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Tags > standards
Four short links: 20 November 2009
By Nat TorkingtonNovember 20, 2009
Spokeo -- abysmal indictment of society, first prize in mankind's race to the bottom. Uncover personal photos, videos, and secrets ... GUARANTEED! Spokeo deep searches within 48 major social networks to find truly mouth-watering news about friends and coworkers. PS, anybody who gives their gmail username and password to a site that specializes in dishing dirt can only be...
Open for Business - Designing Social Interfaces
By Christian CrumlishNovember 19, 2009
This is an excerpt from Designing Social Interfaces. From the creators of Yahoo!'s Design Pattern Library, Designing Social Interfaces provides you with more than 100 patterns, principles, and best practices, along with salient advice for many of the common challenges you'll face when starting a social website. Christian Crumlish and Erin Malone share hard-won insights into what works, what doesn't, and why. You'll learn how to balance opposing factions and grow healthy online communities by co-creating them with your users.
Adam Bosworth on picking standards - Rare nerdy technical post
By Rick JelliffeNovember 11, 2009
I enjoyed Adam Bosworth's Talking to DC. But don't his points apply to most software/interface specifications, without being doctrinaire? What is the difference between his Standards work best when they are focused and, say, Agile's YAGNI?...
Leaked Draft of EU Interop Framework
By Rick JelliffeNovember 11, 2009
A Dutch website has what is claimed to be a leaked late draft in English of European Interoperability Framework for European Public Services (EIF) Version 2.0
The Norwegians still get it! - Surfer dudes go with Ogg
By Rick JelliffeSeptember 28, 2009
These all seem the right way to do things: a user decides what it needs for specific uses, is pragmatic or generous about timing, and doesn't exclude any of the technical eco-systems from equal participation. I think it also represents a real challenge to the software vendors: starting 2011 they will have to compete on features, quality and support, not file format: they won't have the supposed lock-in to benefit or excuse them from providing value.
RSS never blocks you or goes down: why social networks need to be decentralized
By Andy OramSeptember 13, 2009
We may have been willing to build our virtual houses on shaky foundations might when they were temporary beach huts; but now we need to examine the ground on which many are proposing to build our virtual shopping malls and even our virtual federal offices. The next generation of social networking increasingly appears to require a decentralized, peer-to-peer infrastructure.
Do we need lazy loading XML parsers to make XHTML scalable?
By Rick JelliffeSeptember 10, 2009
W3C does not want to cop having to serve dumb XHTML requests.for DTDs and schemas. A different DOCTYPE and a lazy loading parser policy would help. But I think all the ISO/MathML special character public entity sets should be built into XML.
Rikipedia: stuff deleted from Wikipedia - Ken Krechmer on OOXML Standardization - Both ODF and OOXML only support flexibility, but adaptability is better?
By Rick JelliffeSeptember 1, 2009
I found that that an interesting section Ken Krechemer had contributed to the Wikipedia article on the Standardization of OOXML had been deleted for being an editorial. Anyway, I hope Ken doesn't mind me taking the liberty of reprinting it here.
Europeans: only two weeks left to comment on ICT & standards whitepaper
By Rick JelliffeAugust 31, 2009
On my brief reading, the whitepaper is very good in many of the issues that concern me: it mentions balance as well as openness, it mentions vendor-neutral technologies, they mention the need for flexibility. I especially like the encouragement that research efforts need to be more standards-aware. I like the inclusion of consortia (in a way that allows seniority to the international and national bodies.) I like that timely maintenance has been given prominence. there are a few things I am not so keen about, most relating to so-called Intellectual Property, a euphemism for monopoly rights and market distortion. I would like the whitepaper to have gone much further than it does.
Four short links: 17 August 2009
By Nat TorkingtonAugust 16, 2009
How Twitter Works in Theory (Kevin Marks) -- very nice summary about the conceptual properties of Twitter that let it work. Both Google and Twitter have little boxes for you to type into, but on Google you're looking for information, and expecting a machine response, whereas on Twitter you're declaring an emotion and expecting a human response. This is...
Standard media formats and licensing: JPEG versus MPEG - Free as in beer or Free as in 'This is a holdup!'
By Rick JelliffeJuly 31, 2009
Licenses, even peppercorn payments, are a real stumbling block for artisan developers, who were the bedrock of FOSS until the coporates co-opted it.
