DOC, HTML, ODF, Open XML, etc. etc. – any advocacy for going to a single format preference seems to counter the first principle for communications.

B) Transacting government business is based upon applications…not document formats. The apps are the tools used to solve business problems such as the production of complex documents, the manipulation and calculation of information in those documents, etc. This is the crux of business competition from the vendors represented in the hearings on Wednesday. The State should desire greater competition among the vendors to drive innovation and value in the solutions available to them. In fact, this is the exact argument that IBM, Sun, Adobe and others are suggesting - but their approach is flawed when they seek to accomplish this by limiting choice rather than promoting it. (Check out Enderle's post - good points by him on this front.)

If the State were to legislate a single format, they are effectively creating an innovation dead zone by limiting the features / functionality of the applications to the capabilities of a single format. Would IBM and Sun suggest that no state support DAISY? Or the National Library of Medicine formats for research papers? Or PDF for posting of public document for public viewing? ODF (using the generic here on purpose) itself has already progressed beyond the 1.0 ISO version because of the need for the format to represent the innovations in the products that use it. The State of Massachusetts looked carefully at this issue and decided the best path was to set policy at the first principles level and focus on open standards, not on picking one standard over another. This leaves the CIO(s) of the State open to make choices based on value, functionality, and whether or not the products purchased meet the first principles rather than meeting an arbitrary technology mandate.

C) Archival continues to be a critical discussion for governments. If there is any place where first principles are crucial - this is it. The first principle for the State should be one of saying that any solution chosen for office automation technology should provide support of the State’s archival policies and procedures (already defined elsewhere). This includes preservation, access of the data independent of any application, translate-ability of the data from the original format into another, scheduled destruction of the data based on statute, the ability to set custom schema within the context of open standard specification, etc. Then, the CIO's office should be evaluating all solutions against these principles and making the best value for money decision to achieve the stated goals. If done properly, this is an example of using first principles in statute to enable the maximum amount of competition and choice between solutions.

Interoperability:

The last thing I want to point out is that the committee hearing is really about interoperability - JUST LIKE Massachusetts ultimately focused on in their ETRM policy. The marketplace reality is one of multiple document formats. So the question is about translation, it is about building a bridge between formats. It is about dealing not only with the different formats, but about the multiple implementations of the different formats.

If I were in the hearings, I would inform the committee of the work that DIN (the German national standards body) kicked off with the Fraunhofer Institute and their SC 34 mirror. If I am not mistaken, this is also part of the SC 34 committee meeting discussion in Oslo where they are thinking about interop between Open XML and ODF as well. At the international standards level, the issue of interoperability is being pursued. Moreover, there are now hundreds of implementations of Open XML, there are similarly numerous implementations of ODF, PDF (at least in output) is supported broadly...so interop is really the name of the game.

Many of the states who were considering mandates last legislative session ultimately decided to kick off study projects to further consider this issue. I do hope that these studies take a long-look at what really matters, where the value is, and how interoperability will work in a multi-format world. The single format argument is a red herring argument.

van den Beld Post & Participation - Open XML continued

jasonmatusow — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 21:09:00 GMT

The complaints keep rolling in on Groklaw about the outcome from Open XML. ***UPDATE #2: I went out to dinner and have been thinking a great deal about this. I do hold an opinion on this, but I think it is reasonable that people who read my blog expect me to be careful with my assertions. For that reason, I retract this statement.***~~Strange that a website setup by IBM to fight a proxy war during the SCO case would be so focused on the Open XML discussion today. But that is for another day.~~ ***UPDATE: Concern has been raised in the comments of this blog about my assertion of Groklaw and its contents. My assertion in the preeceeding paragraph is my opinion - take it or leave it a face value please.***

It may be that the disagreement of opinions following the approval of Open XML has exceeded what was happening during the process. The one thing that I have noticed from the anti-Open XML camp is a myopia when it comes to facts. It's amazing to me the capacity to put up blinders to facts that skew the picture away from their world view. ***Update. In thinking about this paragraph I think it is worth noting that Microsoft (as with any organization) should take to heart concerns raised about Open XML so that our engagement in international standardization work continuously improves.***

In light of those blinders, it is worth your time to look at a blog post from Jan van den Beld. It is an educational post. If you don't know who he is, he was Secretary General of Ecma for many years and a long-time participant in ISO/IEC business. In fact, he was there at the start of JTC 1 and has been such a good participant that the latest version of the JTC 1 directives are dedicated to him personally.

