That’s not the only controversy over the project, of course; many
people are pointing out that it would have been much less troublesome
to start from a well-established code base like LibreOffice. But it
seems like the EU specifically wanted something that would work as
seamlessly as possible with Microsoft’s native document formats,
rather than any open standard.
On Fri, 12 Jun 2026 01:37:20 -0000 (UTC)
Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
That’s not the only controversy over the project, of course; many
people are pointing out that it would have been much less troublesome
to start from a well-established code base like LibreOffice. But it
seems like the EU specifically wanted something that would work as
seamlessly as possible with Microsoft’s native document formats,
rather than any open standard.
I understand the reasoning behind it, and they've made their choice.
But if ever there were a moment for the world to unite behind ODF, this
is it. Very sorry to see the opportunity pass.
My office has gone all-in on Microsoft's latest - the whole rat's nest
of O365, Sharepoint, and the rest of it (Oh, Teams, how could I forget
that nightmare?) and it is a horrible, horrible experience. Hilarious
to think we rose up in protest over browser choice but stood silent as
Teams bundling did away with the threat of Skype, and the new
subscription model for O365 means the interface can change from day to
day, all while Win11 helpfully suggests things I don't want. Makes me
want to retire to be free of this shitty software. Knowing the EU had
gotten behind ODF would've been a step in the right direction. Sadly:
no.
An EU-sponsored project to create an open-source office suite to act
as a drop-in replacement for Microsoft Office/365 has put out a
version 1.0 release <https://www.zdnet.com/article/euro-office-is-here-libreoffice-supporters-arent-happy/>.
One hiccup along the way was the copyright holders on the original
code, Ascensio, have put a strange requirement on their source, namely
that it was released under AGPLv3, but with a further condition saying
that its trademarks and logos and stuff *could not* be removed from
the code. And yet, at the same time, there was also a declaration that
the source code did *not* come with a licence to use said trademarks
and logos -- a copyright booby-trap if ever there was one.
Bradley Kühn, author of the “A” part of the AGPL, takes this apart
here <https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2026/apr/16/badgeware-onlyoffice-nextcloud-affero-gpl/>.
The general verdict seems to be that Ascensio’s legal threats are toothless, and the EU consortium is free to do all the usual things
with the source code as per the terms of the AGPLv3, including strip
out any proprietary trademarks and logos.
That’s not the only controversy over the project, of course; many
people are pointing out that it would have been much less troublesome
to start from a well-established code base like LibreOffice. But it
seems like the EU specifically wanted something that would work as
seamlessly as possible with Microsoft’s native document formats,
rather than any open standard.
On 2026-06-12, Retrograde wrote:
On Fri, 12 Jun 2026 01:37:20 -0000 (UTC)
Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
That’s not the only controversy over the project, of course; many
people are pointing out that it would have been much less troublesome
to start from a well-established code base like LibreOffice. But it
seems like the EU specifically wanted something that would work as
seamlessly as possible with Microsoft’s native document formats,
rather than any open standard.
I understand the reasoning behind it, and they've made their choice.
But if ever there were a moment for the world to unite behind ODF, this
is it. Very sorry to see the opportunity pass.
This is puzzling me, indeed, there have existed alternatives to MS
Office already, and LibreOffice and OpenOffice.org have been one for
years.
Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> wrote:
On 2026-06-12, Retrograde wrote:
On Fri, 12 Jun 2026 01:37:20 -0000 (UTC)
Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
That’s not the only controversy over the project, of course; many
people are pointing out that it would have been much less troublesome
to start from a well-established code base like LibreOffice. But it
seems like the EU specifically wanted something that would work as
seamlessly as possible with Microsoft’s native document formats,
rather than any open standard.
I understand the reasoning behind it, and they've made their choice.
But if ever there were a moment for the world to unite behind ODF, this
is it. Very sorry to see the opportunity pass.
This is puzzling me, indeed, there have existed alternatives to MS
Office already, and LibreOffice and OpenOffice.org have been one for
years.
The original quote implies the EU fools wanted to continue to use "DOCX files" but without the "DOCX tax" included.
Yes, they would have been much better off going with LibreOffice, and switching their desired format to ODF, and simply making DOCX "legacy".
But the sound of things is they may have wanted to continue to DOCX everything.
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