Last week a court ruled that Microsoft Word 2003 and 2007 violate a patent held by a Canadian company, and ordered them not to sell new copies of the software beginning in mid-October. Microsoft plans to appeal and has filed for an emergency injunction. Meanwhile, it's only one aspect of the Word programs that violates the patent: its use of XML. That means Microsoft could patch the applications to go back to saving documents in the old non-XML file format. Or they could reach a settlement agreement with the Toronto company, which is probably the most likely outcome. In any event, despite some sensationalistic headlines, there's little chance that we'll end up in a "world without Word" anytime soon. Read more here...
