Document Interoperability

OASIS Open Document Format ODF 1.0 (ISO/IEC 26300:2006) and Office Open XML (ISO/IEC 29500:2008) are both open document formats for saving and exchanging word processing documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Both formats are XML based but differ in design and scope.

OASIS ODF 1.0 was published by OASIS in May 2005 and accepted as an international standard by ISO (ISO/IEC 26300:2006) in December 2006. In January ODF 1.2 has been published as an approved OASIS Standard . Early 2012 ODF 1.1 has been published as an Amendment ISO 26300:2006. Office Open XML was first approved in December 2006 by the ECMA International General Assembly as ECMA-376. An updated version was published in November 2008 by ISO (ISO/IEC 29500:2008). The corresponding version, ECMA-376 2nd edition, was published in December 2008. The consolidated version of Office Open XML has been published as ISO/IEC 29500:2011 late 2011.

ISO Technical Report

In the context of the standardization of both documents formats ISO SC34/WG5 has completed the work on a Technical Report “Open Document Format / Office Open XML Translation Guidelines” to identify technical translation guidelines for evaluating translatability between certain parts of the two International Standards. The final version of the technical report “ISO/IEC TR29166:2011” has been published early 2012. Fraunhofer FOKUS supported this work as a responsible editor of the Technical Report.

The Technical Report addresses both developers, seeking to implement either the OpenDocument or the Office Open XML standard and template designers and other power users whose competences cut across the spectrum of XML and XML-related technologies which directly or remotely deal with one or both of the two standards. The report will be of great assistance to those seeking to exchange documents between formats, to extract data from or import data into documents, or to write applications supporting the two formats.

FOKUS White Paper

The FOKUS White Paper “Document Interoperability: OpenDocument Format and Office Open XML” addresses both technical and strategic decision makers in the public sector. It analyzes how both standards implement the most important document features, and if and how these features can be translated between the two formats.