Microsoft announced today that Microsoft Office 2007 will not support the ISO version of the OpenXML. BTW, who knows if the next version of MS Office will?

They also announced the native support for ODF 1.1 in MS Office 2007 after the installation of Service Pack 2, scheduled for 2009. It seems that the ODF will be (or could be) the default format of Microsoft Office 2007.

I’m also happy to see the recognition by the company that ODF is a “de facto standard,” and that they will participate in the OASIS ODF technical committee (of which I belong).

The only thing I would like to understand is what will be done with OpenXML. There must be some good humorist in the board of Microsoft, because they really rush things to approve it as an international standard, that I thought it would be adopted immediately by MS Office (maybe English humor ?… I don’t know why, but that reminds me Alex Brown…).

Anyway, here I will fulfill a promise made to many people. There is a music of Bob Marley called Small Axe, which has the chorus:

“So if you are the big tree
We are the small axe
Ready to cut you down (well sharp)
To cut you down ”

The whole lyric has much more cool and related things, but I love this part of it, and with it I would like to thank all those “small axes” that as I did, insist on working, working, without concern for whether the other side there is a bush or a giant oak.

Let’s see if the reality will be as beautiful as the announcement. Anyway, I think we are finally turning a page in the history of IT.

And to the ones that knows my promise, wait… the tattoo is coming