Microsoft's proposed resolution to EU on competition
By Rick JelliffeJuly 28, 2009
I like the clearer and more objectively verifiable commitments.
The conspiracy to save OOXML from being so crappy
By Rick JelliffeJune 19, 2009
According to my balance principle, I would say that SC34 WG1 needs more participation from (non-MS) vendors to get a good balance: it is currently tipped in favour of users/governments/standards bodies.
Pattern Recognition: Makers, Marketplaces and the Commons
By Mark SigalJune 16, 2009
Finally, having a chance to decompress following his Maker Faire visit, Mark Sigal ruminates on what Maker Faire's 78K attendees means, concluding that it's all about creative destruction, mass customization and the rise of DIY (do it yourself) class.
Balance of interest ~= Broader representation
By Rick JelliffeJune 2, 2009
So a particular phrase in the US Federal Participation in the Development and Use of Voluntary Consensus Standards and in Conformity Assessment Activities stood out: a voluntary consensus standards body needs to have a balance of interest.
Supporting degradation: towards a workable Open Packaging standard
By Rick JelliffeJune 1, 2009
I think we are missing, or have now arrived at the stage where we need, a way to declare relationships between different namespaces in standard XML documents. This needs to be part of a broadly-based open packaging standard.
The limits of standards in OOXML and ODF office suites
By Andy OramMay 20, 2009
Nobody expected Microsoft to make its proprietary OOXML format really work with products that support ODF. But an office suite has to hook into a huge number of outside pieces in its environment. We're just going to have to live with a fuzz factor.
The Bold and the Beautiful: two new drafts for HTML 5
By Rick JelliffeMay 12, 2009
Two new drafts out at W3C from the HTML 5 effort: HTML 5: The Markup Language and HTML 5: A vocabulary and associated APIs for HTML and XHTML. The first one is a model of the kinds of standards-writing we need. The second one is much larger, and is where many of the fiddles of historical HTML applications go.
Apply Sparingly: Open Standards (and When to Use Them)
By Mark SigalMay 8, 2009
The great thing about standards is that there are "so many to choose from." While it may be convenient to default to aphorisms like proprietary is evil, open is good, I am here to tell you that there are only three reasons to embrace open standards.
The big fish swallow the little fish: Adobe's FXG and MicroSoft's OOXML
By Rick JelliffeMay 6, 2009
Adobe's FXG seems to be to PSD what OOXML is to .DOC: a re-factoring of a middle-aged binary format in XML with a focus on fidelity rather than elegance. My working model is that we need to think of the de-proprietarization of market-dominating technologies in the intensely pragmatic model of a sequence of bigger fish swallowing smaller fish: a sequence of consolidation of dialects, modularization of parts, then adoption into pluralistic frameworks and Adaptability Standards, allowing user selection of winning mini-technologies. Each stage of which will take at least a major software release cycle.
Greener typesetting
By Rick JelliffeMay 3, 2009
Consider that there may be one hundred million word processing documents printed every day (anyone know the real number?) That could mean a million extra pages per day generated because of page-profligate settings or algorithms. Now, paper is usually made from estate timber, so there probably is no SAVE THE TREES deforestation angle. But paper production takes energy, toxic bleaches are used, power is used to make it, fuel is used to transport it, if it is disposed by burning the carbon gets released, and more toner cartridges are used. A tiny effect for individuals, but a decent effect when aggregated. So can we green typesetting? Can word processing standards lead the way here?
How big should an open standard be? A real issue for Open Standards and FOSS
By Rick JelliffeMay 3, 2009
But it does go back to a point I have made several times on this blog over the last few years: the more that our laws require the use of open standards, the more that we will need to make sure that the kind of "openness" involved or created by those standards actually allow grass-roots market-enhancing (which may in some cases be a euphemism for 'disruptive') implementation. So I am favouring the term Open Technologies rather than Open Standards: meaning technologies and their enabling standards which don't exclude implementation for reason of size and complexity, just as much as for reasons of openness or language or timezone or IP or corporate afilliation or technological tradition. In fact, I would go as far as proposing the following rule of thumb: no open standard should make a technology that would take an experienced and expert developer more than one month (full-time) to develop.
