Bob Sutor is comparing spec documents by page-count. MSECMAXML at the new version 1.3 weighs in at over 4,081 pages versus OpenDocument's 706 pages. It's significant because the MSECMAXML specification started last Fall at about 1,900 pages.
Now, that's actually a fair reckoning of how bas-ackwards the Microsoft's "community process" is for developing its "open" XML file format (which won't get through ISO, if ever, until late next year).
Says Sutor, in rare form:
"I compare this to going to the gym and working out to build muscle tone and bulk up a little bit. Conversely, weighing in at 4081 pages means you went to the gym and you swallowed a few treadmills."
Why does page-count matter? In this case, it reflects the sheer amount of features and the sheer number of ways the format is tied to application and operating system instructions, otherwise known as system calls, that are unique to Microsoft's stuff. The MSECMAXML format will not do the same things on other people's stuff, like with a multitude of competing applicaitons or, say, on Linux, for example.
This means that MSECMAXML breaks a few of the key definitional requirements for a format that's called an "open" standard: Thou shalt not have single-vendor features or functions. MSECMAXML, therefore, is not an open file format -- even though it has XML in it. Their great new format is not portable, as we say in the software trade. Portability is what you need for modular architectures ("SOA") which will permit you, as never before, to own the budgeting decisions on ALL THE SOFTWARE IN YOUR HOUSE.
Once your organization opts into the Vista stack and overpays handsomely for this bloated version of MS Office 2007 with its wafer-thin format (NOT!), it's a terminal decision from which you will never emerge...Microsoft's FINAL SOLUTION.
Mind your air supply on the next upgrade.
Comments