__/ [ BearItAll ] on Wednesday 24 May 2006 15:55 \__
> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>
>> The geek who took on Microsoft
>>
>> ,----[ Quote ]
>> | The mild-mannered CIO of Massachusetts sparked a standards debate when
>> | he made it policy that state workers use open-standard formats.
>> |
>> | (FORTUNE Magazine) - In the early morning hours of May 3, a dramatic
>> | piece of news out of Geneva began caroming through the online world: At
>> | long last, Microsoft's lock on the $9 billion office-application
>> | business was facing a challenge.
>> `----
>>
>>
>
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2006/05/29/8378022/index.htm
>
> ODF is a very good format, not only for current documents but also has been
> future proofed with the ability to accomodate as yet unknown objects. I
> know most formats these days could at least place a marker where unknown
> objects were, but it wasn't always well done. You can think of ODF as a
> rich file type format but updated for the object world.
I never knew this. Thanks for the information.
> It is also a readily accessible format, so not only would your regular
> office documents make use of it, but also many other areas of the system
> could make use too. Program syntax hi-lighting, general purpose editor
> hi-lighting. There would even be no reason why it couldn't be used in
> console windows, RichEdit boxes. Whether one format across the system is
> practical is an obvious question and I'm not certain of the answer, the
> point I am making though is that it can be done. Imagine the visually
> impaired, the number of areas in the current system where they might have
> to overide the default fonts or colours even with globally set prefered
> fonts etc. Well there would be no reason why a single .conf file couldn't
> be used right across the system.
Much like markup and styled. Web pages that are properly constructed enable
the user to override the default stylesheet.
> The good part for us in the UNIX/Linux world is that almost all of our main
> Office software is now fully ODF capable. For example StarOffice is now
> ODF, OO is due in the next version. As I understand it it is just waiting
> for W3C approval.
KOffice is getting its own implementation as well (KWord and other
applications become more standardised).
http://dot.kde.org/1147115383/
> We are ready for it, I wonder if MS are.
The plug-in is ready for *them* to accept, embrace, and embed.
Best wishes,
Roy
--
Roy S. Schestowitz | Useless fact: the buttocks is the largest muscle
http://Schestowitz.com | SuSE Linux ¦ PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
4:05pm up 26 days 22:37, 11 users, load average: 0.52, 0.88, 0.87
http://iuron.com - Open Source knowledge engine project
|
|
