"The proposed agreement's more promising terms apply
not to computer manufacturers but to independent software
developers. The deal would require Microsoft to document all its
applications programming interfaces, or APIs -- the ways programs
work with Windows itself -- as well as some of its networking
protocols.
That's a fine start. But the agreement fails to tackle
Microsoft's other big leverage point -- its proprietary file
formats.
"The reason I can't walk into an organization and say 'I'm going
to use my Linux box' is that people will send me Word documents
that I can't read," said Jeremy Allison, co-author of the Samba
cross-platform networking program."
