Re: [oiic-formation-discuss] Reason and example arguing for the use of an ODF (or XML) canonical form

[jose lorenzo <hozelda@yahoo.com>]

--- On Sun, 7/6/08, robert_weir@us.ibm.com <robert_weir@us.ibm.com> wrote:

> From: robert_weir@us.ibm.com <robert_weir@us.ibm.com>
> Subject: Re: [oiic-formation-discuss] Reason and example arguing for the use of an ODF (or XML) canonical form
> To: oiic-formation-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org
> Date: Sunday, July 6, 2008, 11:35 PM
> Simon Calderson <caldersons@yahoo.co.uk> wrote on
> 07/05/2008 01:09:51 PM:
> 
> > 
> >  jose lorenzo <hozelda@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > I hadn't realized that an assumption deemed
> necessary in order for 
> this 
> > > venture to have success would be that all market
> players (including 
> the
> > > monopolist) cooperate fully.
> > 
> > Just to be clear, I wasn't advocating that
> assumption.
> > 
> > What I do say is actually two things:
> > 
> > 1. interop will only be improved by vendors
> participating in the new
> > TC in good faith
> > 2. the new TC cannot do much to improve interop in the
> products of 
> > vendors who do not have such good faith.
> > 
> 
> Right.  We make the medicine, but we can't force people
> to take it.
> 
> On the other hand, there are people out there, outside of
> the TC, who can 
> force people to take medicine, and if those people like our
> medicine, then 
> it could conceivably become mandatory in some places.  But
> that is outside 
> of our control.  All we can do is try to create very good
> medicine.  We're 
> forming a technical committee, with the emphasis on
> technical.  Although 
> our work has policy implications, we are not the ones who
> set or enforce 
> policy.

It's a judgment call how much effort to put on building what medicine.

> > For the most part, I believe anyone who participates
> in the new TC 
> > will do so out of good faith. Anyone not interested in
> ODF interop 
> > is just simply not going to participate. 
> > 
> 
> I think that has to be our working assumption, until proven
> otherwise.  It 
> is not a guarantee, but I think we start from that
> position. 
> 
> > And the corollary of that is that I believe it's
> just a waste of 
> > time concentrating on features which "force"
> interoperability. It's 
> > not going to work, and the time would be better spent
> on creating 
> > tools and documents for those really interested in
> interop. This new
> > TC cannot force people to interoperate: only market
> forces will do that.
> > 
> 
> Well said.

A FAQ (as a deliverable I suppose) might be a good idea. The FAQ could help answer direct questions about conformity and interop issues.

[Not necessarily meant to be used as is:]

"Can an ODF conformant app fail to interoperate with other ODF conformant apps? Yes, but ....

"Can ODF conformant apps add extensions not supported in any other ODF conformant apps? Yes, but ...."

Such a FAQ would be very little trouble and should prove to be very useful to both tech and especially to nontech audiences.