OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) Technical Committee

The original Call For Participation for this TC may be found at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/tc-announce/200211/msg00001.html.

The charter for this TC was modified on 16 December 2002 as minuted at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200212/msg00003.html; this change was announced at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/tc-announce/200302/msg00004.html.

The charter for this TC was modified on 8 April 2004 as minuted at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200404/msg00005.html; changes are detailed at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200404/msg00003.html. This change was announced at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/tc-announce/200404/msg00003.html.

The charter for this TC was modified on 8 November 2004 as minuted at http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200411/msg00064.html; changes are detailed at http://www.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200410/msg00026.html.

The charter for this TC was last modified on 19 January 2005 as balloted at http://www.oasis-open.org/apps/org/workgroup/office/ballot_archive.php.

The Charter for this TC was clarified on 25 May 2021. The ballot to approve the clarification can be found at https://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ballot.php?id=3622.

  1. Name of the TC

    OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) TC

  2. Statement of Purpose

    The purpose of this technical committee is to maintain and evolve the Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) to meet the changing needs of office software for an XML-based format for interchange and collaboration.

    The Open Document Format (OpenDocument) and its revisions must meet the following requirements:

    • be suitable for office documents that include content such as, text, spreadsheets, charts, or graphical content,
    • be compatible with the W3C Extensible Markup Language (XML) v1.0 and W3C Namespaces in XML v1.0 specifications,
    • create definitions and conformance requirements that promote interoperable implementations.

  3. Scope of Work

    The Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) was adopted as an OASIS standard and submitted to ISO/IEC where it became ISO/IEC 26300. That standard forms the basis for the future development of OpenDocument.

    The OpenDocument technical committee (TC) will address:

    • Maintenance of existing TC work products,
    • Enhancement of existing TC work products to meet new office suite needs,
    • Development of TC work products that encourage implementation of the OpenDocument,
    • Requesting submission of completed and approved work to other organizations in accordance with the OASIS Liaison policy.

  4. Deliverables

    The deliverables of the technical committee may include but are not limited to:

    • a set of XML schemas setting the vocabulary, constraints and semantics of the file format in question
    • a set of written specifications that describe the elements and attributes of the schemas in plain English
    • Abstraction from the OpenDocument schema as OpenDocument feature tree (or OpenDocument INFO SET)
    • HTML or XHTML versions of the mentioned schemas and written specifications
    • PDF versions of the written specifications
    • Test documents for new OpenDocument features
    • List of changes from the preceding OASIS OpenDocument specification

    The technical committee aims to deliver a Committee Specification Draft at least every year in December, consisting of RelaxNG schemas and written specifications.

  5. IPR Mode

    The TC operates under the "RF on Limited Terms" mode as defined in the OASIS Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Policy.

  6. Audience

    The anticipated audience for this work includes, but is not restricted to:

    • makers of office applications;
    • makers of XML or office document processing or editing solutions;
    • document managers, records managers, and archivists using office document formats for long-term digital preservation;
    • representatives of other office document use cases;
    • other specification writers that need office document content or parts of it.

  7. Language

    The TC shall conduct its proceedings in English.