Microsoft OpenDocument concessions?

Microsoft said it plans to fund an open source project to develop a software capable of converting MS Office print files to OpenDocument.

Expected today (July 6), Microsoft will officially launch the Open XML Translator Project. This project will be located on SourceForge.net - a very popular website, hosting many different source sharing projects provided under the BSD open source license.

"Interpreter"

The Open XML Translator project will be developed by a Microsoft-based partner in France. The end result of this project will allow Microsoft Office to open and store files in the OpenDocument format.

Standard OpenDocument format - the full name is OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications - is an open file format standard for office applications. OpenDocument is developed on the standard OpenOffice.org format. This is the standard that competes with Microsoft's Office standard format.

OpenDocument is emerging as a standard format instead of Microsoft's popular file format standard. Winning such a position is because OpenDocument has received a lot of support from software business developers and from regulatory agencies in Massachusetts (USA) and Belgium.

Why should you give in?

The decision to participate in the Open XML Translator project is the exact opposite of what Microsoft has said and done in the past. Even now Microsoft claims that it will not include the standard OpenDocument support in Office software. The argument Microsoft uses to explain this is "the need to use the standard OpenDocument format with MS Office is not high". And Microsoft said it would use a third-party converter to help Office read OpenDocument files.

" Microsoft has not seen any increase in the need to use the OpenDocument standard. But because government regulators have been constantly asking us to provide compatibility between standard formats of Microsoft has OpenDocument standard , "said Tom Robertson, Microsoft's standard and compatible managing director.

" We think customers don't want a uniformity they want to have diversity, one wants to have a transition back and forth ," Robertson said. " Some of our customers say they want us to focus on some scalability to ensure that our products are of the highest quality ".

When is the fruit ripe?

It is expected that today, Open XML Translator will release a first trial version of the converter software between two standard formats. This test version has the ability to convert standard Word text file formats to OpenDocument and vice versa.

The project aims to release the official version of this converter for Word 2007 later this year and for Excel, PowerPoint next year, Jean Paoli, Microsoft's director of compatibility and XML architecture, said. .

The conversion will be entirely based on Microsoft's Open Office XML standard - the 2007 Office default format. Microsoft will also seek to bring Open Office XML into an Ecma international standard, Paoli said.

The opponent still completes the opponent

Open Office XML is a backward compatible standard, so the product of the Open XML Translator project can also be compatible with previous Office versions, Paoli said. But because the Open Office XML and OpenDocument standards are completely different, the conversion of course will not be perfect.

" We want to be clear about one thing ," Paoli said. " There is no perfect transition. There are many differences between the two formats. Open Office XML is a backward compatible standard and has all the features, while OpenDocument is quite limited. Processing in these aspects ".

For example, participants in this project will have to make and select technically whether there are any features in the Office 2007 suite that OpenDocument products do not support.

Paoli said Microsoft will manage this project and will provide some additional resources.

Clever Age will be responsible for programming. Aztecsoft is responsible for testing and Dialogika will test one more step to ensure the tool is compatible with the requirements of European customers.

Hoang Dung