Microsoft has used many tools to maintain control of dominant control over office productivity products. It attempted to use patents to prevent competitors interoperating without special license. Then the patents were struck down in the US. Microsoft has now stepped back from that strategy and given commitments that nobody would be sued for using their new Word XML formats. However, the competing Open Document Format made popular by OpenOffice and now a ISO Standard has forced Microsoft to provide customers with some support for interoperability. In this article we see Microsoft starting an Open Source project that will provide support for ODF interoperability.

Nandor has been a vocal advocate of Open Source. Here we see another article by Nandor discussing the importance of Open Source software to New Zealand, this time on scoop.co.nz. Nandor comments that "This revolution is being won. By reliable estimates 15 to 20 per cent of the computing done in New Zealand enterprises utilises some form of open source, and much is being driven in-house, by work groups rather than by top management."

Hibernate is a Open Source Object Persistence Framework for Java. It allows Java Objects to be stored and retreived from a Relational Database. Many of the developers for Hibernate are employed by JBoss, which was recently aquired by Red Hat. FireStar Software has filed a patent infringement suit against Red Hat, claiming that Hibernate infringes US Patent 6,101,502.

ZDNet reports that Windows Genuine Advantage, Microsoft's new anti-piracy utility, might become compulosory, and lead to Windows on unlicensed PCs being rendered useless. A Microsoft customer service representative was quoted as saying "in [USA's] fall, having the latest WGA will become mandatory and if its not installed, Windows will give a 30 day warning and when the 30 days is up and WGA isn't installed, Windows will stop working, so you might as well install WGA now." While WGA is targeted at unlicensed copies, there have been reports that shrink-wrapped copies have failed installation and Microsoft's only suggestion has been 'buy another box, at your own expense'. No such kill switch has been reported in any Open Source operating system. Update: Microsoft have denied the speculation that they planned to cripple copies of Windows XP for users who did not install WGA. They have, however, dealt a blow to corporate IT staff, by announcing that volume licenses of Windows will require activation in Windows Vista.

Groklaw are reporting that IBM has been granted (in part) their motion to limit SCO's claims, that proprietary SCO UNIX code was used in the Linux kernel. SCO refused to point out where the alleged infringements were, even when asked directly by the Court, and as such the Court has limited the claims to those where SCO pointed out the file and line number.

The Belgium government has decided to adopt the Open Document Format across its operations in order to improve interoperability and prevent being locked into a single large vendor. The move followed the approval by International Standards Organisation (ISO), and the adoption by the US state of Massachusetts. Zdnet has further coverage here.

If you got a 20% discount off bottled water would you consider the saving compelling enough to wash you car with it? Most people wouldn't consider a discount on something you could otherwise obtain for free a saving. Apparently the Government thinks differently, as they talk about saving nine million dollars over the next three years after signing a new G2006 agreement with Microsoft.

Oracle has been on the side of Linux for some time now, and was one of the few companies to advertise Linux. The Unbreakable Linux campaign may not have been totally accurate, in that Linux is no security silver bullet, but it did spread the word that Linux was now supported by large mainstream vendors. In this weeks ComputerWorld we see comment on Oracles involvement with Open Source.

Microsoft have recently announced a new partnership with Creative Commons, the organization dedicated to providing content producers a legal alternative to "all rights reserved" copyright law, to offer a new tool for easy insertion of Creative Commons licenses into works created with Microsoft Office.

Read more from Rob Mensching, Microsoft's open-source WIX toolkit guy.

Red Hat is getting more serious about supporting New Zealand by establishing a technical and marketing person in New Zealand. Red Hat, one of the most popular commercial distributions of Linux has had a low profile in New Zealand until recently. ComputerWorld have been running Red Hat banner advertising, and there has been improved communication with the local open source community.