8 Sept. 2005
newrowley.com
SourceOn September 9, the Massachusetts Information Technology Division ends it review and public comment period for its Information Domain - Enterprise Technical Reference Model v.3.5 draft, a document that provides guidelines for data and data formats in the Commonwealth, including file formats for office productivity suites (these suites usually comprise word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation programs).
What is causing a stir is the document's demand that in less than a year and a half, Commonwealth agencies must switch from proprietary, vendor-based file formats for office files, such as Microsoft's ".doc" word-processing file format, to OpenDocument, an open standards-based file format.
OpenDocument is based on XML and the public domain ZIP compression and archiving technology. The file format is governed by the OASIS organization, which oversees many important XML and Web service standards. The standard is royalty-free; any organization can use it without paying a licensing fee.
Specifically, the draft document states that:
"As of January 1, 2007 all agencies within the Executive Department will be required to:
1. Use office applications that provide native conformance with the OpenDocument standard, and
2. Configure the applications to save office documents in OpenDocument format by default."
For Microsoft, a shift away from its document formats has the potential of undermining its lucrative Microsoft Office empire. How important is Office to Microsoft? In the company's latest earnings release from June, it reported that its "Information Worker" segment (Office is the dominant contributor) was responsible for $2.9 billion in revenue for the quarter — $11 billion for the year.
The key challenger to Office, and the most likely office productivity suite to displace Microsoft's software if the vendor refuses to support OpenDocument, is OpenOffice.org. Currently in beta testing, the 2.0 release of the software will use OpenDocument as its default file format. For many organizations, from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to large enterprise to small businesses, OpenOffice.org provides the equivalent of Office from a feature and productivity standpoint. However, OpenOffice.org is also free. New Rowley continues to believe that organizations are irresponsible if they do not periodically examine and test the existing 1.1 version and the soon-to-arrive 2.0 version of OpenOffice.org. There is just potentially too much money to be saved to ignore it.
Microsoft is aggressively attempting to head off efforts to promote or mandate standards and open source alternatives to its offerings. The vendor even has its own royalty-free, XML-based document format for its ubiquitous Office suite. But it will be hard to convince organizations and governments that committing to OpenDocument is a bad thing. Why? Because:
* Microsoft could easily support OpenDocument. There is no reason that Microsoft can't offer OpenDocument compatibility in its own software. The vendor cannot complain that it will be at a competitive disadvantage. Microsoft could even make its file format the default for most users but allow certain organizations to default to OpenDocument.
* The standard makes too much sense for users. Given the combination of budget constraints, the capabilities of alternatives like OpenOffice.org, and the desire to adhere to industry standards (or the flip side, not being locked into a vendor's proprietary format), the switch in file formats makes tremendous sense for many user organizations.
For Microsoft, though, this battle is critical. The company continues to lose its grip on a variety of proprietary formats that have previously made it almost impossible for other office suites and software to compete. Slowly but surely, the Web is moving from proprietary Microsoft Web site extensions to standards-based technologies. XML and Web services, the foundation for data exchange and next-generation applications, are built on open standards. And now, a key to Microsoft's hold on the IT market — the combination of Windows and Office — is in danger from the steady maturation and market acceptance of Linux and OpenOffice.org.
The Office file format, once the crown jewel of Microsoft, is now its Achilles' heel. And right now, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is aiming an arrow right at it.