Experts say Microsoft's XML play won't backfire

Conventional wisdom has long held that if Microsoft were to embrace XML as its default file format for Office and discard the proprietary underpinnings that have ostensibly handcuffed customers to its products, businesses might jump at the chance to move to other software providers, or at least start using rival offerings alongside Office more frequently.

Now that Microsoft has announced it will employ XML formats in the versions of Excel, PowerPoint and Word included in its upcoming Office 12 package, the issue is to the fore.

Microsoft's move to create new XML-based file formats for three of its flagship Office products may make it easier for customers to consider rival software, but industry watchers aren't predicting an exodus just yet.

"It has to be one of the first questions you ask when you see (Microsoft's) XML plans: will this encourage people to look at new products, especially open source?" said Forrester Research analyst Bob Markham.

But Markham and others say the predictions of a mass departure won't likely be proven correct, at least not immediately.

Markham said customers in Europe and Asia may start more seriously considering alternatives such as the open source software made by OpenOffice, but he believes most businesses will wait to find out how Microsoft's new designs could help them achieve existing goals with XML before they start looking for help elsewhere.

One of the most compelling elements of Microsoft's new allegiance to XML is that it should let customers and other software developers more easily integrate their IT systems with the company's dominant Office product line, a longstanding bone of contention for both camps.

An example of the gains that could be achieved via such XML tie-ups was recently displayed by enterprise applications specialist SAP, which has an ongoing project with Microsoft, code-named Mendocino, that uses XML-based middleware to pull together the two companies' products into a unified interface.

In a recent post to Microsoft's Web site, the company 's XML guru, Jean Paoli, said customers are only just beginning to understand the manner in which the open standard will change the way they view different technologies, and that Microsoft would be foolish not to further expand its XML strategy.

"Right now there's so much coalescence around XML, within individual organisations and entire industries, that I am convinced a new wave of XML-related content, applications and servers is just on the horizon," said Paoli, whose official title is senior director of XML architecture. "The ubiquity of XML will result in far more sophisticated ways of doing workflows between workers and business processes. We're really just at the tip of the iceberg."

Paoli is predicting that by more fully embracing XML, Microsoft is in fact making it less likely that customers will move to other software providers, as businesses will need more sophisticated tools to generate, store and analyse content created in XML-based programs, and he believes the software giant is positioning itself to help deliver those capabilities.

Still, it remains true that the same flexibility and openness that will supposedly allow for better integration between Office and corporate systems could let rivals make their Office alternatives more competitive.