Barry Robinson

I think one of the major components to the issue of Open Access is utilising open storage methods for this data.

For example, most people utilise the .doc format to store text-based information. Not because it's an open and standard format, but because this is the default document format imposed on them by Microsoft... Which controls the market by saying, "Hey, if you don't use our software, you don't get to view YOUR information." How many people have had problems opening a .docx document in any application other than Microsoft Office 2007?

My suggestion would be to move to open document standards such as ODF (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument), which is supported by all major Office packages and is an open standard, just like the standards we built the Internet off (HTML, DNS, TCP/IP).

It is my understanding the National Archives have put some thought into the issue of open standards, as there is a clear problem with storing information in a closed format that may not be available to us in another 100 years... not going to worry me much, but I am sure it will upset someone's Grandchildren.

I am not too familiar with databasing standards, other than to assume ODBC and XML might be a start down the right track?

Cheers,
Barry