RSSECIS Accuses Microsoft of Plotting HTML Hijack
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published January 26, 2007, 10:45 AM
An industry coalition that has represented competitors of Microsoft in European markets before the European Commission stepped up its public relations offensive this morning, this time accusing Microsoft of scheming to upset HTML's place in the fabric of the Internet with XAML, an XML-based layout lexicon for network applications.
In a prepared statement this morning, ECIS Chairman Simon Awde connected XAML with Windows Vista, the system that will next week be the predominant deployment system for Windows Presentation Foundation. XAML can be used to lay out pages and controls for programs that WPF produces using the .NET Framework.
"Vista is the first step in Microsoft's strategy to extend its market dominance to the Internet," the statement quotes Awde as saying. The statement then goes on to say, "For example, Microsoft's 'XAML' markup language, positioned to replace HTML (the current industry standard for publishing language on the Internet), is designed from the ground up to be dependent on Windows, and thus is not cross-platform by nature."
The statement does not mention that XAML is an XML implementation.
Indeed, XAML (pronounced "zammel") will become the preferred method for implementing applications front-ends in Windows, with more direct support forthcoming in the next version of Visual Studio - current editions support it with patches and updates. And while Microsoft was expected as far back as 2004 to submit XAML to the ECMA organization, which last year approved its Office Open XML document format as an international standard, since that time, there's been no detectable international standardization activity on the XAML front.
The reason for that may be different that you might expect. The W3C has been working to develop its own XML-based forms lexicon for the Web called XForms, the latest recommendation for which was published last year. But besides XForms, the Open XUL Alliance in 2005 counted no fewer than 21 active commercial implementations of XML-based layout lexicons, XAML being just one of them.
If Microsoft were to campaign for ECMA or another organization to push XAML as an international standard, others might pose this question: All things being equal (ignoring the fact that Microsoft often isn't, or at least, doesn't play like it is), what would make XAML any more deserving of standardization and accreditation than, say, Macromedia's (Adobe's) MXML layout lexicon being developed for Flash?
Indeed, throughout XAML's developmental history, Microsoft's own people have argued that the lexicon cannot possibly replace HTML. In a 2005 video, XAML architect Chris Anderson demonstrates that XAML is different from CSS, the stylesheet lexicon used within HTML Web pages, because it does not specify the tools with which controls are bound; instead, it leaves those definitions to the developer, and thus conceivably to the market.
In a much more explicit explanation, Microsoft developer Chad Hower lists and enumerates the features XAML lacks in a side-by-side comparison with HTML. Among the items Hower mentions: XAML has no provisions for submitting the contents of forms - no counterpart to the FORM element in HTML; XAML has no way to embed a scripting language; and perhaps the most striking differentiation, XAML has no provisions for hyperlinking to other documents.
Or perhaps this is the clincher: Hower actually argues that XAML cannot replace HTML because XAML is not yet cross-platform. From his perspective, Hower conceded that many sites are designed for Internet Explorer only, so for at least a chunk of Internet users, Windows-only support is acceptable. But not for everyone.
Nonetheless, from ECIS' perspective, the lone enemy is at the gate: "With XAML and OOXML," stated ECIS attorney Thomas Vinje, "Microsoft seeks to impose its own Windows-dependent standards and displace existing open cross-platform standards which have wide industry acceptance, permit open competition and promote competition-driven innovation. The end result will be the continued absence of any real consumer choice, years of waiting for Microsoft to improve - or even debug - its monopoly products, and of course high prices."
Among the companies that ECIS represents in arguments before the EC is IBM, which is one of the principal sponsors of the XForms effort before the W3C. XForms is - or would be - one part of XUL, Mozilla's own long campaign to implement XML in Web standards, first implemented in the Netscape 6.0 browser in 2000.
Daniel Glazman is [CORRECTION] a member of the CSS Working Group, also currently a Mozilla developer, and the creator of the Nvu Web editor application. In late 2005, after the W3C announced its next step in the XUL campaign - the standardization of an HTTP request format using XML - Glazman argued on his personal blog that such a step may have been too long in coming.
