OStatic

Why is OOXML a bad standard? What does it mean for open source developers? And what, if anything, can menbers of the open source community do, now that OOXML has been adopted by the ISO?

Ars Technica brings the good news that the AbiWord project has received funding from the NLnet Foundation to further a number of the project's efforts on the OpenDocument front.

One of the areas receiving special support is the newly formed AbiSource Corporation, which cites improving AbiWord's collaborative tools as one of its driving forces. NLnet will also work with the AbiWord team to improve the application's support for the OpenDocument standard in other areas, including its import/export filters.

The US Navy is switching to open standards. What does this mean for open source? And what's the difference between open source and open standards, anyway?

According to an article in the March 6th issue of Federal Computer Week, the US Navy will only acquire systems based on open technologies and standards.

Internet Explorer is the most popular Web browser, with substantially higher market share than its nearest competitor, Mozilla's Firefox browser. That's true in spite of the fact that Firefox's market share has been steadily climbing.

But Internet Explorer has also been a source of frustration for Web developers, because of its selective approach to standards. Microsoft promises that the next version will be different. Why is this significant change underfoot?

In December, the Free Software Foundation (FSF) filed suit against Cisco, after several years of urging the company to comply with the licensing terms used on its Linksys routers. Several Linksys routers used firmware licensed under the GPL/LGPL, but Cisco failed to make the source code available per the terms of the licenses.

It's not terribly easy to make the FSF resort to legal action, but after five years of relative unresponsiveness, FSF licensing compliance engineer Brett Smith said the organization had to take stronger measures to get the problem resolved.

The case against Cisco has been settled, with Cisco agreeing to appoint a Free Software Director who will ensure Linksys complies with the terms of the free licenses it uses, and report back to the FSF on its progress.

How do you know when a proposed software contract principle is really broken? When the Linux Foundation and Microsoft have their respective legal departments sit down and pen a joint letter asking it be reconsidered. ZDNet's Mary-Jo Foley has written a nice, legalese-free summation of the story.

In short, the American Law Institute (ALI) has proposed some guiding principles for judges, lawyers and other legal professionals working with software-related cases to aid in settling software licensing issues. Given how quickly everything about software delivery and production changes, this in and of itself is a decent enough idea. The problem is one particular principle, a policy calling for a non-disclaimable implied warranty of no material hidden defects. Both the Linux Foundation and Microsoft say this is a disadvantage all around -- discriminating and subtlely changing between various licensing, business, and distribution models.

Recently, Black Duck Software conducted a survey of developers to ascertain what they know about open source software, and how they've used it in their workplaces.

While it's important to keep in mind that the survey consisted of about 50 participants at companies that were vastly different in size (ranging from less than 20 to more than 10,000 employees), and that Black Duck is in the business of servicing managed and secure open source deployments, there are still valid bits of information to take away from the results.

Information Week highlights some of the more interesting statistics the Black Duck surveyors collected. Even if the percentages in this impromptu survey would vary with a larger survey pool, the data is so vastly different it's safe to say there's a disturbing trend: Companies often take a hands off approach to managing open source software.

Joi Ito and the Creative Commons need help getting the word out -- and defined. Creative Commons licenses allow (to varying degrees) the content they apply to to be freely used, distributed, and altered, with varying levels of attribution or certain restrictions on commercial use. One of the gray areas Creative Commons has been grappling with is how exactly one defines non-commercial.

The Creative Commons team asks any one willing to take some time and fill out their questionnaire prior to December 7th. The survey is completely anonymous, and the study is open to the general public.

For most people, the most important part of a software license is the end. That's because they're totally uninterested in the license itself; they are merely interested in scrolling past it, so that they can click on OK and install the software that they are running. For users of open-source software, however, licenses should be extremely important, because they determine what you may and may not do with a particular program. Open-source developers have long debated the merits of the GNU General Public License vs. the BSD License. As open-source software becomes mainstream, and is integrated into larger systems, these age-old arguments are less theoretical than ever, and should be understood not only by developers, but also by managers and executives of organizations working with open source. Van Lindberg's new book is an excellent place to start.