Microsoft are arguing that their Office Open XML format is the best standard for preserving Legacy files, when the world already has an adopted standard, ISO/IEC XML 26300:2006 for storing, recalling, and transmitting documents, relied upon by industry already that has brought new economic giants to the $100 Laptop.

The Open Document Foundation argue this is both un-necessary, counter-productive, and will not enable Governments and other bodies responsible for safe storage and access to legacy files achieve this objective without being locked in.

In this concise paper, Preserving legacy files with ECMA Open Office XML (MSOOXML), the ODF Alliance's Chris Puttick, CIO, Oxford Archaeology examines Microsoft's claims and finds a considerable gap between assertion and openness. Why for example, does the ECMA Open Office XML document say “2.15.3.6 autoSpaceLikeWord95 (Emulate Word 95 Full Width Character Spacing)”. Or why does saving an older Excel spreadsheet in Excel 2007 OOXML format cause a lost feature alert? And why should this concern a Government Information strategist?

Download the paper today, and see why this proprietary standard, MSOOXML, should be excluded.

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