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By V Sasi Kumar India should not make the mistake of being pressured to adopt a non-free standard for computer applications or we could have big problems in the future
Read Microsoft’s clarification Computers and the Internet have been with us for a number of years now, and are becoming increasingly popular among those who can afford them. Internet cafes are making this technology accessible also to a section of the population that cannot afford personal computers. Although the size of the population with access to the Internet is admittedly tiny, this is a technology that's soon going to be ubiquitous. More importantly, state and central governments have begun using it to bring greater transparency in governance and to speed up the administrative process. Records pertaining to land, people and governance are being converted into digital format. Similarly, a lot of information related to government, even courts of law, is being put up on the Internet. This raises certain issues related to the technology used. In Information Technology (IT), there are broadly two kinds of software: proprietary and free. Here, ‘free' is used in the sense of ‘freedom', not necessarily ‘free of cost'. Examples of the former are Microsoft software like MS Windows and MS Office, and other software such as Adobe Photoshop. Examples of free software are the GNU/Linux operating system, the office suite OpenOffice.org and image editor Gimp. Free software offers users four kinds of freedoms -- the freedom to use the software on any computer, for any purpose; the freedom to share it with others; the freedom to study the software and modify it for one's own use; and the freedom to redistribute the modified version. While the use of free software benefits everyone, especially governments, we shall look at another aspect of IT here. File formats Apart from the software used, we also need to choose the format in which files are stored. For instance, documents containing only text can be stored in text format, which does not permit complex formatting like bold, italics or colour. It can also be formatted in a word processor like Microsoft Word or OpenOffice.org Writer. Similarly, pictures, sound files, movies, animation, databases and so on may be stored in different kinds of formats. Some of these are proprietary formats that can be decoded properly only using proprietary software, while others are free and open formats that can be opened with a wide variety of software. Most computer users are not fully aware of the issues related to using different kinds of formats. Let us look at one such problem. This is based on a real incident. When Raghu could not open a document he received by email from a friend overseas, he decided to contact his colleague Harish who was the local troubleshooter for all kinds of computer-related problems. Harish took a look at the file and told Raghu that he would not be able to open it in Word because it was a Lotus WordPro document. Raghu was, naturally, taken aback. He did not understand what Harish meant. Harish explained to him that Word is only one of several word processors being used on computers, albeit the most popular one; WordPro was another, so are WordPerfect and OpenOffice.org Writer. All these, except the last, stored their documents in formats that are understood properly only by their respective applications. So, a document created using one word processor cannot be opened using another. Many people have faced this problem at one time or another, though not very often. But it's a potentially serious problem, especially for central or state governments. In most cases, documents are generated in proprietary formats such as Microsoft Word or Excel. Five years from now, if it becomes necessary to open one such document, two conditions will have to be satisfied: one, that Microsoft still exists and its applications still allow us to open documents in these formats; and two, that we will have the required Microsoft application installed. This means that we are bound to always use Microsoft applications -- a phenomenon known as ‘vendor lock-in'. We don't face these drawbacks in other areas where we use technology products. For instance, we still continue to use plugs, holders and other electrical fittings installed 20 or more years ago. We are still able to connect our modern gadgets to them without experiencing any problems. This is possible because of standardisation. There were standards in place when these fittings were made, and we follow the same standards today. Unfortunately there were no standards for documents generated using computers, until recently that is. This may appear to be a small problem, especially in India where few people use computers. But it's not. Imagine a huge database for e-governance built on a proprietary database. The company that provides the database could, one morning, suddenly announce that it is shifting to another format and will not be able to continue providing support for the older version beyond a certain date. Such things have actually happened. For instance, Microsoft told users of its older system, Windows NT, that it would not provide support beyond December 31, 2004, and that those who were using it should move to the newer system, Windows 2000. This meant that people who were using Windows NT and were happy with it were forced to install the new system, which often meant replacing the computer itself, migrating all the data (sometimes including applications) to the new system, and retraining staff -- a very expensive exercise in many situations. It could have been worse: suppose the company itself were to wind up! Like in the case of a company that was developing an application (called 3B2) for typesetting academic journals which was taken over by another company that is now silent about the software's maintenance. Typesetting companies that were using this application are now getting the jitters since changing over to a new application means retraining hundreds of employees and the consequent loss in production. So, what's the solution? The solution is to have a standard format for all documents. This fact was realised by users in developed countries long before we did, as a consequence of which we have an ISO standard -- the Open Document Format (ODF). This