Court orders Microsoft to stop selling Office 2007 by January 11th

Seems to be a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding in this thread.

First, i4i created (and patented!!!1!!) a plug-in for Microsoft Office that allows you to dynamically create and piece together parts of a document into a main document via XML. i4i is a *real* company, not a patent troll, they have dozens of employees and first implemented their commercial product (which Microsoft subsequently ripped off) all the way back in 2000 (!) in an application that is/was, among others, used widely by the US Patent office. http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/6_473021

Second, this patent decision is about *dynamic* document creation using XML parts. It does NOT affect or change the fact that Word, Excel, etc. use XML-based file formats. This decision in no way impacts the .docx or .xlsx file formats.

This is important enough that it's worth repeating: the Office 2007 (and 2008) .xlsx and .docx file formats are unaffected by this decision.

Third, companies are building internal applications using the Microsoft Word 2007-based version of this technology to, for example, allow a workflow-based system to build custom-tailored contracts based on standard contract language with customizations as specified by one or both parties. So it may not be "widely used" as Microsoft claims, but the companies using it have large scale implementations with lots of corporate seat licenses being affected.

Last, if Microsoft says that Office 2008 for Mac is unaffected by this ruling, that would be because the latest Mac versions don't come with the same feature set as their Windows-based siblings.

The Engadget article has more links for anyone interested in understanding what this really means to end users (vs. the usual internet histrionics): http://www.engadget.com/2009/12/22/microsoft-loses-patent-appeal-word-and-office-to-be-barred-from/

Well, if there IS anything big and honking to be done, we can trust that Ballmer is uniquely suited to the job.

The XML format of Word and Excel documents is the best thing to happen to Office users in the last 15 Years.
File sizes are smaller, Documents are searchable though aftermarket DMS's and if Microsoft cancel support for the format (like they have with Word 2.0a,b,c), third-party developers can still write software to access the files.

Hopefully MS will be forced to use a true open document format like Open Document Format (ODF).
ODF has it's issues, but the security of data in a true open standard is much higher than data in a licenced format like i4i's Open-XML.

I doubt the US Supreme Court will hear this case.

How, exactly, is this going to f--- things up for you? It's not as of your copy of Office is going to suddenly stop working. Nor will anyone else's.

Hahaha...its all crumbling down....slowly. Hi my name is Rodrigo and i work for Apple!

This doesn't mean I have to go back to Appleworks does it?

Oh god damn it. MS Office 2007 and 2008 both use the XML formats from i4i and i use both of those versions. Obviously the 2007 on PC and 2008 on Mac.

XML is so much better than other similar formats.

A couple corrections: 1) This wasn't the decision of one judge--the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit is a panel bench, just like all other Federal Courts of Appeals; and 2) Microsoft cannot appeal the ruling "again"--it can appeal the holding of the Court of Appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court alone.

haha Goverment you tell them they need to remove these crappy exentions.