Tag Archives: ooxml

Where are we going and what’s with the handbasket?

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Well, that’s it. Not only did Verizon and AT&T come out on top in the 700MHz spectrum auction – promising an end to hopes of Google’s utopian ideals of a truly open network – but I just heard that “Office Open XML” was approved as an ISO standard.

I don’t think it even merits comment on my part. The world is run by corporations. Corporations with more money than brains, hopes, or balls. The 700MHz spectrum will become another copy of what American has now – a resource (frequencies) that are “owned by the people”, yet controlled by major corporations, and horribly biased against the interests of the consumer.

Well, OOXML is now a standard. Is it any less flawed? No. Is it any safer for me to implement? No. Does it even contain enough information for me to implement? No. But it’s a specification, and it’s here. While Jason Matusow may have stated that “the patents related to the technology are not a barrier to use – for anyone, in any country, for all time“, I’m still a bit worried about the issues that will crop up with OOXML – not to mention the fact that it’s a standard squarely aimed at eliminating choice (we all know Microsoft will push hard for organizations not to use ODF) and preventing competition in a sector already overwhelmingly dominated by *one* product.

In short, what happened in the past few weeks? A confirmation that the governments and organizations of the world care little about the individual, and fear change. They’re owned by big business, and the 700MHz spectrum will end up being, at best, a marginal improvement over the current restrictive cellular system. And big business doesn’t even have the balls to fight for itself. Or, even worse, doesn’t worry about vendor lock-in or proprietary software because, as long as they keep bending over backwards to follow Microsoft’s every whim, Microsoft will always be there to help them.

I’m surprised that even multinational corporations, who have a data center filled with redundant systems, and fiber running in every direction in case this or that CO goes up in flames, doesn’t consider closed standards, proprietary (possibly patent-encumbered) software, or closed-source software to be as obvious a single point of failure as a critical service running on a single desktop computer. Sure, your vendor might tell you their software will achieve five-nines. But if they discontinue support, or have a few bad quarters, and they won’t fix it for you, what then?

I’m just thankful that there are some people, few and far between, that don’t fall into the trap.

Microsoft… again

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Here’s another Groklaw article on recent Microsoft tribulations. This really is starting to get disgusting. It’s not that I hate Microsoft, I don’t. What I hate is their attitude, and their business practices. Everyone else – I mean everyone – makes software that interoperates with other vendors. Microsoft, even after a *billion* dollar fine, won’t. Everyone else uses open, industry-accepted standards. Microsoft doesn’t. Many other vendors open up their code. Microsoft tried to make some vague gesture to, but makes it incompatible with GPL’d code (okay, okay, I know about ZFS…) and says developers can only use it in non-commercial projects. So they open a few things up to hobbyists, and want a pat on the back. It boils down to how they treat customers and developers. Not very well. I don’t like that. I’m not going to start on the technical aspects of Windows, though it seems to be getting better, a baby step at a time. But the bottom line is that Microsoft actively tries to turn the software industry into a facist dictatorship, where you do it Microsoft’s way, or you’re taken out back and shot (ok, bought up and then shut down).

Anyway, from the blog of Zeheda Bhorat, Open Source Programs Manager at Google,

Google believes OOXML would be an insufficient and unnecessary standard, designed purely around the needs of Microsoft Office.

How can it be that the ISO – the International Organization for Standardization – would actually consider a second, competing standard for document formats. And one that’s as flawed as OOXML? These guys are the ISO. They practically run the world, at least technically. Why don’t they have the balls to look Microsoft in the eye and say, “Hey, moron. We already have a document format standard. It’s called ISO 26300. If you want to have anything to do with the ISO, which sets standards, you can take your 6,000 page specification, put it through a crosscut paper-burning radiation-producing shredder, pay the $320 for a copy of ISO26300, and implement it!”

Links for 2008-02-23

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Some links for today:

Microsoft’s new promised on interoperability, open standards. etc. – somewhat ironic given the Office Open XML debacle on “standards”. And Red Hat’s worries about it. (Ars Technica)

Groklaw’s lengthy analysis of the promises.

Pakistan removed from the Internet, causes global YouTube outage.

A Guardian article on the WikiLeaks debacle – perhaps the biggest affront to the First Amendment this year.

An InformationWeek article about some guys from BlackHat D.C. who said that they will be able to crack GSM encryption in under 30 minutes with $1,000 of technology or 30 seconds with $100,000 (FPGAs – Maybe a cluster of PS3′s?)

A Princeton Unviersity blog about cold boots possibly able to crack the Windows BitLocker system.

Yay! Firefox has hit its’ 500 Millionth download!!! And there was much rejoicing…

An ArsTechnica article on Internet Explorer, what should be done to fix it, and how there can still be a non-standards-compliant browser.

Jeremy’s Blog – the mind behind LinuxQuestions.org – provides a recap of the 2007 LQ Members’ Choice awards. Some interesting winners were VirtualBox for virtualization package, Debain for server distro, Knoppix for Live Distro, Eclipse for IDE/Web Development Environment, Python for language of the year, and – much to my chagrin – vi/vim for editor.

A LinuxJournal article on What’s Next for Open Source and Public Meida.

LinuxInsider – EU taking Microsoft’s promises with a grain of salt, noting that MS has made “at least four similar statements” in the past.

Chris Siebenmann – Where the risk is with virtualization (and iSCSI) and Wireless, machine rooms, and the Asus eeePC.

IBM DeveloperWorks – OOXML: What’s the big deal? – outlining the technical objections to OOXML as a standard. Linked from a rootprompt.org article mentioning that “OOXML is essentially a complete replication of every chunk of data that a Microsoft Office application might possibly save in a file”.

Slashdot YRO – a guy who got hist stock photos stolen, entered into a long legal battle, and won.

Microsoft’s Windows Vista Capable lawsuit granted class-action status.

A Washington Post article on Hans Reiser’s Geek Defense strategy.

A Slashdot post linking to news that Apple sent a cease-and-decist order to the Hymn Project, which produces software to remove DRM from iTunes songs. Apple had their ISP remove all download links. (I guess the only solution is for us all to buy bandwidth right from a NSP…)

Yahoo’s shareholders are suing it for not gobbling up the Microsoft deal.

Comcast getting sued AGAIN for P2P filtering.

A leaked RIAA training video for prosecutors, going so far as to say that IP piracy can lead to arrests for drugs, weapons, or terrorism. It also includes instructions on how to get a RIAA investigator certified as a court expert.

A New York Times article on – gasp – women using the Internet. Linked from Tom Limoncelli’s blog.