ODF calls time on da Vinci coding

Still seeking OASIS approval

The Open Document Foundation (ODF) has quietly ended all work on its da Vinci project after failing to secure approval from the Organisation for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS).

The da Vinci project was to develop a class of plug-ins that would allow users "to create and edit CDF (compound document format) files in their existing Microsoft Office installations". That is to say, a user could save a .odt file within Word as easily as if it were a .doc format.

However, the organisation now says all work has ceased because OASIS has not granted approval of its generic extensions. Without this approval, ODF says: "We can not effectively convert existing Microsoft documents, applications and processes to ODF. The loss of fidelity and feature - business process specific information is too great."

In a statement on its site, ODF says: "We are however able to make full, high fidelity 'round trip' conversions to the W3C's CDF - meeting critical market requirements. If at some point in the future, the OASIS ODF TC does approve both our ODF iX enhancements, and our 'Universal Interoperability Framework Proposal', we will configure da Vinci to support both CDF and ODF iX." ®