
Reversal: Australian Govt picks ODF doc standard over Microsoft - renai_lemay
http://delimiter.com.au/2013/05/29/reversal-australian-govt-picks-odf-doc-standard/
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AlexanderDhoore
Great news!

Check out this map of ODF adoption in the world [1]. Purple is mandatory
standard, green is officially approved. Governments around the world are
really pushing ODF forward.

... Now just get my uni to move off of docx and I'll be a happy programmer :)

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:OpenDocument_adoption_worl...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:OpenDocument_adoption_world_map.svg)

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hugi
I live in Iceland and ODF isn't being used by any government institution that
I know of (and I've worker in/for government quite a lot). Is it possible the
NATO mandated use of ODF applies only to official NATO documents?

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avar
In Iceland in particular (and I'm guessing a lot of countries have the same
situation) what'll happen is that the Ministry of Education will publish some
official recommendation about what formats should be used, or that free/open
source software should be "strongly considered".

Then what happens in practice is that everyone just ignores that
recommendation and buys proprietary software anyway, feigning compatibility
with existing systems, re-training costs etc.

So in practice a government recommendation about ODF can mean absolutely
nothing unless you really make it mandatory. So this map on Wikipedia is
effectively useless as an indicator for "adoption". It's probably actually a
map of what governments have made feel-good press releases about ODF.

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antninja
Well, Microsoft Office supports ODF and can use it as the default for all new
files. At least since the 2010 version. If even MS recognizes that ODF has
won, we have no reason to use OpenXML.

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chris_wot
Not sure why you are being voted down, but I tend to agree that ODF is the
standard to use. Not sure if MS have agreed that they believe it should be
_the_ standard to use though :-)

~~~
danielbarla
Regarding downvotes, I'll take a guess - OP's post says:

>[MS office] can use [ODF] as the default for all new files. At least since
the 2010 version. If even MS recognizes that ODF has won, we have no reason to
use OpenXML.

That leap of logic just doesn't compute... By the same token, since OpenOffice
/ LibreOffice can be set to use OpenXML as default, they've admitted that
OpenXML has won. Being able to use each other's formats should be viewed as an
attempt to move into each other's markets, not as declaration of victory.

~~~
signed0
OpenOffice has to support OOXML because they have always positioned themselves
as supporting everything under the sun. They supported .doc from the start.

Microsoft has traditionally supported only their own formats, so their
decision to adopt an open source format is much more meaningful than
OpenOffice's decision to support OOXML.

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jjude
What technology do govt departments across the world use to maintain
trustworthy records?[1]

Some Indian departments use pdf with DSC for this. Interested if there are
alternatives.

[1]: <http://www.epa.gov/records1/faqs/rks.htm#q4>

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dhx
Also interesting with this update is the suggestion[1] to use open source
multimedia DirectShow filters including LAV Filters and ffdshow. LAV Filters
appears to ship with DeCSS code[2] -- something which appears to be legally
usable within Australia, for most purposes at least, as per §132APC(1) of the
Copyright Act 1968[3].

Further to the above, widespread adoption of open source multimedia libraries
on government computer networks would appear to further lock in a future for
Australia where software patents are not recognised.

[1] Page 19 of [http://agimo.gov.au/files/2013/05/SOE-Build-Guidelines-
Windo...](http://agimo.gov.au/files/2013/05/SOE-Build-Guidelines-
Windows-v3.0-Official-Draft.pdf)

[2]
[https://code.google.com/p/lavfilters/source/browse/#git%2Fco...](https://code.google.com/p/lavfilters/source/browse/#git%2Fcommon%2FDSUtilLite%2FDeCSS)

[3]
[http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca1968133/...](http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca1968133/s132apc.html)

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asperous
I'm not an expert on government documents, so I am wondering: what formatting
does the Australian Govt need?

Why wouldn't plain text suffice?

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asperous
Even for long documents with structure, gamefaqs has shown us that plain text
can be used effectively there as well.

~~~
trobertson
Not to mention Org Mode... but there's about a zero chance of emacs being
picked up as 'standard'.

~~~
KC8ZKF
Perhaps Emacs could me made to produce ODF.

~~~
adestefan
org-odt-export-to-odt

[http://orgmode.org/manual/OpenDocument-Text-
export.html#Open...](http://orgmode.org/manual/OpenDocument-Text-
export.html#OpenDocument-Text-export)

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jumblesale
So does this mean that all that money Microsoft put into getting this
'standard' through ISO was wasted? It would be a delightful slice of
schadenfreude if now everyone was refusing to use it. I remember that the main
reason they wanted the ISO to bless it was so that governments could use it.

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jwildeboer
They should NOT go for ODF 1.1. Instead they should push for ODF 1.2. Someone
needs to tell them.

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nknighthb
The standard has to be pragmatic. 1.2 is still new enough to make support an
issue. MS Office 2013 was just released with native 1.2 support in January.

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atirip
Correct me if im wrong - no computer out of the box can not open Australian
Govt documents anymore?

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DoubleMalt
Every computer that has access to the internet can open them in Google Docs.
Every Tablet or Smartphone with Polaris Office can. Every Chromebook can.

Also in what way would the Microsoft "Standard" be different?

Only for the MS time limited crapware installed on all the Windows Laptops?

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atirip
I can open any MS Word document with any computer out of the box. Without
installing _any_ crap or having account at Gevil (and uploading anything). On
OSX Textedit, on Windows Wordpad, and so on. On iOS any MS doc as attachment.
In that way Microsoft Standard is different, i can view the docs without doing
nothing, only "standard" ODF documents i can not view on standard computer.

~~~
KC8ZKF
Texedit on Mac opens ODT, as does Wordpad on Windows.

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z92
Should have gone for RTF. More widely supported.

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throwaway2048
unfortunately RTF is not rigorously standardized, some basic elements of
documents are, but lots of stuff is still adhoc, and not really suitable for
an encompassing editable document standard.

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sigkill
On the other hand I suddenly thought about HTML/CSS. I think HTML for
reflowable and PDF for fixed would be awesome. The only thing is that you need
a very good wysiwyg editor for html that's as good as word yet produces clean
code.

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mtgx
They might not want to base their financial calculations on Microsoft Excel,
after what they heard a few months ago.

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Leszek
Because some idiot may get the formulae wrong? I don't think there was an
actual Excel bug recently, just PEBKAC errors.

