ISO approval: A good process gone bad

You may have read our background article about ODF and OOXML and why Red Hat believes OOXML should not be approved as an ISO standard. This time, we focus on how the standardization process has been compromised at ISO.

ISO’s JTC-1 directives were designed to provide a fair, consensus-based way to design standards that are portable, interoperable, and adaptable to all languages and cultures. The OOXML proposal has suffered from two basic problems: (1) voting irregularities, and (2) the use of a fast-track process for a complex, new, large specification that has not received adequate industry review. The resulting specification was driven almost exclusively by one vendor, has not achieved industry consensus, and has had thousands of issues logged against it, largely due to issues involving implementability, portability, and interoperability. Although resolutions have been proposed for many of the issues that have been raised, there is virtually no time to review these resolutions to determine whether they fix the problems. And the voting irregularities have raised serious issues with the fairness of the process.

Is Microsoft really any more trustworthy?

Microsoft continues to prey upon the overly cautious with patent deals

Apparently Microsoft has a thing for conservative Japan. Just when I thought Microsoft had closed patent cross-licensing deals with every Japanese firm ever to have considered corporate existence, Microsoft surprises me with a deal with Onkyo.

So far Microsoft's list includes the needy (the various second-rate Linux distributions and Novell, which is a first-class Linux distribution with second-class aspirations of how to build on its technical merit) and the overly cautious (Japanese and Korean electronics companies for whom it's easier to just pay rather than try to figure out whether Microsoft's machinations are worthy). Microsoft might consider this a Very Good Start, but to me it looks like a Very Poor End to Microsoft's attempts to afflict the world with its dubious patent-rattling.

Microsoft's latest interoperability pledge: How free is 'open'

No move by Microsoft to share information with its competitors will ever be taken at face value, and certainly yesterday's new Interoperability Principle will come under very close scrutiny. Is this the opening of the floodgates the EC has been demanding?

In incremental, measured, if slow steps, Microsoft has made some efforts to comply with directives from the European Commission to make its software and protocols more interoperable with products from other manufacturers. Yesterday, the company surrendered one more boundary between its interoperability policy and the EC's dream situation, making a huge chunk of the information it published in response to the EC's order available to developers free of charge.

Microsoft FUDwatch: Windows vs. Linux security

t's been at least a week since the last bout of Microsoft FUD hit the wires, so I guess it was time for a new wave. Today's FUD comes from an article Microsoft released on how its security compares with that of Linux. It should come as no surprise that Windows comes off as the Second Coming while Linux is left on the wrong side of Acheron.

Microsoft's pseudo-open source: open trap for open-source developers?

If you believe some of the headlines, Microsoft just open sourced a bunch of software related to its .Net libraries. Don't be fooled. The definition of open source is very clear. This is not open source. Not even a little bit. In fact, this may actually be an insidious trap (more on that below).

Will Hurley captures the move accurately:

Is .NET open source now?...The license indicates that developers can "see" the source code, but Microsoft's not providing any means of copying it. If a developer finds a bug in the code, rather than fixing it themselves and submitting a patch to the community they'll be encouraged to submit feedback via the product feedback center. They're showing us the man behind the curtain, but we're not allowed to speak to him in person just yet. We're still stuck with the giant, disembodied green head. And since community involvement is essential to most open source efforts, well....

In other words, it's not open source. But is it good for developers, anyway?

Ballmer repeats threats against Linux

Microsoft's bold march towards open source

Microsoft-Novell Deal: Nightmare In Linux Land

Vole rumbled in Linux, IDC bung fiasco

A visual timeline of the Microsoft-Novell controversy

Did Microsoft want to 'whack' Dell over its Linux dealings?

Just how successful is the MS/Novell pact?

Microsoft Shuts Down Linux 10 Years Ago Says Iowa Attorney

Jeremy Allison: Why the Vista launch will be a disaster

"Microsoft's most important product launch ever" blare the headlines in the trade press. Yet the silence from businesses and customers is deafening. No one cares. Contrast this with what most people would consider Microsoft's most successful Windows launch ever: Windows 95. People actually queued outside stores to be the first to buy this exciting new product, the launch itself was covered as news; real news, actually covered by the mainstream press as a real media event; not just in the computer trade press.