Participation:

This brings me to my thought of the day. One of the most often raised accusations of the community who was in favor of Open XML was that they were "stuffing committees." There are a number of things that come to mind when I read these accusations.

Participation is a good thing - it is a very positive word and concept. Furthermore, it is an important part of the standards world.

Yet in the case of Open XML, it seems that participation by those in favor of Open XML only happened through pernicious activities and breeched ethics - while participation against Open XML was purity and light personified. I just don't get that.

In Norway when IBM and Google join the committee 2 days before the final vote...or when IBM brings a subsidiary company to the table with them in Italy effectively giving one company 2 votes...or when Oracle and Red Hat join the US V1 committee just before it votes....that is participation, right? I actually believe that to be true. It is no different than Microsoft or its business partners coming to the table to have their voices be heard in the process. As long as the participation is within the context of the rules for a given NB, then it is legitimate participation.

It would be nice if people would get off their high-horses on this particular issue, because the only position ANYONE should be taking is one in favor of participation. I would certainly be surprised to hear that anyone thinks participation should only be limited to those who agree with you. That would be an indefensible position to take.

IS29500 - Open XML Is An International Standard

jasonmatusow — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 18:52:00 GMT

ISO has distributed the results of the Open XML vote to national bodies (**UPDATED) resulting in leaked information - but now confirmed by ISO in a press release. DIS 29500 has become IS 29500. In regular person speak – Open XML was adopted as an international standard by ISO/IEC JTC 1.

This standard has received more technical and political attention than any specification in the history of the ICT industry. Genuine industry competition around office productivity applications fed a heated exchange of technical considerations and philosophical positions regarding standardization, intellectual property, and most certainly document format technology. In the end, all of this – from the most ardent critics to the dedicated supporters of the specification – contributed to the improvement of the Open XML specification which ultimately led to its adoption as an ISO standard.

DIS 29500 failed to pass the Sept. 2 ballot by missing the super majority requirements. The fact that the ballot resolution process – conducted intensively over a seven-month period - produced such strong technical work and quality engineering engagement resulted in many of the “no” votes changing to “yes” as contemplated by the JTC 1 Directives. This happened because these national bodies considered the substantive changes to the specification and felt that their concerns had been sufficiently addressed -- leading to the position that the specification should be adopted as an International Standard.

The spec is genuinely better today than when it started. The Ecma 376 version is already broadly implemented across multiple platforms. Now the work continues in SC34 on maintenance and with product teams throughout the industry as they make use of the new standard.

*******

Given the focus on this topic throughout the industry, I’m going to take the time to put down some extended thoughts about the standard and where we are today. (Caution – long post) I think it is worth discussion some of the macro factors that surround Open XML.

1. It is imperative that you own your data – and control its future. Within this context, XML-based document formats are good for society at large. The promise of the W3C specification that gave us XML in the 1990’s is now being realized in a myriad of ways -- through new protocols, new document formats, and new capabilities of applications. The innovation made possible by this technology – XML – is changing the very face of the industry (of course coupled with the advancement of processing capacity, and core infrastructure such as the continued spread of network ubiquity etc.) and the extent to which users are gaining greater control of their data.

2. Those who create applications need to invest in building the bridges that enable the effective exchange of data. This is a significant statement, and one that I could write a many thousand word essay on to explain. Suffice it to say that this is a critical aspect of what Microsoft has been and will be doing on interoperability. Every vendor needs to think across the full spectrum of the products they build, the work they do with the broader community, the access they give to their IPR, and the work they do with standards to achieve this goal.

