Microsoft and Open Standards: Can Other Vendors Implement Microsoft's Office Open XML

This paper examines whether OOXML can be fully implemented by vendors other than Microsoft and concludes that a number of application specific and undisclosed behaviours (as well as a number of other technical flaws) in the proposed standard make this impossible. Also while Microsoft has waived patent claims for the explicit and required parts of the specification it is clearly stated that this does not extend to the undisclosed behaviours or ambiguous definitions, providing a legal as well as technical barrier to OOXML's implementation.

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