includes standards for text documents, spreadsheets, presentations and drawings. And it is a free standard (all ISO standards are not free). What is a free standard? A free standard is a standard that belongs to no one. It belongs to all of humanity and is not controlled by any person or organisation. It may appear strange that standards are controlled by people. But it's possible. For instance, Microsoft has proposed a document standard known as OOXML (Office Open XML, where XML is a language that is becoming popular for formatting documents and stands for eXtended Markup Language). OOXML has been accepted as a standard (Ecma 376) by Ecma (originally, the European Computer Manufacturer's Association), a private standardisation body, on December 7, 2006. It is now under consideration for acceptance as a standard by the International Standards Organisation (ISO) but has lost out in the first stage. OOXML is a proprietary format by Microsoft and someone who wants to implement it will require a licence, though it is an open standard. This is one of the reasons why organisations like the Free Software Foundation and industries like Google and IBM are fighting the acceptance of OOXML as an ISO standard. Another reason is that they are trying to create a second standard while the ISO-approved ODF standard still exists. Interestingly, both are based on XML. Moreover, instead of using existing standards for components inside the document standard (such as ISO 8601 for the representation of date and time), it uses its own non-standard formats. Finally, it is strange that Microsoft refuses to support the ISO's existing ODF standard. They are actually duplicating the effort of creating an ISO standard, namely ODF, which is totally unnecessary. India voted against OOXML at the preliminary stage. Along with several other countries, India points to aspects of OOXML that are not acceptable in the country. Microsoft submitted a 6,000 page document for evaluation. Since it had asked for (and was given) the fast-track route for acceptance, the time available for people to respond was just about a month. This was probably done deliberately so that people would not find the time to study the document, necessarily a highly technical one, in detail. In spite of this, teams in India and other countries burnt the midnight oil to go through the document carefully and come up with major objections, some of which Microsoft may find difficult to counter. They get another opportunity to defend themselves against the criticism; if they are able to respond satisfactorily to the issues raised by the various parties, then OOXML could become an ISO standard. However, India and other countries have the option of deciding on the standard they will follow. This should be a free standard, like ODF (a few countries and regions like the state of Massachusetts have already adopted this standard). If OOXML becomes an ISO standard there is bound to be a lot of pressure on governments to adopt it. We should not make that mistake. (V Sasi Kumar is with the Atmospheric Sciences Division of the Centre for Earth Science Studies, Thiruvananthapuram) Microsoft clarifies: This is with reference to the story ‘India must adopt free standards’ by V Sasi Kumar. The article which expands on the individual view held by the author, raises questions around Open XML as a technology standard and the intent of Microsoft as a technology player. I would like to strongly point out that there is some erroneous understanding of the entire process as well as the technology. At the outset, Microsoft software is completely interoperable. In fact Microsoft has consistently invested in helping customers integrate our platform and applications with a broad array of popular (and even not so popular) hardware, software and networks. We have partnered with Novell & Sun among others to ensure Windows interoperability across technology platforms. As a result of these efforts, Microsoft offers a comprehensive portfolio of interoperability software capabilities, from the operating system to individual applications. This development highlights our commitment to address customer interoperability needs, and that we acknowledge the mixed source environment needs of our customers. Our efforts are helping our customers run both Microsoft Windows and SUSE Linux Enterprise systems seamlessly together.
The article mentions that Microsoft is pushing for Open XML as a standard despite a host of technical flaws. The fact remains that Open XML was submitted for ISO standardisation by Ecma International, and is an open standard and was developed as part of a cross-industry/cross-organisation collaboration that included Apple, Barclays Capital, BP, The British Library, Essilor, Intel, Microsoft, NextPage, Novell, Statoil, Toshiba, and the U.S. Library of Congress. The so-called ‘technical flaws’ are comments made by ICO committee members in order to document the standard. As part of the standardisation, Ecma is currently in the process of collating resolutions for the comments given by the ISO. At the end of the Ballot Resolution phase, the ISO will ask all national bodies like the Bureau of International Standards (BIS) to ascertain the resolutions. The report erroneously suggests that the Indian committee meeting of BIS rejected Open XML. This is incorrect since the committee unanimously supported the need for multiple standards and they have also stated they would welcome Open XML as an ISO standard once Ecma reverts on the comments given by the committee.
Contrary to what the article suggests, users do not need to sign any licence agreement or pay Microsoft anything to use Open XML. It is also important to understand that placing a standard under ISO actually means handing over its control to the international standards body!
The piece quotes Massachusetts as an example for having ‘chosen’ ODF over other standards – while the reality is that the opposite is true. The state of Massachusetts included Open XML and ODF, both, in its state policy on August 1, 2007. The state opted for choice of open, XML-based document formats by including both standards in its Enterprise Technical Reference Model (ETRM).
--Meenu Handa
(Director Corporate Communications, Microsoft India) InfoChange News & Features, January 2008
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