Open XML: 1st anniversary

ArticleDirectory

• Open XML support in office 2010
• Improve the relationship between interoperability and Innovation

You may have heard that this week is a crucial week for the Microsoft Business Department. Earlier this week, we announced a public release of Microsoft Office 2010 beta. Have you ever wanted to create a document in word together with your team? Have you ever wanted to analyze piles of data in Excel? Or break through multimedia restrictions in PowerPoint presentations? Now, try the beta version.

For standardsCommunityThis week is also a crucial week, especially for our members engaged in document format work. This week marks the first anniversary of the first release of ISO/IEC 29500 (also known as open XML. Because the cross-Office driverProgramI am responsible for supporting open XML in office 2010, so I think it is a good opportunity to share with you what we do in office 2010 to support open XML standards, at the same time, we will analyze how the improvement of interoperability is closely related to our office innovation capabilities.

Open XML support in office 2010

In terms of document format, everyone is thinking about a major issue, that is, to what extent office 2010 will provide support for open XML.I am very pleased to announce that office 2010 will generate a transitional consistent file that complies with the ISO/IEC 29500 standard by default.

To make office 2010 generate documents that comply with ISO/IEC 29500 standards, the first step is to evaluate the files we have generated in Office 2007. The product will generate the first version of the ECMA-376, you may remember, the first version of the ECMA-376 is the predecessor of the ISO/IEC 29500 standard. After identifying the Syntactic differences caused by defects or changes in the standard, we proceed with the necessary changes to make the syntax compliant with the standard.

Most people are surprised when they learn some of the changes we have to make to conform to the standard syntax. In most cases, changes are caused by small defects in specific circumstances. One of my favorite examples is a defect in Word 2007: in some cases, word willBeforeWrite the omath element, and the standard clearly states that the rfonts element should beAfterWrite the omath element. This is a small problem that can be easily solved. Most of the changes we make have this feature.

Since we have changed some syntaxes in the written file, we have also done the relevant work to ensure that customers using previous Office versions can continue to use these new syntax to process files. First, we include patches in Office 2007 Service Pack 2 to ensure continuous compatibility. Secondly, we have updated the compatibility packages for older versions of office. In other words, if you have Office 2007 SP2 or the latest compatible package, you can seamlessly interoperate with office 2010.

What we do is not limited to ensuring that the generated file conforms to the syntax. We also reviewed feasible recommendations made by national/regional agencies during the ISO approval process for open XML, and selected a small portion of them to be supported in office 2010. The following are some major suggestions:

• Supports reading the new percentage and measurement syntax;
• Supports titles on graphics to improve accessibility;
• Supports more named colors and longer color MRU lists;
• Supports new contentpart to retain ink permanently.

Based on feedback from national/regional institutions through standard processes, we have made significant investments in other two areas.

The first aspect involves our dependence on Vector Markup Language (VML. During the approval process, we heard some clear feedback that it is difficult for some other implementers to meet the requirement of dependency on VML. To overcome this obstacle, we managed to reduce VML dependencies and made significant progress in moving to drawingml. For example, in PowerPoint 2010, VML is almost never used as the main method to render drawing elements.

The second aspect involves the date syntax in the workbook. We also heard a lot of comments during the approval process requesting increased support for representation of dates in workbooks using ISO 8601 date syntax. Although it is still in progress, the support for this syntax is included in Excel 2010 beta. With regard to this investment, it is worth noting that we are working closely with members of JTC 1 SC 34 (the standard organization responsible for maintaining open XML, to identify and solve the backward compatibility issues related to this new feature. We are very proud of this cooperation between Microsoft and the standard community.

Improve the relationship between interoperability and Innovation

When I spoke to clients and partners about our ongoing efforts to improve interoperability, they asked me what impact I was looking to improve interoperability on our ability to provide innovation in office.

A few months ago, a friend of mine, Dr Lee (a member of the JTC 1 SC 34 Korean National Agency delegation), asked me during a DiI activity in Seattle, WA, focus on improving interoperability, and what is the impact on our innovation capabilities in office. This is a good question, and my answers surprised many DiI participants.

My answer is simple: no effect. If so, our innovation willEasier. Silence.

From a technical point of view, nothing in the standard hinders our innovation. Indeed, we must follow many rules and requirements. However, some technologies are defined in the open XML standard, MCE, and extended list. For example, some technologies enable all implementers to deliver standards-compliant implementation solutions. At the same time, however, the market is competitive in the value of customers. As we demonstrated at that DiI activity, Microsoft Office has used these technologies extensively to add all the great innovations to be delivered in version 2010, such as the mini graph in Excel 2010, and the switch function added in PowerPoint 2010.

In addition, I also pointed out that we have made a detailed record of the open XML implementation of office 2010 and the technical details behind these innovations to ensure that all implementers can access this information for free. After all, this is related to interoperability.

However, my answer to Dr. Lee is not only about technology, but also about the extent to which the work to improve interoperability does have a positive impact on the way we build the office.

We have increased interoperability to the same level as other core design requirements of our products. Just as all our features will pass security and privacy reviews, performance and scalability tests, accessibility and programmability reviews, and adequate global testing, we are now dealing with interoperability in the same way. We do not record the implementation of our file format until the end of the release, but are releasingPeriodThat is, record the implementation in the Process of processing it. This provides countless benefits for engineering teams to build functionality in a more effective and efficient way. In view of the rich documentation we have recorded in the document format, it also makes the induction training for new employees and the load balancing between employees more efficient. In the end, it will bring huge benefits to the entire design process. Thanks to its existence.

However, it is not just a record of your document format. It also involves constantly looking for new methods to improve the overall interoperability between implementations of different vendors. Recently we held a DiI activity on the PST format used by outlook. This is not what we do, but because it is indeed a correct thing. According to the feedback so far, this is a major victory for the industry.

I promise that the length of this article cannot exceed two or a half pages. Therefore, if some of you do not believe that our pursuit of improving interoperability does not impede our innovation capabilities, I have to provide another suggestion to prove my point: to get the beta version. It will explain everything to you.

Every member devoted to Microsoft Office development will always look forward to your valuable suggestions to help us improve our current interoperability. We hope that you will be as excited about the release of office 2010 as we do.

Shawn login Aron

Microsoft Office product group project manager

Shawnv@microsoft.com

For details

• Microsoft Office file format document
• Microsoft Office 2010 ISO/IEC 29500 Implementation Instructions
• Microsoft Office 2007 ECMA-376 first implementation instructions