Government, Microsoft haggle over documentation

Microsoft Corp. is behind schedule in complying with a court order to document its proprietary communications protocols, according to U.S. authorities monitoring its behavior. It also plans to release the documents in a file format that cannot be annotated, and can only be used with Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser, they said in a report published Friday.

The plaintiffs have three main areas of concern about the documentation.

First among these is that Microsoft, asked to open up and document the interfaces to its communication protocols for licensees, has chosen to issue the documentation in a rights-protected file format called MHT, readable only with its own Web browser, Internet Explorer. This means licensees can neither annotate nor effectively search the information, according to the plaintiffs.

Contracts for Microsoft's .Net Framework require that licensees ask Microsoft for permission before publishing benchmark testing results for the framework. Since this information could be key to effectively comparing Microsoft products with those of its competition, and the license provision could be used to prevent such comparison, the plaintiffs asked Microsoft to change it. Microsoft agreed to modify it to require only prior notice from licensees of their intent to publish, so that it can attempt to reproduce the results itself. "Microsoft does not object to benchmarking of non-Microsoft software against the .Net Framework," it said in the report.