3. Hundreds of organizations were involved in the JTC 1 process. Like most software standards, Open XML was a contributed specification. While the original smaller specification came from a single organization (Microsoft in this case), the specification was improved through the input of more than 20 organizations in Ecma TC 45 originally (including key users and competitors), and then from hundreds of parties through the JTC 1 process. I am greatly encouraged by the participation by all parties (for and against) as the process resulted in a better specification. As I stated before, significant industry competition factors around applications created a highly contentious environment, but out of that came an improved specification that is meticulously documented and gives independent implementers what they need to be successful.

4. Governments requested that Open XML be standardized. More than 2 years ago governments requested that Microsoft standardize the default format of Microsoft Office. Since the late 1990s Microsoft had been working to move away from binary formats to an XML format. That engineering effort culminated with the move to Open XML as the default format for Office 2007 and the contribution of that specification to Ecma. That has all resulted by responding to this request from governments.

5. Open XML is creating new opportunities throughout the industry. Open XML has opened the door for partners of Microsoft, customers, and competitors alike to create innovative solutions and to tap into the marketplace opportunity of Microsoft Office customers. We are already seeing applications in the healthcare, mortgage lending, manufacturing, eGovernment, insurance, document management, mobile devices, and many more segments that are taking advantage of Open XML. While some of these implementations are in association with Microsoft Office, many more are completely independent of it. I hope to see an explosion of innovation surrounding this format as it will benefit all parties.

6. The future of the specification is in ISO/IEC’s hands. A contributed specification is just that – it is “contributed.” Microsoft is like everyone else in regards to the future direction of IS29500. Long-term maintenance of the specification will be under the direction of JTC 1 (via SC34) and in partnership (of some form – to be determined if I’m not mistaken) with Ecma TC 45. Microsoft has committed to implementing IS 29500 in its next version of MS Office, and we will document that implementation in accordance with the interoperability principles we announced earlier this year.

I could go on and on, but I want to shift focus to the question of lessons learned. Anyone who has worked on this standard will likely reflect on their experiences. The long-term effects of this effort will be felt throughout the international standardization community as well.

1. International standards are about the long-term, not the short-term. The ratification of Open XML is just the first step in a longer discussion about document formats at the international standards level. ODF 1.2 and 1.3 (currently only under review at OASIS) will come before JTC 1, as will other activities: Open XML maintenance; PDF 1.7 maintenance; China may decide to move UOF to JTC 1; the work that is happening in DIN (the German national standards body) on translation and harmonization. It is a testament to the importance of document formats that so much engineering capacity and business investment is focused on these issues.

2. Politics matter. It became apparent to me early on in the cycle of DIS 29500 that the technical merits of the specification were only partially influential in the discussions of Open XML. The detractors and supporters alike (myself included) took the debate to the court of public opinion and into the political arena. The long discussions held over ODF procurement mandates being placed into statutes, the attempt to exclude Open XML from state-level procurement through policy mandate, and the debates over economic opportunity and industry competition were significant discussions. Each of these exposed different aspects of the debate. And each, to some extent, touched on foundational issues regarding the role of ICT in society. “Lobbying” was thrown about in an accusatory manner by both sides, but the pejorative hides what are some truly critical issues. Frankly, I welcome the fact that OSS advocates, private industry, NGOs, academics, and even other government agencies reached out to each other to discuss these issues. The invective that often accompanied some of these activities was unfortunate – but the end result was an overall, relatively deep discussion.

