academic ideas & focus re ODF Adoption and Union

[Louis Suarez-Potts <Louis.Suarez-Potts@Sun.COM>]

if we are focusing on our mission for the coming year, it makes sense  
to claim the ODF Toolkit Union as the reference point. The Union is  
not about any one implementation but about the technology for  
efficient implementations. It thus makes a lot of sense then that the  
ODF Adoption TC should work more closely with the Union (and vice  
versa) and be, in effect, if not de jure, the vehicle for the Union's  
and technology's promotion and development.

Comments?

* We need to recruit development teams to the Union, as well as this  
TC. That's not new, but it should be a lot easier now, what with the  
Union's concrete identity. If before, there was no "there, there," in  
that it was just an abstraction satisfied by particular  
implementations, there is now solidity, and a developing community.  
(Progress!)

* Whom to recruit? Our tendency is normally to hit on Big Spenders,  
and that's not a bad approach. But I would also suggest looking at  
CMSs, as they are a very rapidly growing sector, and differ in their  
management of file formats, with eZ Publish expressing data as ODF but  
Alfresco having, I believe, im/ex functionality only.

Don also suggested that David E. be a kind of ambassador for  
academics, as the topic is ripe for development by professors as well  
as students. I've floated the idea of having classes at Seneca on the  
ODF development, and this is possible, but there, as at many other  
places (eg, SFSU), we'd need to fund an instructor, at least part  
time. But, to return to academics:

* inform various academic CMS leads, such as those involved with  
Moodle, Sakai; and to ping Jutta T. of the Toronto accessibility  
effort, Fluid Project, which is to work with any CMS, but esp. Moodle  
and Sakai, the latter privileged.

* Create a Google Group focused on ODF Union and its development. This  
can be a complement to the Union lists and fora, to be sure, and its  
point would be to appeal to other audiences.

* Present at various SIMS events (formerly library schools, now  
information sciences); as well, the social science research events

And so on.

-louis