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● 04.25.08

●● Viewing Corel as the Lesson That Must Be Learned About OOXML

Posted in America, Antitrust, Corel, Europe, Microsoft, Novell, Office Suites, Open XML, OpenDocument at 3:24 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Why is Novell so blind?

Corel was last mentioned earlier this week along with some background about the company's history when it comes to formats, Linux, and Microsoft. Is Corel collapsing at the moment, based on the news about its CEO resigning?

=> mentioned earlier this week | company's history when it comes to formats, Linux, and Microsoft | ↺ its CEO resigning

The CEO of Corel Corp. plans to resign, two weeks after an investment firm that owns a majority stake in the Ottawa-based graphics and desktop applications software vendor offered to acquire all of the remaining shares and take the company private for the second time in five years.

[...]

Ironically, WordPerfect Office X4, a new release that Corel announced last Wednesday, is being touted by the vendor for its strong compatibility with its rivals’ document formats, including Microsoft’s Office Open XML, Adobe’s PDF and the vendor-neutral OpenDocument Format for Office Applications. Corel claimed that X4 is the first office suite to let users import, edit and export PDF documents — including scanned ones — without the need for third-party software.

Whatever happens, this does not look too encouraging, but abuses against WordPerfect have a long history and the case is yet to be resolved in court. Microsoft is trying to ‘pull another WordPerfect’ at the moment using OOXML, which is made deliberately incompatible with everything else in the market (secret extensions and deviations).

=> yet to be resolved in court | secret extensions and deviations

A belated reposted Associated Press article about the protest in Norway seems to have just made an appearance in unexpected places.

=> the protest in Norway | ↺ in unexpected places

Roughly 60 data experts staged a rare and noisy street demonstration in downtown Oslo on Wednesday to protest Norway joining adoption of Microsoft Corp.’s document format as the international standard.

[...]

Opponents claimed the move locks out competitors and forces Microsoft customers to keep buying the American software giant’s programs.

The entire world, not just Norwegians, ought to have learned from history and vigorously prevented a repetition of it. Remember what Groklaw wrote about WordPerfect experiences (Microsoft-imposed nightmares). It’s quite a deja vu. █

=> what Groklaw wrote about WordPerfect experiences

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