There has been a lot of discussion about whether Open XML should become an ISO standard. There is lots of FUD, MUD and other stuff flying around. Many people are just parroting that which is being publicized by IBM, but in the Dutch committee we have mostly constructive discussions. My vote? Yes, yes, yes!
The reasoning behind this is simple. We have been demanding from Microsoft that they open their document format. Now that they are willing, we should hammer down and make sure it happens. This will ensure that the solutions that I build will be maintainable and open right now. The main reason for this yes has nothing to do with other formats also available. Instead it has to do that we in the human world tend to work with Microsoft software and I need a file format that serves this purpose, I need Open XML, especially in a form that will not change too much (e.g. out of the hands of the evil do-ers, into the hands of ISO / ECMA).
Many of the technical objections being raised are correct and should be fixed during the ballot resolution. The non technical stuff is just FUD in my opinion.
- The spec is too big. To me it's not big enough. I never had the feeling of having too much examples. Microsoft isn't known for its documentation, and now that they document their format it becomes too big? I've been able to work with it without any issues. Most people who say this haven't even read the spec. Or, just read my pocket-size book on it. If that's still too big, I guess no-one can help.
- To complex, can only be done by Microsoft. The appearance of object frameworks, open source projects and adoption by major office productivity suites tends to make me disagree.
- Overlap with ODF. Perhaps, and also with TXT, HTML, PDF etc, all have a different goal. There is an opportunity to unify though. It is just that for this unification I see no reason to limit the customer's choice right now.
- No benefit for the society. That's not what my customers are telling me, the opposite is quite true.
All the technical objections are great. They benefit the standard as a whole. I'll leave out comments on the political-technical stuff such as the perceived dependency on MS internal stuff such as image formats etc, these people just didn't read the spec. All the others can and will be fixed during the ballot resolution.
Go Open XML!