3. Speed of standards development remains an open-ended debate. One of the most basic criticisms of Open XML was that it should not have been put through the “Fast Track” process. The fact is, Fast Track is a more rigorous process than PAS (by the fact that it has the contradiction phase tacked on to the front of the process) and both move straight to the JTC 1 plenary vote rather than the SC-level work. As governments continue to drive toward eGOV frameworks where they have a favoring of standards that carry the ISO imprimatur (I’m not necessarily saying this is good or bad), then the old issue of speed of development will come to the fore. The software industry has relied heavily on industry consortia over the years due to the desire to get specs into circulation faster than through the slower, and more formalized, international standardization process. Open XML has shown a very bright spotlight on this issue which should merit the healthy, and rational, discussion of how this issue is to be dealt with over time. PDF 1.7 just went through the Fast Track process (with nary a peep from the vast majority of people about it), and ODF 1.0 went through the PAS process. (These are just doc format examples – anyone with a DVD player is using ISO Fast Track standards without famine or draught being caused.) My personal opinion is that nimble performance is going to be a real test for ISO in the future.

Quite frankly there is much more, but this is enough to think about for one day. I’m really proud of the work done by so many organizations in reaching this goal. The FUD-throwers will paint a picture of Microsoft taking unilateral action and thus this result. Anyone saying that is either purposely obfuscating the truth or spectacularly ignorant. The deep technical work done by engineers from around the world representing a truly staggering number of interests is what brought us to this point. Congratulations to everyone involved in helping Open XML become an ISO/IEC International Standard.

Building Bridges to other XML-based Formats

jasonmatusow — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 08:04:53 GMT

I have repeatedly made the argument that it is bad logic that leads you to the conclusion that there should be only one document format. If you value innovation in document creation, and you want to see applications continue to advance rapidly, and you want to see broad-based problem sets be addressed creatively - then more innovation is good.

I have often heard that there should be just one document format...ODF...and yet it is just amazing to me how many document formats there are, and how many more seem to crop up on an ongoing basis. (remember the whole CDF discussion?) It would seem that the folks at the National Library of Medicine did not get the memo that they were to adhere to the singularity that is ODF. They had the temerity to go and solve for the very complex issue of creating an XML format that takes into account the needs of the scientific journal community. Specifically they did this with...

...the intent of providing a common format in which publishers and archives can exchange journal content.

They have focused on four challenges:

Archiving and interchange
Journal publishing
Article authoring
National Center for Biotechnology Information "Book Tag" (to describe volumes for the NCBI online libraries)

Microsoft has been espousing the belief that multiple document formats provide choice, innovation, flexibility, etc. etc. Moreover, in the context of XML, we fully anticipate that there will by a myriad of document formats created to solve particular problems.

So - at the heart of the document format discussion remains the concept of interoperability. The effective exchange of data to connect people, data, and diverse systems. And in the case of document formats...specifically the issue of effective translation of data from one format to the next.

Pablo Fernicola from Microsoft Research seems to have a new blog up in which he talks at length about the work he is doing in developing and authoring add-in for Word 2007 that builds a bridge between Open XML and the NLM format. Here is the link to the Technology Preview Release of the add-in.

I think this is a very cool thing, and it is absolutely what we have been talking about all along. We did this with the DAISY format (Nov 2007), with ODF (July 2006), and here is a link to the UOF (Chinese national XML format.

No matter what the outcome is of the current deliberations on Open XML, we will persist in our belief that diversity in innovation is a good thing and that goes for document formats as well as applications.

Countries Are Saying Yes To Open XML

jasonmatusow — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 22:17:00 GMT

***Updated April 2*** - ISO has just confirmed the approval of IS 29500 in a press release. ***Updated end***

It has been a few days since I've had a chance to blog. I've been on the road and that tends to make it harder to find the time to put up posts. I have been pleased to see the fact that countries around the world are either sustaining their "yes" votes or moving to "yes" from either "abstain" or "no." Again, that is the point of the BRM process (not just the 5 days in Geneva, but the whole 5 month process) - address the concerns raised so that the spec is improved and move on to maintenance (further improvement) over time.

I am cautiously optimistic at this point that the final outcome will be the approval of DIS 29500 as an ISO/IEC standard.

