Editing Microsoft Office (section)

=== Data formats ===
Microsoft Office has been criticized in the past for using proprietary file formats rather than [[open standard]]s, which forces users who share data into adopting the same software platform.<ref>{{Cite web |title=gnu.org |url=https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140419020311/https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html |archive-date=April 19, 2014 |access-date=April 18, 2014}}</ref> However, on February 15, 2008, Microsoft made the entire documentation for the binary Office formats freely available under the [[Microsoft Open Specification Promise|Open Specification Promise]].<ref>{{Cite web |date=February 15, 2008 |title=Open Specifications Developer Center |url=https://www.microsoft.com/interop/docs/OfficeBinaryFormats.mspx |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080218212338/http://www.microsoft.com/interop/docs/officebinaryformats.mspx |archive-date=February 18, 2008 |publisher=[[Microsoft]]}}</ref> Also, [[Office Open XML]], the document format for the latest versions of Office for Windows and Mac, has been standardized under both [[Ecma International]] and [[International Organization for Standardization|ISO]]. Ecma International has published the Office Open XML specification free of copyrights and Microsoft has granted patent rights to the formats technology under the Open Specification Promise<ref>{{Cite web |title=Microsoft Open Specification Promise |website=[[Microsoft]] |url=https://www.microsoft.com/interop/osp/default.mspx |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161229194811/http://www.microsoft.com/interop/osp/default.mspx |archive-date=December 29, 2016 |access-date=April 17, 2020}}</ref> and has made available free downloadable converters for previous versions of Microsoft Office including Office 2003, Office XP, Office 2000 and Office 2004 for the [[Mac (computer)|Mac]]. Third-party implementations of Office Open XML exist on the Mac platform (iWork 08) and [[Linux]] ([[OpenOffice.org]] 2.3 – Novell Edition only).