None of the documents that I write for myself and much less any of the documents that I write for others could be written as .md.
The reason is that I always use only good typefaces and I must use various typeface features provided by the OTF format, to which something like .md does not provide access.
If .md would be extended with the missing capabilities, then it is likely that it would become not much simpler than ODF.
Even in the simplest documents that I write for myself, I must use multiple document styles, as provided by a format like ODF, because I typically mix multiple languages, including multiple alphabets.
.md is OK for a ReadMe file written in English, but it is not good enough for what I would call a real text document.
I hope that Germany mandating ODF over OOXML will enhance the whole ecosystem.
As a programmer, finding decent ODF libraries is far from certain. Last year I had to output some spreadsheets from a Go program, but I could not find any maintained library for ODS, so I had to output XLSX files. Recently, I was luckier while programming in Rust.
LibreOffice needs to pull their heads out of the sand and recognize that both OOXML and ODF are the past.
Make it a polyglot ZIP à la SingleFileZ if you have to (or polyglot JSON[1] or just straight up XHTML with a big sidecar blob of embedded metadata), but nothing trying to take on Microsoft Office is "the future" if it's trying to get there with a strategy shackled to the notion of people downloading the appropriate format-compatible software for something as simple as being able to view (not even edit!) the document that has been sent to them.
It's great to have open standards and free software, but be compatible by default with the universal formats understood by the readers for the ubiquitous document infrastructure that everyone already has installed (WHATWG-/W3C-compatible hypertext readers, i.e. Web browsers), or be forever doomed to the same level of obscurity that OpenOffice/LibreOffice were fated 10–15 years ago due to their myopia.
> A forward-looking format is one that reduces future dependency, not one that reinforces it[…] A “backward-looking” format, by contrast, is one that ties the future to the commercial strategies of a single vendor. In this sense, OOXML Transitional is an archaeological artefact that preserves the past at the expense of the future.
This is delusional. As long as it's modeled on the same outdated paradigm of 80s- and 90s-style office suites (no matter which one), then any format whether it's an ISO standard or not is hopelessly attempting to preserve the past.
> Even today, web formats cannot render documents with the same fidelity as ODF. Especially not for spreadsheets.
That's a nonsense claim—literally a category error. You're conflating the limitations of what can be represented in a given file format with an implementation's (lack of) support for doing things encoded in that format.
LibreOffice doesn't render documents encoded in plain-text, browser-compatible formats with the same fidelity as ODF because LibreOffice has not implemented encoding documents in plain-text, browser-compatible formats that it renders with the same fidelity as ODF.
There is nothing in ODF that's inherently unrepresentable in JSON or pure XML.
If you try to print any non-trivial Web page with any of the existing Web browsers, all of them will print different things and none of them will print the same thing that they render on the computer display. For all of them the printed files will have various obvious defects, caused by incorrect size ratios between various elements or by an incorrect stacking of the elements, so that some of them obscure others that should have been visible.
For instance, Firefox and Chrome almost always print garbage, while Vivaldi is typically much better, but it also fails from time to time. It looks like all those who maintain Web browsers only test how pages are rendered on displays, but they never test how they are rendered by a print command.
With a file format intended for documents, the first property that I demand is that the document will be rendered perfectly in a deterministic way and it will look absolutely the same regardless on what medium it is rendered.
Nothing could be less true for anything that is used on the Web.
I strongly hate anyone who provides documentation in the form of Web pages, instead of using real documents, e.g. PDF files, ODF files or even Microsoft Office files, which can be used offline without problems. Nowadays, even the attempt to save Web pages in browsers is unreliable, due to the embedded scripts that may fail to work offline, making impossible the rendering of the saved pages.
The media (web or desktop) is irrelevant: a file format must exists for backup and interoperability. I barely use office documents myself, but I work on software that produce and parse many spreadsheets every day.
An open standard is even more very relevant in public administrations where the process follows legal constraints and ISO standards. The Document Foundation's article reacts to an German institutional decision.
At some point mandating a universal document format for ALL government use, becomes the only reasonable way forwards, along side tax software, utility billing, employee payrole,recipts, and banking that is also standerdised, and free.
Criminalising any further attempt to "patent" , obfusicate, privatise, or close source a public comunication medium as a shot accross the bow is the first step, with an expliset declaration that total dismantaling of companys attempting to insert themselves and comodify basic rights and privlages is going to happen.
Maps and navigation are also on the list.
Historical precidents are impossible to dismiss.
Just last week I needed to output a formatted document, and my choices were constrained to: HTML+CSS, Markdown, docx (OOXML), or odt (ODF).
The formatting had to be manipulable in code; the first two options were unsuitable for my use case. That left OOXML and ODF.
Both docx and odt are zip files, with XML content. Any guess which one turned out to be the better choice? I was left wondering why docx even exists in the first place.
Anyone using OOXML can rightly be regarded as stupid. There are far superior formats, and we should insist on their usage.
.md is the future. I've compiled the worst word docs to markdown and then pdf, and suddenly it looks as great as TeX
None of the documents that I write for myself and much less any of the documents that I write for others could be written as .md.
The reason is that I always use only good typefaces and I must use various typeface features provided by the OTF format, to which something like .md does not provide access.