Four short links: 8 Apr 2009
By Nat TorkingtonApril 8, 2009
Bias, RFCs, virus batteries, and a glimpse at life beyond record labels (the last item features profanity, beware): Bias We Can Believe In (Mind Hacks) -- Vaughn asks the tricky question about the current enthusiasm for Behavioural Economics in government: where are the sceptical voices? As he points out, It's perhaps no accident that almost all the articles cite a...
Open Cloud Manifesto: about openness, standards, and the vitality of SMTP
By Andy OramMarch 28, 2009
Thanks to George Reese, I learned about the bruhaha over an Open Cloud Manifesto. Let's put the debate in the context of some basic and perennial issues about openness and standards.
"U.S. industry competitiveness depends on standardization": Open Standards and Patents discussed at WIPO:
By Rick JelliffeMarch 26, 2009
WIPO Standing Committee on the Law of Patents (SCP) meeting this week includes a session on Standards and Patents. There has long been a strong need for better international regulatory clarity on the overlap between standards and patents (or copyright): in particular to provide the necessary legal and administrative superstructure for the emergence and favouring of Open Standards. Among other reasons, to stop FUD and rorting.
Apache up against corporate dominance of fake standards process?
By Rick JelliffeMarch 17, 2009
Read the rather startling comments to the article The long-running Sun-Apache dispute<at Javaworld.
Requesting features for OpenOffice and Office?
By Rick JelliffeMarch 14, 2009
Readers who have potential features they would like to see in OpenOffice and Office (or other ODF and OOXML applications) should submit requests now to the appropriate standards committees. If we don't speak up about your requirements, they probably won't be met. Mind reading is not the optimal mechanism for standards development! In particular, this may apply to you if you have put in a request for an enhancement (or perhaps bug fix) to a product which actually relates to a provision in a standard.
FAT32 should be a QA-ed, RAND-z standard
By Rick JelliffeMarch 11, 2009
Hobby horse time again!
Consistent With Their "Web 2.0" Philisopical History, Amazon Opens Up Kindle To iPhone; More To Follow
By M. David PetersonMarch 4, 2009
In a seemingly bold move by Amazon, on Wednesday support for the Kindle e-book format will become available to iPhone owners via a freely downloadable application. But this shouldn't really come as any shock: Amazon is simply doing what they've always done: Looked to the bigger picture as their guiding light.
No real technical barriers...
By Rick JelliffeFebruary 23, 2009
I enjoyed this quote in Charles Babcock's 'Why Windows must go Open Source'
Safe Plurality: Can it be done using OOXML's Markup Compatibility and Extensions mechanism
By Rick JelliffeFebruary 13, 2009
The particular issue that MCE address is this: what is an application supposed to do when it finds some markup it wasn't programmed to accept? This could be extension elements in some foreign namespace, but it could also be some elements from a known namespace: the case when a document was made against a newer version of the standard than the application.
Preventing standards death march, plus augmenting RELAX NG to support variants
By Rick JelliffeFebruary 5, 2009
The ODF and OOXML standards should move to a strictly timed release cycle. So ODF 2009, ODF 2010, ODF 2011, OOXML 2009, OOXML 2010, and so on. And a proposal to add true() and false() to RELAX NG (Compact Syntax).
Conformance classes should mirror stakeholder usage clusters
By Rick JelliffeFebruary 4, 2009
It seems that both ODF and OOXML have reached the stage where the killer bee of conformance is buzzwording itself around the ears of the various committees. ... So what do I mean by a stakeholder usage cluster? From the vendor/developer side, you have needs for different levels of development effort. From the user side, you have needs for reliable interchange at different levels of complexity
Will Obama's Technology Push Extend to Financial Regulators?
By Diane MuellerJanuary 16, 2009
Obama's technology-savvy election team worked very effectively to leverage a new world order of YouTube, social networking, and blogging tools to promote his agenda, connect with a nation of voters, and raise campaign funds. But does he really know what...
An Infrastructure for Big Data
By Kurt CagleJanuary 11, 2009
The potential benefits of being able to expose even a portion of data that businesses and organizations produce in a compatible manner would be huge - it would, indeed, be a major boost for businesses that are built on or around the Internet as well as provide the framework to turn much of the economy into a Mashup Economy. The problem, of course, is standardization.
