OSV and Phase N Launch OpenOpenOffice (O3)

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OSV and Phase N Launch O3: Bringing Open Document Format to Microsoft
Office.

Melbourne -- 20 October 2005

Open Source Victoria, Australia's government-funded open source industry
cluster, has formed an alliance with Phase N to develop an open source
solution to bring Open Document Format capabilities to Microsoft Office
users.

Called OpenOpenOffice or O3, it will allow Microsoft Office users to
read and write Open Document Format (ODF) files. ODF is the
next-generation standard for storing and interchanging office documents
such as word processor files, spreadsheets and slide-show presentations.
ODF is supported by many of the office productivity suites on the
market, including OpenOffice.org, Sun's StarOffice, Corel Office,
Abiword, KOffice and others.

"Through universal adoption, Open Document Format will bring, for the
first time in our industry's history, the reality of friction-free
interchange of office documents between different office suites," said
OSV convener Con Zymaris. "The major hold-out here is Microsoft, who
refuses to support ODF - a decision that seems based on self-serving
reasons, to protect the near-monopoly of their high-priced Office suite.
The ones who will suffer are the users."

"We believe that Microsoft Office users should have a choice as to which
format they store their documents in," continued Zymaris. "To that end, we
are partnering with software development firm Phase N to build a solution
which will indeed give Microsoft Office users that very choice that
Microsoft denies them. This is what open source is about - freedom from
the control of proprietary vendors and more options for users."

"The amazing thing about the O3 concept is how simple it is," said key
O3 developer Adam Kennedy. "Just take the Word-to-ODF filters from the
OpenOffice.org suite, and put them into Office in reverse. Microsoft has 
made it trivial to write plugins for Office using .NET, and the
OpenOffice.org team has put a huge effort into their document conversion
filters. So all that's left is to connect the two together via some
simple SOAP calls using C# and Perl, and then make sure it is easy for
people to install into Office."

"By not supporting ODF, Microsoft is placing its interests ahead of its
users, who will be barred from entering this new sphere of document
interoperability. This is another sign that the vendor cares little for
offering interoperability and choice to its customers. The open source
community equates such vendor stubbornness with damage, and much like
the Internet, we will route around it. If Microsoft won't offer choice
to its Office users, we will do it for them," concluded Zymaris.

More information on O3:

 http://www.phase-n.com/openopenoffice/


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About Open Source Victoria

Open Source Victoria is an Industry Cluster consisting of over 100
Victorian firms and developers which provide services and technology
related to Free and Open Source Software (FOSS.) Open Source Victoria
offers marketing, advocacy and information referral services, and aims
to raise the profile of FOSS in Victoria and work with other similar
organisations across Australia.

http://www.osv.org.au/

Contact: Con Zymaris
Phone: 03 9621 2377
Fax: 03 9621 2477
Email: conz@cybersource.com.au
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