Standards Policy Choice

Governments around the world are moving to include both Open XML and ODF as part of their standards policy. Choice and interoperability among open standards helps to ensure innovation can take place in an efficient manner.

March 20, 2008
Finally! INCITS finalizes U.S. 'yes' vote on Open XML standards bid
After several rounds of voting and internal debate, the committee that represents U.S. interests on technology issues within the ISO standards body reaffirmed on Tuesday its support for approving Microsoft Corp's Office Open XML document format as an open standard, according to sources close to the process.

Read the Computerworld Article

February 1, 2008
Massachusetts Embraces Open XML
An article in The Metropolitan Corporate Counsel February edition, "The Power Of Choice: Massachusetts Wisely Embraces Multiple Document Format Standards To Drive Greater Competition And Innovation", covers the details of why and how the state of Massachusetts decided to include Open XML in their document format standards. Originally they had solely adopted Open Document Format (ODF); however, after years of debate, Massachusetts finally agreed to allow competing document format standards, specifically Open XML along with ODF. According to authors Francis M. Buono and McLean Sieverding, "Massachusetts became more transparent and democratic, government officials ultimately arrived at a more rational conclusion that permits multiple, interoperable standards to serve the unique needs of various users, which will lead to much greater choice, competition, and innovation."

Read The Metropolitan Corporate Counsel article

December 13, 2007
State of Florida rejects ODF preference
In December, the Florida legislature and CIO council rejected Open Document Format (ODF) and Open Source (OSS) mandates and recommended that technology decisions be based on merit and not mandate. In addition, they said that cost savings among other arguments are inaccurate and that large legacy database back-ends prove to be the real challenge for locked information.

August 24, 2007
U.S. Votes "Yes with Comments" for Open XML
On August 23, the INCITS Executive Board (the United States National Committee) announced their vote on whether or not the Ecma Office Open XML should be approved as an ISO/IEC standard. They voted "Yes, with comments." The results of the vote were as followed:

12 Yes – Apple, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Electronic Industries Alliance, EMC, GS1 United States, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Lexmark International, Microsoft, NIST, Sony, United States Department of Defense.
3 No – Oracle, IBM, Farance Inc.
1 Abstain – IEEE.

These results passed the needed two-third majority required to establish the United States position on an International Ballot. In 2004, the EU recommended Microsoft transition to open document standards. The United States vote is one step in the direction to put Open XML under the control of the ISO/IEC standards body. As they've stated, ECMA international will work with the United States and all countries who submit comments to resolve those comments as part of the ballot resolution meeting regardless of the outcome on September 2.

August 22, 2007
Germany Votes Yes with Comments on Open XML
The responsible Information Technology and selected IT Applications Standards Committee (NIA) in the German Standards Institute (DIN) held a meeting about Office Open XML on August 21, 2007, in Berlin after months of intensive preparations. The meeting was attended by representatives of software providers, application developers, scientific institutes, governmental departments, and authorities. After detailed and constructive discussion about the comments submitted, the committee decided to approve adoption of the draft of ISO/IEC 29500 with comments. The DIN association emphasized that the approval of Open XML includes various suggestions for improvement that will now be integrated into the standardization process.

Gerd Schürman, Director of the Fraunhofer FOKUS eGovernment Laboratory, argued for the DIN vote: "The standardization process of Open XML as an ISO standard will start now and result in the technological advancement of both standards, Open XML and ODF 1.0." Microsoft appreciated the decision of the DIN, stating: "The vote in favor of Open XML and the constructive comments from experts from the industry, science, public sector, and politics encourage us to continue developing Open XML for the purpose of our customers," said Michael Grözinger, National Technology Officer, Microsoft Germany.

Germany's endorsement is one step closer to helping ensure governments, businesses, and developers have open access to a platform independent, open document standard, designed to be backwards compatible with billions of existing documents, that will reside under the custodianship of an international standards body.

For more information, refer to the Press Releases listed below:

August 1, 2007
Massachusetts Includes Open XML and ODF in State Policy
Massachusetts' revised Enterprise Technical Reference Model 4.0 (ETRM) now includes ECMA 376 Office Open XML (Open XML) and OASIS ODF 1.1 (ODF). Massachusetts has opted for choice of open, XML-based document formats by including both standards in its ETRM. As part of a public statement state representatives note that "Massachusetts is the first state to adopt a policy encouraging open, XML-based document formats. The Commonwealth has set the stage for a new and innovative way to ensure state government operates most efficiently and effectively for its citizens."