If .md would be extended with the missing capabilities, then it is likely that it would become not much simpler than ODF.
Even in the simplest documents that I write for myself, I must use multiple document styles, as provided by a format like ODF, because I typically mix multiple languages, including multiple alphabets.
.md is OK for a ReadMe file written in English, but it is not good enough for what I would call a real text document.
I hope that Germany mandating ODF over OOXML will enhance the whole ecosystem.
As a programmer, finding decent ODF libraries is far from certain. Last year I had to output some spreadsheets from a Go program, but I could not find any maintained library for ODS, so I had to output XLSX files. Recently, I was luckier while programming in Rust.
LibreOffice needs to pull their heads out of the sand and recognize that both OOXML and ODF are the past.
Make it a polyglot ZIP à la SingleFileZ if you have to (or polyglot JSON[1] or just straight up XHTML with a big sidecar blob of embedded metadata), but nothing trying to take on Microsoft Office is "the future" if it's trying to get there with a strategy shackled to the notion of people downloading the appropriate format-compatible software for something as simple as being able to view (not even edit!) the document that has been sent to them.
It's great to have open standards and free software, but be compatible by default with the universal formats understood by the readers for the ubiquitous document infrastructure that everyone already has installed (WHATWG-/W3C-compatible hypertext readers, i.e. Web browsers), or be forever doomed to the same level of obscurity that OpenOffice/LibreOffice were fated 10–15 years ago due to their myopia.
> A forward-looking format is one that reduces future dependency, not one that reinforces it[…] A “backward-looking” format, by contrast, is one that ties the future to the commercial strategies of a single vendor. In this sense, OOXML Transitional is an archaeological artefact that preserves the past at the expense of the future.
This is delusional. As long as it's modeled on the same outdated paradigm of 80s- and 90s-style office suites (no matter which one), then any format whether it's an ISO standard or not is hopelessly attempting to preserve the past.
1. <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44229684>
Even today, web formats cannot render documents with the same fidelity as ODF. Especially not for spreadsheets.
Remember, many people feel that neither ODF or OOXML are sufficient and reach for things like LaTeX.
I think LibreOffice also supporting Markdown is a nice nod at simpler open formats.
Perhaps you have not dug into the problem deeply enough.
ODF is certainly better than OOXML at any rate.
> Even today, web formats cannot render documents with the same fidelity as ODF. Especially not for spreadsheets.
That's a nonsense claim—literally a category error. You're conflating the limitations of what can be represented in a given file format with an implementation's (lack of) support for doing things encoded in that format.
LibreOffice doesn't render documents encoded in plain-text, browser-compatible formats with the same fidelity as ODF because LibreOffice has not implemented encoding documents in plain-text, browser-compatible formats that it renders with the same fidelity as ODF.
There is nothing in ODF that's inherently unrepresentable in JSON or pure XML.
I am not sure what you claim about web formats.
If you try to print any non-trivial Web page with any of the existing Web browsers, all of them will print different things and none of them will print the same thing that they render on the computer display. For all of them the printed files will have various obvious defects, caused by incorrect size ratios between various elements or by an incorrect stacking of the elements, so that some of them obscure others that should have been visible.
For instance, Firefox and Chrome almost always print garbage, while Vivaldi is typically much better, but it also fails from time to time. It looks like all those who maintain Web browsers only test how pages are rendered on displays, but they never test how they are rendered by a print command.
With a file format intended for documents, the first property that I demand is that the document will be rendered perfectly in a deterministic way and it will look absolutely the same regardless on what medium it is rendered.
Nothing could be less true for anything that is used on the Web.
I strongly hate anyone who provides documentation in the form of Web pages, instead of using real documents, e.g. PDF files, ODF files or even Microsoft Office files, which can be used offline without problems. Nowadays, even the attempt to save Web pages in browsers is unreliable, due to the embedded scripts that may fail to work offline, making impossible the rendering of the saved pages.
The media (web or desktop) is irrelevant: a file format must exists for backup and interoperability. I barely use office documents myself, but I work on software that produce and parse many spreadsheets every day.
An open standard is even more very relevant in public administrations where the process follows legal constraints and ISO standards. The Document Foundation's article reacts to an German institutional decision.
[dead]
At some point mandating a universal document format for ALL government use, becomes the only reasonable way forwards, along side tax software, utility billing, employee payrole,recipts, and banking that is also standerdised, and free. Criminalising any further attempt to "patent" , obfusicate, privatise, or close source a public comunication medium as a shot accross the bow is the first step, with an expliset declaration that total dismantaling of companys attempting to insert themselves and comodify basic rights and privlages is going to happen. Maps and navigation are also on the list. Historical precidents are impossible to dismiss.
Just last week I needed to output a formatted document, and my choices were constrained to: HTML+CSS, Markdown, docx (OOXML), or odt (ODF).
The formatting had to be manipulable in code; the first two options were unsuitable for my use case. That left OOXML and ODF.
Both docx and odt are zip files, with XML content. Any guess which one turned out to be the better choice? I was left wondering why docx even exists in the first place.
Anyone using OOXML can rightly be regarded as stupid. There are far superior formats, and we should insist on their usage.