● 07.23.12

●● Microsoft Uses Proprietary Formats to Impede and Derail Government Migrations to Free Software

Posted in Free/Libre Software, Microsoft, Novell, Office Suites, Open XML, OpenDocument at 4:03 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Migration difficulties consistently point to problems with Microsoft’s format abuses

WE recently explained how SUSE, part of the now-defunct Novell, is promoting OOXML in government. Rather than embrace ODF, some governments find themselves reliant on Microsoft-funded SUSE programmers who were legally required to push OOXML. And here is the outcome:

Local, national and European governmental dependencies on proprietary software continue to hinder municipalities that try to get rid of vendor lock-in by switching to open source. Recent examples include the municipal governments of Freiburg in Germany, Miskolcs in Hungary and Schoten in Belgium.

ODF has no such issues; our guess is, Microsoft occupied the competition to the point where ODF advocacy got demoralised and rather scarce. The problem is not Free/open source office suites; the problem is proprietary Microsoft formats that corruption such as bribery has defended. █

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