wrote:
> Comment from:
>
> Marketing of OASIS format to office suite implementors
I'm not on the committee, but perhaps my comments will be useful.
> I am interested to see this format adopted by more office suites.
Currently KOffice is working to implement
the format (as well as OpenOffice.org). I believe it's been at least
discussed by Abiword (which has a similar format) and Gnumeric.
> While I am personally a user of OpenOffice.org, interoperability and
> choice is one of the advantages this format offers.
> Is there documentation that could be used to convince IBM (Lotus SmartSuite),
> Corel (Wordperfect suite) or other such vendors the advantages of the format?
Corel has been involved; I don't know what their commitment is.
I would also like to see Adobe (Framemaker) involved.
> I am also very interested in how to promote the format to large users
> such as governments. One of the limitations so far is the lack
> of support in some of the major suites.
> If it was "everyone but" then vendors who don't support
> the standards could be excluded using existing acquisition policies,
> but currently most of the suites don't support the standard.
Clearly market share is critical. If implementations of a standard
are widely used, the standard will be adopted; otherwise they won't.
European governments have expressed an intense interest, see, e.g.,
http://europa.eu.int/ida/en/document/2592
If nothing else, it may be possible to support these formats through
various plug-in translators. Not ideal, but a workable interim step.
I eagerly look forward to a time where office suite data is in
a publicly specified format that anyone can implement, without
restrictions.
--- David A. Wheeler
