NoOOXML

How to follow the international vote

The Chairwomen of the Technical Committee in Poland rewrite the voting rules in favor of the company of Redmond, and distributes propaganda written by Microsoft Netherlands. That's when the polish sausages begins to smoke.

Commentor on Channel Register who worked on reviewing the fast track document surprised at BSI rumours. Suggests contact information to lobby BSI.

Please post a map for us to observe rhe evolution of national votes.

A foss-vendor reporting from the OOXML process in Romania

In the last days, new members keep applying in the Romanian NB, CT210 comitee at ASRO

Bristol City Council's switch to StarOffice in 2005 has led to a major reduction of IT costs, says Gavin Beckett, the council's ICT Strategy manager.

A good summary of the standaridazion process so far and the controversies and problems afflicting MS-OOXML.

Rob Weir addresses in detail ODF-editor Durusau's pro-OOXML position and eloquently argues that there is no good reason to support OOXML becoming an ISO standard.

After the BRM, Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society has now recommended its standards body to maintain its "abstain" vote from Sept 2.

van der Beld characterizes the Geneva meeting as typical: "The cheering and applause that I could hear OUTDOORS at the end of the meeting – I did NOT attend the BRM itself – gave me confirmation that it must have been a normal BRM, although a large one. The spirit of the FT process must have been in that room: seeking an ever broadening support for an FT proposal, first in Ecma, and then on a global scale in ISO/IEC in a fully open process. Also there I’m fully in line with Patrick Durusau’s article about that."

According to a Friday blog post by Microsoft employee Doug Mahugh, V1 voted to recommend that INCITS maintain its Approve position on DIS 29500, the name for the OOXML proposal. [...] The news was confirmed by by Patrick Durusau, the V1 chairman, who wrote in an e-mail that the vote was 17 'Yes', 4 'No', zero abstentions, and 1 absent. Durusau wrote that [...] it would be unlikely that INCITS would override its recommendation and change its vote now.

A summary of the BRM and some reactions. Nice quote of Tim Bray of Sun an Canada's rep atthe BRM: "The process was complete, utter, unadulterated bullshit. I'm not an ISO expert, but whatever their 'Fast Track' process was designed for, it sure wasn't this."

Leap Year Babies born on 29 February are attacking Microsoft for trying to standardise their leap year bug in OOXML. I guess the leap year is still in the standard after the BRM because standards needs to be tailored for a large dominant vendor.

Jeremy Allison discusses the responses to the comments on OOXML. Illustrates the "mainly lipservice" nature of the responses by the "date-formats bug". He //couldn't find any agreed change that would cause a single service pack for Microsoft Office to be released.//

Article on why two standards, bad - one standard, good

IBM responds to MSFT's accusations that it leading a campaign againgst OOXML, telling Ars instead that Microsoft is leading a fight against truly open standards.

PJ discusses the recent decisio by a US court to extend the judicial oversight of MSFT for two more years and, in particular, its relevance to interoperability with OOXML and the upcoming BRM. Bottom line: don't trust promises.

As a true friend of Mr. Gates, Romania participates at the Governments forum in Berlin.

I have yet to see creativity from M$. Ask yourself, are you M$ Guinea Pig? Do you know one? Do you want M$ to suppress ODF?