[Pc_Support] Re: OpenOffice v2 beta usage in production setting?

[Bryan J. Smith]

On Wed, 2005-07-06 at 00:11 -0400, Phil Barnett wrote:
> Are you saying that a format that OOo can save in now is going to go away?

No, I was saying if you're using OOo to save in DOC 8/9/10 by default,
that has not only _always_ been a risk, but Microsoft is _killing_it_
as of DOC 11 (in favor of its new, supposedly-to-be-documented, XML
standard).

In fact, let me re-iterate the issues, one-by-one ...

1)  x86 Binary Alignment issues

DOC 8/9/10 (MS Word 97/2000/XP) have well-known, unintentional
Hostageware (unmaintainable standard, unmaintainable source) issues due
to reliance on simple binary records write/reads and lack of any
alignment in x86.  This is not only affecting portability to Mac and
inter-version compatibility, but is affecting the x86-64 port as well.
See #3.

2)  Tag reuse

DOC 7/8/9/10 (MS Word 95/97/2000/XP) also have well-known, _intentional_
Hostageware issues due to "tag reuse" to force upgrades and stint
reverse engineering.  E.g., tag re-use of DOC 7 (95) to both DOC 8 and 9
(97 and 2000), and some, to a lesser extent, in DOC 8 (97) to 10 (2000).
This has improved in DOC 11 (MS Word 2003), but it's too little, too
late -- especially for companies like Ozz who are still using DOC 8 (MS
Word 97).

3)  DOC 12 is going to be XML

Because of the issues caused both unintentionally by #1, and
intentionally by #2, Microsoft has been planing to make XML** the
default in DOC 12 (MS Word 2005) -- especially for portability to
x86-64.  This is now the plan for DOC 12, and will cause
_major_conversion_headaches_ for _all_, although it will solve the
problem in the long-run.  Conversion programs are already in
development, and it wouldn't surprise me if Microsoft licensed Sun's
copyright on OOo/SO conversion code (that's a conspiracy theory, yes,
but it's a very good one, given that OOo contributors are encouraged to
sign over copyright to Sun in a formal writing).

[ **NOTE:  Don't confuse the DOC 12 plan with prior XML efforts.
Although they already offered "end-user interfaces" in DOC 11 (2003),
they were for extending on the user side -- i.e., interfacing/extending
MS Office for 3rd party apps, not using them as the underlying format
for MS Office's own documents. ]

4)  OOo/SO has features that do _not_ match MSO

If you save to DOC in OOo/SO, you are often prompted if and when (which
is almost always) any features that are OOo/SO-only will be lost when
saved to DOC -- especially older DOC like version 8 (97).  If you set up
OOo/SO to save to DOC by default, this will happen _all_the_time_.
I.e., users will create documents, and when they open them again,
various features of the document will be _lost_.

Not to mention the slight differences between OOo/SO and MS will be lost
anyway, as conversion is _never_ perfect (not even between different MSO
versions -- see #1 and #2 above).  It's best to either convert _only_
when you need it, or just not use OOo/SO at all if you want DOC to be
your default anyway.  Trust me on this, you're asking for a world of
hurt -- only adopt OOo/SO if you plan to produce _all_ new documents in
OOo/SO formats, and only occasionally convert as necessary to send to
other parties.  It is _not_ "transparent" -- not even in OOo 2.0.

> Or that OOo will some day become incapable of loading a document that it
> saved in a previous incarnation of OOo?

No.  Sun/OpenOffice.org _continues_ to support _all_ formats, prior and
current ...

- StarOffice 3/4/5 (pre-OOo):  sdw
-   StarOffice 6/7 (OOo 1.x):  sxw
-    StarOffice 8+ (OOo 2.x):  odt (full OASIS standard**)

[ **NOTE:  This is basically the "sxw" as of OOo 1.1.x / SO 7.x ]


-- 
Bryan J. Smith                                     b.j.smith at ieee.org 
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