On 02/04/2010 11:52 AM, Saswata Banerjee wrote:
Hi Guys, I do not know if you consider this as an achievement, but Microsoft Word 2007 can open and read all odt files. They have provided a add-in converter. If you have MsOffice on your PC and you double click an odt file, it gets the converter (once only) and installs it in MsOffice
I found this when a business associate to whom i send a odt file was able to open it without issues :-)
Not much of an achievement considering that the odt format is an *open* format, so anyone who can read specifications and write software to match those can create a odt reader/editor, unlike proprietary formats (or in case of ooxml bad, over general and patent dependent ^standard^), where creating a reader/writer is not only a technical issue (if the format has to be reverse engineered) but also a legal issue (if implementing such software would imply 'infringing' on patents).
So, basically it is the same as Microsoft's contribution to the linux kernel -- not really noteworthy since they do it only because they can.
cheers, - steve