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The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) finally published the Open Document Format (ODF) as an official standard last week after approving it as an international standard last May. The ODF file format—the XML-based open format for text, spreadsheet, database, and presentation files—is now published under the standard name of ISO/IEC 26300:2006. ODF is being championed as the accessible file format by accessibility groups, as the open standard must face public peer review to evaluate its accessibility as opposed to other, proprietary formats (such as .doc). Since it is specified as a public document, the idea is that anyone can create software for it under any platform at any time for those with disabilities without worrying about royalties or implementation barriers, not to mention those who simply like being able to move files around without concerning themselves with incompatible formats.

This move will likely give an advantage to ODF over other open standards, such as the Office XML standard that Microsoft has been working on. There are already a number of companies and organizations worldwide that support the use of ODF, and various software, such as OpenOffice.org, already generates ODF files as the native file format. Additionally, Google's web-based office apps support ODF, and even Microsoft has conceded that it will support a plugin for Microsoft Office that will convert files to ODF. However, while some doomsdayers claim that the standardization of ODF will be the end of proprietary apps such as Microsoft's Office, there is very little evidence to support this claim. As we wrote back in June, ODF may become more popular with the support of big names such as Google, but MS Office won't be stamped out by open standards alone. Many users will still prefer the interface advantages of software such as Office over open source alternatives, but the adoption of an open file format that Office and other software can save out to will be what matters for the future of ODF.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061204-8349.html

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