With the countdown on to the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) ballot on OOXML, Australia and New Zealand's representatives are keeping their cards close to their chests on which way they will vote.

The policy indicates open source should be looked at first and if it doesn’t meet requirements then commercial options should be considered, says NZOSS president.

Industry standards may not be open (e.g., Microsoft Word file formats) so there are reverse-engineering risks with any OSS dependent upon those standards. The MoJ preference for open standards (e.g., Open Document Format, which is now supported even by Microsoft) lessens this risk.

For someone whose job suddenly disappeared on him, Auckland software developer Vik Olliver is on a high. Apart from his employment misfortune, good things have been happening to Olliver, a stalwart of the open source software community in New Zealand.

Standards New Zealand will host forums this week that could determine New Zealand’s position on Microsoft’s controversial Open XML file format in a crucial international vote on September 2.

On Oct. 17, New Zealand honors those who make positive contributions to Open Source by presenting the first New Zealand Open Source Awards.

The event, to be held in Wellington, is being spearheaded by Catalyst IT, New Zealand's largest open source provider, and the New Zealand Open Source Society.