UK tests open source waters (BBC News)

UK tests open source waters (BBC News)

But if it's the government ...

You just say that if a citizen can't read a document, because the app you supplied contains an undocumented extension, then that is a breach of QoS punishable by a decently sized fine, an obligation to publish the extension, and an obligation to provide free upgrades to everybody on an older version.

I can't really see MS extending Office 2004 for government if they know it's suddenly going to trigger a requirement to give it away for free to everyone they hoped to push into paying for an upgrade ... :-)

And why should an open spec be a problem. Look at the current spec for the WordPerfect document format. WordPerfect did things so well that an "out of the box" install of 5.1+ (from 1994) can do a damn competent read of a document produced by WP10 (aka WP2K3).

Cheers,
Wol