Re: ODS Compatibility?
For a while now, I've been saying that they want to kill the offline/local binary versions of Office programs.
These programs have issues. Their codebase is very old - parts date back to the mid-90s. This came out a decade ago during the OOXML specification debacle, when it became clear that Word has compatibility modes with names like "autoSpaceLikeWord95". No explanation was immediately forthcoming on what that meant though.
Which means that somewhere in Word there's an entire code branch for spacing that can be activated, but only exists for compatibility purposes.
Let's be honest, that's a problem. Ignoring the bloat, there's the security aspect. A bunch of code nobody is touching, fewer people understand as they leave/retire each year, but can still be activated by an OOXML document despite being 25+ year old code...
Word, Excel and PowerPoint are overdue a rewrite. And if you're going to rewrite it, you may as well make it a web based application. Local "cached" versions can still be provided - look at Teams as an example.
Whether we want it or not, this rewrite is happening. And the desktop apps will be matched by the web apps, then left behind. It's a stealth rewrite.
I actually think it's probably a good thing in the long run. And long overdue. But I don't expect it to be popular...