Before the deadline expired, the International Standards Organization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) had received appeals from South Africa, India and Brazil against the adoption of Microsoft’s Open Office XML document format as an ISO/IEC International Standard.

OOXML, the default file-saving format of Microsoft Office 2007, is actually a rival to an already approved open standard, the Open Document Format (ODF).

A lot of experts argue that having two competing similar open standards defeats the purpose of having open formats in the first place, while others say that Microsoft built the format very complicated on purpose so it can't be fully translated into another format.

Initially the proposal was rejected in the “fast-track vote” ended September 2007, but re-entered discussion under joint technical committee rules. A ballot resolution meeting (BRM) later held in Geneva on 25-29 February 2008 resulted in a massive withdrawal of previously disapproval votes, which led to the approval of the document as an International Standard on March 29.

Last Friday, SABS (the National Body member of ISO/IES JTC1 for South Africa) filed a formal appeal against the “fast-track” adoption of the OOXML as an International Standard, saying that the matter is “of deep concern.”

South Africa challenged the validity of the final vote on the OOXML, arguing the inadequate information resulting in a poorly conducted BRM, as well as the entire process, which demanded parties involved to analyze far too much information in far too little time.

Brazil joined South Africa in its appeal, saying the results of the BRM were inconclusive, and supporting South Africa’s idea that the decision was influenced by the lack of time. Brazil also claimed the misapplication of rules regarding who was entitled to vote in the BRM, and that the decisions taken were mostly based on a “need to give answers to journalists.”

Despite the fact that India’s appeal was not lodged in the correct procedure, Jonathan Buck, spokesman for IEC said, the appeal has also been taken into consideration.