OpenDocument standardization

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Main article: OpenDocument

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[edit] Process

The first official OASIS meeting to discuss the standard was December 16, 2002; OASIS approved OpenDocument as an OASIS standard on May 1, 2005.

The group decided to build on an earlier version of the OpenOffice.org format, since this was already an XML format with most of the desired properties, and had been in use since 2000 as the program's primary storage format. Note, however, that OpenDocument is not the same as the older OpenOffice.org format.

According to Gary Edwards, a member of the OpenDocument TC, the specification was developed in two phases. Phase one (which lasted from November of 2002 through March of 2004), had the goal of ensuring that the OpenDocument format could capture all the data from a vast array of older legacy systems. Phase Two focused on Open Internet based collaboration. (Einfeldt, 2005).

[edit] Participants

The standardization process included the vendors of office suites or related document systems, including (in alphabetical order):

Document-using organizations who initiated or were involved in the standardization process included (alphabetically):

As well as having formal members, draft versions of the specification were released to the public and subject to worldwide review. External comments were then adjudicated publicly by the committee.

[edit] Next Steps

OASIS submitted the OpenDocument standard to JTC 1/SC 34 Document description and processing languages a joint technical committee of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) for approval as an international ISO/IEC standard. It was accepted as ISO/IEC DIS 26300, Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) v1.0 draft International Standard (DIS), and it was published November 30, 2006 as ISO/IEC 26300:2006 Information technology -- Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) v1.0 [1].

ISO spokesman Roger Frost stated that the committee will send the specification out to its members, probably at the end of this month, and they will have five months to study and vote on it (Sayer, 2005).

If a two-thirds majority of the P-members of the TC/SC are in favour and not more than one-quarter of the total number of votes cast are negative, OpenDocument will be submitted as a final draft International Standard (FDIS).

The FDIS is approved as an International Standard if a two-thirds majority of the P-members of the TC/SC are in favour and not more than one-quarter of the total number of votes cast are negative.

OASIS is one of the organizations which has been granted the right to propose standards directly to an ISO SC for "Fast-Track Processing". This process is specifically designed to allow an existing standard from any source be submitted without modification directly for vote as a DIS (or DAM).

Gary Edwards, a member of the OpenDocument TC, says that after ISO standardization, "there is no doubt in my mind that OpenDocument is heading to the W3C for ratification as the successor to HTML and XHTML." (Einfeldt, 2005). The W3C has not made any public statements supporting or denying this statement, however.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) v1.0. International Standards Organization (2006-11-30). Retrieved on 2006-12-05.
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