Packaging formats of famous application/*+zip
By Rick JelliffeJanuary 10, 2009
Here is a little table showing some of the characteristics of the various packaging formats used by modern XML-in-ZIP applications. ... To me, this is the only feasible route to format convergence: getting agreement on what almost everyone already supports (the low-hanging fruit), neutralizing any gratuitous limitations where there are legitimate areas of difference (extensibility), and supporting alternatives as a practical mechanism for allowing market/bazaar forces to determine the viability of different vocabularies and subformats (plurality.)
A national direction for international standards
By Rick JelliffeDecember 23, 2008
Governments need to get a (and financially encourage the) vision of the open research, open development, open source, and open standards communities as a chain that promotes an efficient market for markets.
Throwing Money at Problems: More Thoughts on Bailouts
By Kurt CagleDecember 15, 2008
Government absolutely must play a role in dealing with companies that are too big to fail ... it must prevent them from reaching that point. Until that happens, real reform in business will be slow and problematic.
ISO standard 'office' formats overpromise compatability?
By Rick JelliffeNovember 22, 2008
A friend in the industry who works with ODF gave me a heads-up about a new Gartner report, available on Microsoft's site which he describes as "delusional". Of the three pages, I pretty much agree with their first and third pages. Towards the middle it gets a little, err, nutty to me.
Fake real-time blog from JTC1 Meeting, Nara, Japan
By Rick JelliffeNovember 21, 2008
ISO/IEC JTC1 (the international standards body that looks after Information Technology standards) has just published two documents from its recent meetings in Nara, Japan. Along with the publication of IS29500 today, these represent a kind of line being drawn underneath the OOXML episode. JTC1 also addresses the "one standard" issue but needs to go further on reform of accelerated processes like the contentious "fast-track" submission.
OOXML standards finally published and available free!
By Rick JelliffeNovember 21, 2008
I am delighted to see that the free site for ISO publicly available standards finally has the OOXML standards available:
Open Comparability: boycott and ban products with anti-benchmarking EULAs
By Rick JelliffeNovember 17, 2008
It is time that legislators, regulators and procurement officials put an end to end-user license agreements (EULA) that prevent publication of comparative benchmarks.
Current CSS & formatting specs and drafts at W3C
By Rick JelliffeOctober 27, 2008
Here is a quick list of the current CSS specs and drafts from W3C.
Is ODF the new RTF or the new .DOC? Can it be both? Do we need either?
By Rick JelliffeOctober 22, 2008
Is ODF the new RTF or the new .DOC? Can it be both? I suggest that perhaps the looming challenge for document standards is not in deciding or developing perfect formats, but in integrating the packaged world of documents with the fragmented world of web resources. ...First, a potted history of the document format landscape over last 25 years...
What is Great About the Web
By Eric LarsonOctober 20, 2008
I'm not sure many people really understand what is truly great about the Web and why it works. Most developers see the web as a technology platform and nothing more. HTML, JavaScript and CSS are simply tools that must be...
Ken Krechmer's Adaptability Standards
By Rick JelliffeOctober 10, 2008
I think Ken Krechmer's Adaptive Standards pre-suppose the kind of frameworking and support for modularity and plurality that I have been banging on about for the last decade. An interesting recent quote from him.
How many mavericks does it take to change a lyspære?
By Rick JelliffeOctober 7, 2008
Thirteen members of the Norwegian standards body's technical committee walked out recently... If we take these 13, and subtract people who either work for competitors of Microsoft or affiliated with the NUUG/FOSS industry/community, we get...1 person (the esteemed Steve Pepper) by my count...
Fake real-time blog from SC34 meeting: including audio of proposed Schematron revision
By Rick JelliffeSeptember 30, 2008
I presented by podcast to WG1 (which is the working group on schema languages) my suggested update to ISO Schematron.
The derivatives crisis and standards
By Rick JelliffeSeptember 29, 2008
We hear a lot of talk about Web 2.0, but has the financial sector even got to Web 1.0, really? Lets take two key things: first, that data interchange should be rich, and second that everything important should be identified. But unless there is an accounting standards emphasis towards objective valuation, we can have all the good standards for financial data interchange we like, and it we won't have reduced society's risk nor improved evidence-based management.
Let's just lie back and enjoy it!
By Rick JelliffeSeptember 25, 2008
I have the same reaction to IBM's recent publication of its I.T. Standards Policies as I had with Microsoft and OOXML standardization. What should we do when some large FUDdy commercial Colossus whose motives we don't necessarily have confidence in wants to do something we pretty much had wished they would do? My recommendation: just lie back and enjoy it honey!
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