blog.scottlowe.org

I have a variety of miscellaneous tidbits to mention, in case you haven’t already heard about them.

• ODF for Microsoft Office:  Now that OpenDocument format (ODF) has been approved as an ISO standard, the OpenDocument Foundation has announced a plug-in for ODF that allows Microsoft Office (as far back as Office 97) to open, render, and save files as ODF.  This, in my opinion, is a great thing, as it allows those organizations that can’t use an alternate office suite to still take advantage of open file formats.
• Vista’s Security Implications:  While Microsoft touts the impressive security benefits of Windows Vista, others are disagreeing.  A recently published report believes that the new security measures interfere so heavily with users that they’ll end up getting turned off.  Furthermore, the new features and their administrative overhead will likely cause significant delays in the adoption of Vista.
• Resource Manager Web Interface:  Jason Conger has released the Web Interface for Resource Manager.  If you use Citrix Resource Manager, this is a must-have add-on.
• Virtual Security:  Joining Reflex Security (which unveiled its Reflex VSA virtual appliance a while ago—I hope to be able to review/demo this product soon and will provide more details here when that happens), Astaro has announced the Astaro Security Gateway for VMware.  The cool part is that users are encouraged to download a trial copy from Astaro’s web site.

Mark one up for cross-platform standards:  the OpenDocument format, an XML-based file format originally derived from work on OpenOffice.org (and Sun’s StarOffice) has been officially approved as an ISO standard.

There are numerous announcements of the approval—this eWeek article, which initially alerted me; this press release at the OpenOffice.org web site; and this blog entry by Andy Updegrove, a participant in the standardization committees.

Of course, Microsoft continues to push its Open XML format as an alternative to ODF.  The push for ODF was never really about taking power away from Microsoft, though; it was really about moving documents and records and information into a format that isn’t controlled by a single vendor.  With ODF as an ISO/IEC standard (and likely to see much broader adoption now as a result), organizations don’t have to worry about changes in file formats suddenly wreaking havoc with years of accumulated documents.  If the application(s) they use with ODF are Microsoft Office, StarOffice, KOffice, or OpenOffice, who cares?  It’s not really about the application, it’s about the data.

I stumbled across a forum on Apple’s web site this morning (referred to me in turn by Derrick Story’s request for MacBook Pro feedback) that makes me glad I’m not yet able to afford a MacBook Pro.

According to the forum, there is a bug in the Ethernet driver in the Intel version of Mac OS X 10.4 that causes excessive packet loss on networks that employ 802.1Q.  802.1Q, in case you aren’t already familiar with it, is an Ethernet networking standard used in networks that employ multiple VLANs.  Apparently, the Ethernet driver on the Intel-based Macs is incorrectly processing packets as 802.1Q packets when they really aren’t.  This causes excessive packet loss and network connections that are pretty much unusable.

I guess I’ll have to wait for the second generation of Intel-based Mac laptops.  That’s OK, as it gives me plenty of time to get my money’s worth from my current PowerBook G4.

Not suprisingly, Microsoft’s moves to “open” up its XML-based file formats for current and future versions of Microsoft Office have swayed the State of Massachusetts back to its side again.  Get the details here.

Microsoft recently made a move to “open” up its XML-based file formats for Microsoft Office 2003 and the forthcoming Office 12.  These file formats were offered to ECMA International for consideration as a formal open standard.  However, the “license” for these file formats was merely a promise not to sue people violating its patents on the use of the file formats.  Read more here.

Also see these comments from a legal analyst regarding Microsoft’s Patent Protection Covenant.

Personally, a promise “not to sue” from any large corporation—not just Microsoft—wouldn’t be good enough for me were I a developer.  Somehow, I don’t think that many developers are going to feel completely comfortable incorporating Office 2003/12 XML-based file formats into their applications based solely on the Patent Protection Covenant.  What happens when (not if) the covenant changes?

The rallying cry around OpenDocument prompted Microsoft to make its counter-move.  As fully expected, Microsoft is trying to create a standard based on Microsoft’s own (until now) proprietary XML formats.  Please tell me you saw this coming, right?

With companies from Novell to Corel standing in support of the OpenDocument format, a new coalition forming in support of the format, and governments agencies such as the State of Massachusetts requiring the use of file formats such as PDF and OpenDocument, clearly Microsoft was worried.  Otherwise, why try to create an alternate standard of your own creation?  Why not just join the existing standards?  Many are also saying that Microsoft’s decision to include PDF support in the next version of Office is another attempt to keep from being shut out.  After all, Office is a major cash cow for Microsoft, so the company will do whatever it can to provent a loss of marketshare (and revenue as a result).

News surfaced today that the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has approved the Linux Standards Base (LSB) as an international standard.  The LSB 2.0.1 core specification has been accepted by the ISO and will be published as International Standard 23360.

In my eyes, this is a big indicator of Linux’s maturity.  Does Linux still need growth in some areas to be more competitive with Microsoft Windows, Novell NetWare, Solaris, or Mac OS X?  Yes, certainly.  And yet, at the same time, Linux has strengths all its own as well.  This recognition by the ISO of the Linux Standards Base serves to further legitimize Linux as a viable and worthy competitor to the proprietary operating systems listed above.

(By the way, you’ll note that I did not include Novell’s Open Enterprise Server in the list of operating systems above because it is, of course, based on Linux.)

In my experiments with Perdition, I learned a couple of very interesting facts.  First, the IMAP4 implementation on Exchange Server 2003 does not support the STARTTLS command, as described in RFC 2595 and re-affirmed in RFC 3501.  Instead, Exchange expects an SSL session to be established immediately, and then IMAP is spoken.  This is similar to the “smtpd_tls_wrappermode” directive that Postfix supports.

Second, it appears that the Mac OS X Mail application (commonly referred to as Mail.app) also uses this IMAP-over-SSL approach, since I’ve been using Mail.app to connect to Exchange using IMAP with SSL for quite some time.  I’m trying to confirm that now, but having precious little luck finding any definitive information one way or the other.  If anyone knows for certain, please let me know.  I’m going to keep searching.

This is one of those things that just makes me crazy.