Microsoft's OOXML victory claim was premature

Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) has failed to come up with the goods to get the format ratified as a standard in its current form by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO).

Yesterday, the software giant publicly claimed an early victory in the standards ratification fast-track voting process, alluding to the fact that most ISO members are with it rather than against it.

But drilling down into the details of the voting requirements suggest otherwise with the official line from the ISO stating that OOXML "has not achieved the required number of votes for approval".

"The five-month ballot process ended on 2 September and was open to the IEC and ISO national member bodies from 104 countries, including 41 that are participating members of the joint ISO/IEC technical committee, JTC 1, Information technology," said a statement issued by the ISO.

"Approval requires at least 2/3 (i.e. 66.66 per cent) of the votes cast by national bodies participating in ISO/IEC JTC 1 to be positive; and no more than 1/4 (i.e. 25 per cent) of the total number of national body votes cast negative. Neither of these criteria were achieved, with 53 per cent of votes cast by national bodies participating in ISO/IEC JTC 1 being positive and 26 per cent of national votes cast being negative."

Comments from Microsoft following the vote suggested that the outcome was more positive than it later transpired. The software giant issued a statement declaring "strong global support for Open XML" suggesting a 74 per cent vote in favour of ratification. Although accurate, this statement didn't reference the fact that the voting is two-pronged and two-thirds of P members must also vote in approval.

Furthermore it said that the many of the remaining members would be supportive once they're comments have been addressed, which doesn't leave much time to iron out any potential issues given the ISO ballot resolution timeframe of February next year. If it doesn't succeed in making enough changes to swing the negative votes into positives, it will fail the fast-track process for publication but still be eligible to go through the normal standards development and voting processes.

"We are extremely delighted to see that 51 ISO members, representing 74 per cent of the qualified votes, have already voiced their support for ISO ratification of Open XML, and that many others have indicated they will support ratification once their comments are resolved in the next phase of the ISO process," said Tom Robertson, general manager for interoperability and standards at Microsoft.

"This preliminary vote is a milestone for the widespread adoption of the Open XML formats around the world for the benefit of millions of customers. Given how encouraging today's results were, we believe that the final tally in early 2008 will result in the ratification of Open XML as an ISO standard."

Many media reports and industry blogs have highlighted late entrants to ISO membership who have taken part in this latest vote - many of which are Microsoft certified partners - and the company has admitted that, in the case of Sweden -which has been used as a particular example - its local team "did reach out to partners and encouraged them to join the process". However it alleged that rival IBM has engaged in similar tactics to the counter a positive vote and has pointed to active anti-ratification campaigns such as www.noooxml.org.

"A broad variety of customers, technology providers, and governments around the globe have a stake in the standardisation and ongoing evolution of Open XML. These groups want to have a seat at the table when these decisions are being made and have joined national standards bodies around the world so their voices can be heard," Microsoft said in a statement sent to IT PRO in response to our request for comment on the issue.

"We reject the assertion that the document standards process should be closed to new voices and it's clear that those with an interest in Open XML do too."

Click here for IT PRO's feature looking into more detail about Microsoft's OOXML and the issue of standards.

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