I have to say, it is impressive how much diligent, thoughtful conversation is going on around the world about Open XML. This is based on the fact that technical work on the comments from the Sept. 2 ballot has resulted in a high-quality standard .

Another key factor is the fact that people recognize the broad use of Open XML in the market as seen by the hundreds of independent implementations of Ecma 376. And the literally thousands of customizations of Microsoft's implementation in Office by independent software providers and services providers. Good standards are used...and are used broadly. So the big question about the future of Open XML becomes one of future work on the spec. The reality is, it is in the best interest of the industry and users of implementations of the specification to have DIS 29500 be maintained through the ISO/IEC processes rather than at Ecma alone. (ODF editor Patrick Durusau has made this point as well.)

I had a conversation recently in Japan that reflected this point. There remain concerns in Japan about future interoperability issues particularly for a single Japanese software provider. Okay, valid point and one that is best addressed by having a strong voice in the future of the spec - which will happen through their position in SC34 than if the spec were to fail the ISO/IEC process and fall back to the sole stewardship of Ecma TC 45.

I have not spent time blogging the back and forth of the past few weeks. The FUD campaign and process attacks from the anti-Open XML crowd have become increasingly shrill and not reflective of the truth nor reason. (For example the fear-mongering misdirection on the IP issues.) The whole idea of the standards process is to move forward and improve technology specifications - not rip them down. Open XML is an important document format for the industry. Driving interop through the ISO/IEC process is better for ODF, PDF, CDF, UOF, and any other document format.

Frankly, I'm looking forward to moving beyond this discussion. I started writing about Open XML 2 years ago and have watched the progression carefully. Open XML has been about moving forward, brining the promise of XML into the Office ecosystem and well beyond it through standardization. I am amazed that the anti-Open XML crowd have spent so much time trying to stop something vs. build up their own technologies. (Miguel de Icaza wrote on this recently) Imagine if the time/money put into the anti-Open XML campaign had been put into improvement of ODF and/or OpenOffice? It would seem a better investment.

Applying the Interoperability Principles to Accessibility

jasonmatusow — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 02:15:17 GMT

As last week came to a close, I blogged about a few examples where Microsoft was applying the Interoperability Principles to its business. Much is being written about the role standards will play in the future of the software industry. It is important to understand that no software company or product can (or would want to) implement all standards. Or even support all standards in a given technology segment. All software producers will continue to build value-based solutions where competitive differentiation will remain critical to the success of their businesses.

Yet within the context of the production of commercial software, Microsoft has laid out a series of principles that will both enable and constrain design choices to some extent. Listening to customers, working with partners and competitors are activities that will take on even more importance (no matter how hackneyed it may sound) because it will be through those conversations that we can understand where real-world interop will be delivered and how the principles may be applied to achieve those goals.

So, let’s look at the world of accessibility technologies (AT). If there is a place where the industry (competitors and partners alike) should be focusing on delivering workable solutions – this is it. Rapid innovation of technology is essential to the social benefit delivered by things like text-to-speech, screen reading, alternative data entry devices, and a huge range of additional choices. In fact, if you look at the DAISY Consortium and the great work they are doing, you can start to see the complexities involved with matching AT with the pace of overall innovation in software/hardware from multiple vendors.

When you peel back the layers of the AT problem set, you quickly see that the interfaces, data formats, and protocols offered up by operating systems (“the platform”) are critical to the success of the AT vendors being able to produce technologies that can interact efficiently with the wide array of devices and applications out there. For example, the dozens of members of Microsoft’s AT vendor program provide hundreds of AT products for the Windows platform alone. (general info from MS on AT)

Microsoft has been watching a very interesting piece of work in ISO in a technical committee known as TC 159/SC4 – Ergonomics of human-system interaction. Before I move on – it is important to note that this is not JTC 1 (Joint Technical Committee 1), that is a joint effort between ISO and IEC. ISO does carry on its own business as well, and the work on a specific accessibility standard has been happening there. Microsoft has had limited involvement in the work of TC 159/SC4 up to this point. But they are in the final stages of a specification known as ISO/FDIS (final draft international standard) 9241-171 – Ergonomics of human-system interaction – Part 171: Guidance on software accessibility. The overall goal of the specification is to provide guidance on the design of software to achieve as high a level of accessibility as possible.

