Microsoft [...] has lost a vote to have its Office Open XML document format approved as an international standard, dashing the company's hopes of wider adoption of the standard by public-sector organisations. The result of the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) ballot was hailed as a victory for open standards by supporters of the rival Open Document Format, who argued the Microsoft format was not open, but a ploy to lock in users. Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) is the default file-saving format in Microsoft Office 2007. The widely used Open Document Format (ODF) is already an international standard.
Microsoft argues that its format has higher specifications and is more useful than ODF, while opponents say Open XML's 6,000 pages of code compared with ODF's 860 pages make it artificially complicated and untranslatable into other formats.
The ISO said in a statement on Tuesday that 53 percent of the votes cast by national standards bodies were in favour of Microsoft, missing the necessary two-thirds majority.
Twenty-six percent of national votes cast were against approving Open XML in the five-month ballot process, in which 104 national member bodies were entitled to vote.
Source: reuters.com
Tags: adoption | approved | Complicated | document format | FRANKFURT | International Organisation for Standardisation | iso | Media | Microsoft | Open Document Format | Open XML | specifications | Standard | victory | Vote
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