Productivity Moving To The Web

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My recent post about Oracle backing Open Office, an open source productivity suite to rival Microsoft, elicited a great response from Gary Edwards, former executive director of alt-Office effort Open Document Foundation, which I’ve reproduced below:

What Web business systems really need are advanced desktop editors capable of producing business process rich compound documents in the language of the Web: HTML5/CSS3/JavaScript.

The opportunity for OpenOffice (OOo) is incredible, but there are two faults the community must overcome. Although OOo can go toe-to-toe with Microsoft Office when it comes to features, those features were designed to be competitive, but not compatible. When you’re up against a competitor dominating over 94% of all business desktops, after 15 years of business systems development bound to their productivity environment, entangled and deeply entrenched into the day to day life of these businesses, compatibility matters.

The second fault for OOo to overcome is that it can’t speak Web. Especially the HTML+ language used by ACiD3 browsers and WebKit wonders that dominate the edge of the Web.

The low hanging fruit for OOo is the Open Web because that’s the one place the Microsoft Office editors and the productivity environment they anchor can’t go. Going to HTML+ with round trip capable collaborative capabilities would end the monopolist’s reign. And what business out there isn’t evaluating their business systems and thinking Web?

This is not to say that Microsoft has been sitting back, enjoying the profits while feature-filled alternatives flounder in the weeds of non-Web formats. The 2010 gush of integrated desktop, device, developer, server and Cloud products are designed to provide all the features of the Open Web 3.0 without the Open Web formats, protocols and interfaces that would have leveled the business playing field for competitors.

This is not to say that the future of the Open Web now rests with Oracle. If the desktop won’t come to the Web, the Web will come to the desktop. Microsoft’s fight against Open Web browsers and run time engines will be nothing next to the fight against Open Web ready netbooks, smartphones, counter-tops and tablets. But yes, it would be something if OpenOffice finally decided to join the battle for the Web.

Tags: Web, Microsoft Corp., Channel Management, OpenOffice, Desktops, Open Source, Marketing, Office Suites, Software, Hardware, Michael Hickins

Michael Hickins is a professional writer and journalist with a passion for ferreting out the intersections between technology and culture.

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rcweir

08/11/09 | Report as spam

RE: Productivity Moving To The Web

First, the Open Document Foundation was not an "alt office effort". It was a 3-person operation that produced absolutely nothing but press releases. It is defunct, having disbanded several years ago. The fact that Gary has nothing better to put in his job title today shows that his accomplishments since 2007 are even more modest than before.

Second, have you not heard that Office 2010 will be including web-based editors? That seems to cut against the assertion "that?s the one place the Microsoft Office editors and the productivity environment they anchor can?t go".

Finally, Gary makes a blanket assertion on compatible that is generally not held to be true. We've witnessed many incompatible technological advances, even in the face of wide deployment of legacy systems. For example CD's dominated, even though they were incompatible with LP's. Of course, you can point to examples, where compatibility was the determining factor, such as the case of two different approaches to color television where the one that was compatible with B&W signals won over the superior system that was incompatible. In general, the analysis of these kinds of standards wars is quite complex, but well-covered in the literature. Gary's post does not seem to comprehend what is already known on this topic, and certainly does not add to it.

Remember, everyone once ran WordPerfect and 1-2-3. Certainly the move to MS Office was not hampered by Office's lack of perfect compatibility with those legacy formats? And we had business systems coded in 1-2-3 macros, even back then, that people needed to convert. It is an issue to consider, of course, but only a shallow consideration of the topic would conclude that it is an insurmountably obstacle to migration.