Windows 7 in EU without Browser!

[hito_kiri]

Well unfortunately downloading something to get office 2007 to recognize ODF is too complicated for most people.

I read somewhere that ODF files created by M$Office does not conform fully to ODF format (as expected).

That is probably true though I don't know. While I was working one day near the end of the semester one class was doing presentations and since they all pretty much used Office 2007 to make them there were some problems with a few (there were only about 6 in the class so a majority really). One persons worked fine in Open Office, but one woman who has been rather vocal about her displeasure with the computers (once claiming linux being on them was the reason the 6 yr old computers that were crappy to begin with was crashing while using AutoCAD in Windows) could not get hers to work at all. Everything was messed up. So then I have people asking me why they can't use something "standard". I was like, well if they could get Office 2007 for free it would be on here, but since it costs so much they don't put it on them. I didn't even bother to say it would be easier for her to change the format than for the engineering dept. to buy licenses and install it on all the computers.

[syampillai]

I work in a bank and I almost had taken a "military" approach to force Linux there Democratic approach may not work. (But, this requires proper support from top management).
The first few things one needs to do is to have an IT Policy that even specifies file formats for internal use, file formats for external communication (example: PDF only) etc.
But, soon, everybody realized the benefits in terms of cost saved by doing that.

[saahne]

Originally Posted by syampillai

I read somewhere that ODF files created by M$Office does not conform fully to ODF format (as expected).

It's probably fine unless you have documents with a lot of complicated formatting but much as I dislike Word 2007, mostly because of the radical interface changes, I am glad there is some support for ODF. Note also that Microsoft's initial support is for ODF 1.1.

More here on Office 2007 SP2 and ODF:

Are Microsoft and OpenDocument Getting on the Same Page?

Office 2007 SP2's Full ODF Support Checks Out Well in Labs' Tests

[TimButterworth]

Most folks are saying that the Sun Plug-in works better than Office 2007 SP2 support.

There was recently a meeting at the Royal Library in the Netherlands to discuss ODF support in a lot of office products. Here is the link to the article at KDE news KOffice Developers At The First ODF Plugfest | KDE.news

[saahne]

Interesting. The Sun Plugin supports ODF 1.2. Office SP2 is ODF 1.1.
Here's the link to the Sun pages:
Sun ODF Plugin for Microsoft Office