OOXML loses a battle

OOXML loses a battle

>To be honest, I'm not so sure OOXML is much worse or better than ODF. Both are more or less a serialization of their respective apps' state. That makes both of them pretty hard to implement by a third party.

Pff. That has got to be the most asinine thing regarding document formats I've read in quite a while.

The document format should be the representation and description of *document structure*, not application's state. That's exactly what makes OOXML largely unimplementable by third parties: unlike ODF, which represents *document structure*, OOXML represents *application state*. A document structure can quite a bit more easily be equivalently rendered by different applications then application state which is inherently unique to the application (hence it is called 'application state' - and if you want to work on, or with, that state you essentially need to duplicate, or emulate to a sufficient degree, the application).

>f.e. AbiWord is not using ODF as its standard output filter, because it doesn't match their internal representation that well.

Gee... Let's just forget ODF then, standardize AbiWord's internal representation (*application state*), put it into a standard envelope (which is what XML is, and nothing more), prepend a catchy word of the day that seems to matter to *other* people (and cross our fingers that those open-dummies and ignorant decision-makers don't notice the difference between professed and actual) and call it.. well OpenAWXML!

That should make it easier. And standard. Not a standard description of document structure though, but STANDARD APPLICATION, which is exactly what this game is all about (and them poor open-dummies thought it's about interoperability and that our objections have to do with technicalities heh).

Ka-ching!

PS: Prepare grea$e. Just in case it gets stuck and needs some pushing at the last minute.