"With dozens of Mozilla milestones in the wild, and almost in sync with [Internet Explorer 7], the W3C finally discovers the whole browser world uses XML-based UI languages," Glazman wrote. Citing a W3C document, he continued, "The future W3C format will 'be based on an existing application/UI format, such as Mozilla's XUL, Microsoft's XAML, Macromedia's MXML or Laszlo Systems' LZX, provided the owners of the format are willing to contribute.' OK, but how the hell are Mozilla and Microsoft going to implement that? Moving from their own format to that one? Seriously?...It's late guys, too late, far too late."
To many, MS can never make or invent anything for itself.
Capitalism seems to be waning in some areas of the world...growing in others.
Choices and opinions...I hope we can still have some flexibility as individuals or companies. If people don't like something, it won't become a standard...if they do it will.
It's a strange world where companies are forced to fit a standard...and even stranger when that only applies to the large and great entities.
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|It's not gonna make ANY DAMN DIFFERENCE if MS formats become "standards" per some international body. ANY of their formats. If they do, "good! continue to throw money at them groups!".. If they don't.. All MS needs to do is SAVE THE DEVELOPER TIME AND EFFORT, and they'll use their tools EVEN IF the product (website/software/mediafile/game) can only be used by "only" 80% of the people and is "NON INT'L STANDARD". I seriously don't see anyone here learning Chinese/Hindi so they can promote their "product X" to those huge markets...
It's the same thing - you give up potential marketshare so you can CONCENTRATE on one relevant market. In other words, in the past, and in the future, working with MS tools will save you so much time in producing WHATEVER, that'll you stick to those tools knowing that the time you SAVED has been used WISELY in enhancing your product. You CANNOT do both. A minute wasted on non-MS technologies is a min you didn't spend on enhancing your app. It boils down TO THIS AND ONLY THIS.
So IBM is crying cuz they'll have to come up with something BETTER for the developers. Something that'll work on Firefox, Linux, Macs, but STILL gives all the features of Visual Studio. And of course the main point: for you to be able to get a project from ground up AT LEAST AS FAST AS CAN BE DONE ON V.S.
Good f'ing luck, IBM hehehehe
MS rules, and sorry to say this: they deserve to rule. IBM had a HUGE CHANCE in 1993-1994 with OS/2 WARP. They BLEW IT BIG TIME and Win95 came and put them to shame. So what does that mean? That means survival of fittest. It means building an OS that will work on thousands of hardware and software components as well as backward compatibility (to make most customers very happy) isn't such an easy task after all.
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|Soo... whats wrong with HTML?
Im quite confused of all this. Would anyone in their right mind replace "HTML" with something Microsoft came up and is only for Windows?
Personally, id rather go with the "less innovative" and more flexible, open, solution than something Microsoft came up in their "labs". Theres just something with "MS" that makes me bit... uncomfortable.
On my personal "trust-o-meter" Microsoft would go right next to Russia and that aint much.
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|A lot of people would indeed argue that there is a lot wrong with HTML, but because it is so established, there is no way that Microsoft or any one else is going to "replace" it. What has been going on for many years is that the dealing with HTML deficiencies is done by embedding different things into HTML (e.g., a PDF document). That is precisely the approach that Microsoft will be doing with its XAML. Web sites could choose to embed XAML code, and thereby offer their viewers a much enhanced experience.
Oh, and its not going to be Windows-specific or even Internet Explorer-specific. A subset of XAML is part of the "Windows Presentation Foundation Everywhere" (WPF/E) effort going on, that is a *platform-independent* approach to much richer users experiences in a browser. There are videos showing it running under OSX on a Mac, for example.
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|"XAML has no provisions for hyperlinking to other documents"
Actually XAML DOES have this ability. Its XBAP that has some issues here, although it has provisions as well.
