Office Open XML (OOXML), Microsoft's answer to the upstart open source Open Document Format (ODF), has passed to the nextOffice Open XML (OOXML), Microsoft's answer to the upstart open source Open Document Format (ODF), has passed to the next hurdle on its way to fast-track ISO standardization just like ODF: a five-month-long ballot by the national members of ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) that stays open until September 2. hurdle on its way to fast-track ISO standardization just like ODF: a five-month-long ballot by the national members of ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) that stays open until September 2. More info

DataDirect Technologies announced the latest release of its DataDirect XML Converters and DataDirect XQuery products. With version 3.1 of its XML products, it offers even greater scalability and performance; broadens its support of popular databases and industry standards; and offers a highly scalable streaming architecture to exceed the most demanding data integration and enterprise system requirements. More info

Microsoft and Novell have opened that interoperability lab in Cambridge, Massachusetts promised in their controversial November accord. The location is right under the nose of the disapproving Free Software Foundation. The idea is to build and support technologies that let Windows and SUSE Linux, unlike other strains of Linux, work well together starting with virtualization, then moving on to standards-based systems management, identity federation and document formats. The 2,500-square-foot lab reportedly houses 80 servers of varying architectures and a SAN. More info

FireScope debuted its breakthrough IT operations management dashboard solution at RSA Conference 2007 in San Francisco. Surpassing both the graphical and performance capabilities of other IT operations solutions as well as traditional monitoring products, FireScope offers a real-time, intuitive and customizable look at the entire availability, performance and security of an enterprise?s assets, enabling IT managers to instantly assess?and even diagnose?any aspect of the system?s health. More info

Deutsche Post CEO Klaus Zumwinkel, the head of Europe's largest postal service and a powerful member of the establishment, resigned last Friday - reportedly not willingly but under pressure from the government - after the German authorities started investigating him for tax evasion, a melodrama complete with a raid on his office in Bonn and a televised search of his home in a Cologne suburb. An arrest warrant was even issued and Zumwinkel was detained for questioning late last week then released after posting bond. More info

Tail-f Systems and IP Infusion announced a strategic partnership to integrate their products and collaborate on sales and marketing. Together the companies will enable network equipment providers to benefit from leading routing protocols managed by standards-based XML configuration management software. More info

JustSystems, Inc. will promote XML?s evolving role at the XML 2007 Conference & Exposition, being held in Boston at the Marriott Copley Place on Dec. 3 ? 5, 2007. ?XML has grown up, with companies accelerating their XML adoption to support SOA and winding up with an abundance of highly-accessible information,? explained Jake Sorofman, vice president of marketing for JustSystems. ?All of a sudden, XML isn?t just about interoperability between disparate applications. It?s about making business-critical information available to executives, knowledge workers, and others who need it.? More info

DataDirect Technologies has released version 3.0 of the DataDirect XQuery product, an XQuery processor that enables software developers to access and query XML, relational data, SOAP messages, EDI messages, legacy data, or a combination of data sources and provides full update support for relational data. More info

JustSystems, Inc., a global enterprise software company, has announced three important additions to its Partner Program. The 4-tier program, categorized into Strategic Partner, Premier Certified, Certified and Associate designations, was created earlier this year to reflect the company?s focus on quality partners that will add value through complementary software and services to support an end-to-end content lifecycle solution. More info

ZANTAZ, an Autonomy company, announced that ZANTAZ Introspect is compliant with EDRM's Extensible Markup Language (XML) standard, EDRM XML 1.0. Autonomy ZANTAZ Introspect is one of the first e-discovery products to achieve compliance with the newly released XML standard, which was designed to improve interoperability and the transfer of electronically stored information (ESI) between applications involved in the discovery process. More info