ISO adopts OOXML format as international standard

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The ISO has approved Microsoft's OOXML as an international standard.

By Peter Sayer | Paris | Wednesday, 2 April, 2008

The International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) has adopted an international standard based on Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) document format.

The standard was approved by 86% of all countries voting, and by 75% of those countries participating in JTC1, the joint committee of the ISO and the International Electrotechnical Committee that organised the vote, according to a number of sources. To pass, it required the approval of 75% of all countries voting, and 66% of those countries participating in the committee, known as P-members.

Among the organisations relaying the information were Microsoft and industry standards consortium ECMA International. Microsoft first sent its OOXML document format to ECMA for approval, where it was adopted as standard ECMA-376. ECMA then submitted its standard to the ISO where, after numerous modifications, it has been adopted as ISO standard 29500.

While the ISO has sent the ballot results to the national standards bodies, it does not plan to announce them publicly until Wednesday.

The results were first disclosed in a document sent to the OpenDoc Society mailing list in a posting by a Dutch technical standards committee member, Michiel Leenaars.

Of the 87 countries that voted, 61 approved, 10 disapproved and 16 abstained. Among the P-members, 24 approved, eight disapproved and nine abstained, according to the document.

The full results the document contained are as follows:

Country	Status	Vote
Argentina		Abstention
Armenia		Approval
Australia	P-Member	Abstention
Austria		Approval
Azerbaijan	P-Member	Approval
Bangladesh		Approval
Barbados		Approval
Belarus		Approval
Belgium	P-Member	Abstention
Bosnia and Herzegovina		Approval
Brazil		Disapproval
Bulgaria		Approval
Canada	P-Member	Disapproval
Chile		Abstention
China	P-Member	Disapproval
Colombia		Approval
Congo, The Democratic Republic of		Approval
Costa Rica		Approval
Côte-d'Ivoire	P-Member	Approval
Croatia		Approval
Cuba		Disapproval
Cyprus	P-Member	Approval
Czech Republic	P-Member	Approval
Denmark	P-Member	Approval
Ecuador	P-Member	Disapproval
Egypt		Approval
Fiji		Approval
Finland	P-Member	Approval
France	P-Member	Abstention
Germany	P-Member	Approval
Ghana		Approval
Greece		Approval
India	P-Member	Disapproval
Iran, Islamic Republic of	P-Member	Disapproval
Ireland	P-Member	Approval
Israel		Approval
Italy	P-Member	Abstention
Jamaica	P-Member	Approval
Japan	P-Member	Approval
Jordan		Approval
Kazakhstan	P-Member	Approval
Kenya	P-Member	Abstention
Korea, Republic of	P-Member	Approval
Kuwait		Approval
Lebanon	P-Member	Approval
Luxembourg		Abstention
Malaysia	P-Member	Abstention
Malta	P-Member	Approval
Mauritius		Approval
Mexico		Approval
Morocco		Approval
Netherlands	P-Member	Abstention
New Zealand	P-Member	Disapproval
Nigeria		Approval
Norway	P-Member	Approval
Pakistan	P-Member	Approval
Panama		Approval
Peru		Approval
Philippines		Approval
Poland		Approval
Portugal		Approval
Qatar		Approval
Romania		Approval
Russian Federation		Abstention
Saudi Arabia	P-Member	Approval
Serbia		Approval
Singapore	P-Member	Approval
Slovenia	P-Member	Approval
South Africa	P-Member	Disapproval
Spain	P-Member	Abstention
Sri Lanka		Abstention
Switzerland	P-Member	Approval
Syrian Arab Republic		Approval
Tanzania, United Rep. of		Approval
Thailand		Approval
Trinidad and Tobago	P-Member	Approval
Tunisia		Approval
Turkey	P-Member	Abstention
Ukraine		Approval
United Arab Emirates		Approval
United Kingdom	P-Member	Approval
Uruguay	P-Member	Approval
USA	P-Member	Approval
Uzbekistan		Approval
Venezuela	P-Member	Disapproval
Viet Nam		Abstention
Zimbabwe		Abstention