What has caught our attention is a sub-section of the specification – section 8.5 to be specific. Section 8.5 specifies high-level functional capabilities that software platforms (operating systems), such as Microsoft Windows, must provide to enable AT software to interact with other software on the platform.

This is good standards setting – the specification does not name any one platform, or mandate any one solution. It does not require any specific technology or API. This means that each platform vendor remains free to adopt the technologies and APIs that fit the specific platform design. The specification is about “what” not “how.” So Windows, SuSE Linux, Red Hat Linux, Mac OS, Palm OS, Symbian, or any other operating system can implement an accessibility architecture appropriate to that environment as long as they are offering up the capabilities (interfaces) that AT providers may use.

Based on significant requests from consumer advocacy groups and governments back in the 1990s, Microsoft built in extensive accessibility APIs in Windows. The existing technology is known as the MSAA, Microsoft Active Accessibility, and has been used as the foundation for hundreds of accessibility solutions. Additionally, Microsoft has introduced a more advanced, newer technology known as User Interface Automation (UIA) in Windows Vista and the .NET Framework 3.0, and is working with 17 other industry participants to define future versions of UIA in the recently formed Accessibility Interoperability Alliance (AIA).

Applying the Interop Principles

The third principle was stated simply as “Enhancing support of industry standards.” This is a very simple statement but carries extensive implications. I’m not going to rehash the implications of this – check out my earlier blog post on that.

The rubber meets the road on a principle when it comes time to think about a specific technology segment and think about the role of existing standards, in particular international standards, vs. what the company is building for its products. 9241-171 makes sense, and is drafted in a way that is inclusive for all operating system producers. Maximizing the benefit of innovation to citizens with disabilities comes from encouraging a standardized set of behaviors while encouraging all vendors (using all development models) to innovate rapidly and still bring competitive products to market.

Microsoft will support the ISO spec even though we were not the authors, nor are we currently particularly active in that committee. One way Microsoft will support this standard is to prepare a formal specification that describes the set of services provided by Windows to enable AT software to interact with other software on Windows. This technical report will make it easier for application developers to use the accessibility services provided in Windows. We are encouraging other platform vendors to produce similar technical reports.

Community is Part of Interoperability

As always, an important measure of a standard is the recognition of that standard by others, and the use of it for implementing real-world products. Even though the ISO standard isn’t final yet we can already see that 9241-171 is garnering serious attention in other accessibility standards work.

· ETSI references 9241-171 extensively in their Draft Technical Report 102 612, being developed as part of the EC’s eAccessibility Standards Mandate

· According to a note in the ETSI draft report Spain will replace their related national standards with 9241-171 when it is published

· It looks as if the TEITAC (advisory committee to the US Access Board on Section 508 standards) will recommend that the Access board harmonize with ISO 9241-171 in their update of the Section 508 standards

Time will tell how well 9241-171 is adopted in IT products, but based on the quality of the work done by TC 159/SC 4 in drafting the standard, and the interest we already see in it, we expect to see major improvements in the interoperability of accessible software products as platform, AT, and application vendors follow the guidelines laid out in 9241-171. The result will be a significant increase in the IT products more fully accessible to users with a broader range of abilities.

DIS 29500 Recommended for Approval by The United States V1 Committee

jasonmatusow — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 00:26:53 GMT

I just saw this come through in email, and would point you to Doug Mahugh's blog that the US V1 technical committee voted today regarding DIS 29500. I wrote about the V1 committee and the US position back before the Sept. 2 ballot here and here. I also posted on the Executive Board decision for INCITS here.