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|ECMA has not yet approved OOXML as a standard... it's in the fast track, but it has not been approved, and there is as yet no certainty that it will, because there's already an existing, fully implemented, fully open XML ISO document standard, called Open Document Format (ISO/IEC 26300).
-cybervegan
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|The ECMA *did* approve it, last year. ECMA Open Office Format is now an open, international standard for office document formats, fully compatible with MS Office. It is owned by the ECMA, who will govern its evolution. It has now been submitted to the ISO, for it to come under that standards umbrella as well.
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|Oh no! Microsoft is conspiring to make money by utilizing innovative solutions! How illegal of them!
Seriously, since when did free market become so expensive?
Where do we draw the line...was Intel illegal for inventing the Intel Core Duo 2 processors? YES! THEY SCHEMED TO DOMINATE THE WHOLE MARKET BY PLOTTING THEIR SINISTER TACTICS OF PRODUCING GREAT PROCESSORS AT A LOW PRICE!!! DA*N THEM TO HELL!!! (end sarcasm)
Bah, I'm just a freaky-evil-demented-ultra-neo-conservative, so why am I expecting anyone to listen to me anyway?
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|Yep, seriously. People whine that MS never does anything new or innovative, and then whine when they do that they are being anti-competitive. Goodness forbid they make something that only works with their software, or to rephrase that, only make their software work with it.
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|I agree gents. If the design is innovative and it works, what's the problem? So it might not be cross-platform, I don't know if anyone's noticed but Windows and IE still dominate an extrememly hefty portion of the computer/browser market today. So creating Windows only formats and languages isn't such a bad thing. I have no problem with Mozilla or any other open source format or software, I'm just saying Microsoft is doing what they do best with their software, let the OSS community do what they do best with theirs. Furthermore, the OSS community will gain nothing by whining about it. If they just sit around and whine, they've already let Microsoft win.
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|The whine is not about innovation it is about locking in the Windows users and locking out the competition.
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|The file formats are totally cross-platform. There is nothing about Windows in them.
The format standards do, however, allow for embedded objects, e.g., a Linux drawing application object embedded in a PowerPoint file. Such embedded objects may be almost anything, and thus a particular document (note: not the standard itself) might potentially be platform-specific. Note, however that the standard: 1) Provides for a platform-independent viusal representation of such an embedded object; and 2) Does not force a program to parse such embedded objects in order to manipulate the document , and thus the document can be "read" or "written to" on all platforms.
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|"The whine is not about innovation it is about locking in the Windows users and locking out the competition."
Apple has been doing it for years, I don't hear anybody complaining about them.
Personally I consider this making a mountain out of a molehill. When it comes to 'the internet', I don't think any one company can 'lock' anything in or out, unless it's some kind of gov't intervention or something happening at the ISP level. When it comes to formats, if it's not universal - 3/4 of the people out there won't see it/use it - and that's that.
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|I'm a co-creator of CSS ? Ah. Good to know...
The two co-creators of CSS are Bert Bos and Håkon Wium Lie.
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|I'm sorry, Daniel. You've been listed several places as having contributed to the CSS project since the very beginning. Hope you don't mind if I inadvertently promoted you. Though I'll make a correction above.
-SF3
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|Simon Awde doesn't understand what he's talking about.
- HTML is an SGML based language which is used to define the contents of webpages.
- XAML is an XML based language (XML is based on SGML) which is used to define the layout of Windows Forms as well as internet applications made in WPF (aka .NET 3.0).
XAML/WPF is closer in comparison to Flash than HTML in appearance. In addition it won't gain wide acceptance because the number of users who DON'T use Windows Internet Explorer (IE: Firefox, Opera, MacOSX, Linux) is too high for that to happen now.
On the internet, their use is different. HTML is universal while XAML is restricted to .NET 3.0 / WPF programs.
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|Actually because of WPF/E XAML can run in Safari and Firefox:
http://msdn2.microsoft.c...s/asp.net/bb187358.aspx
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|I can't run it in Firefox, because though there is a Firefox plugin, the assumption is that you're running the Windows OS.
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