Backcountry.com runs OpenOffice on top of Ubuntu Linux on about two-thirds of its 300 PCs, saving $250 per system annually compared with the cost of its machines that still have Windows XP and Office 2000 setups, according to Jenkins.

But that doesn't mean Backcountry.com has turned its back on Microsoft's formats. Jenkins has set OpenOffice so that files are automatically saved in Office formats. He said he would prefer to use ODF but adopted what he described as a pragmatic approach to minimize "yelling and screaming" about incompatible file formats.

In Massachusetts, where the state's Information Technology Division made a controversial decision to adopt ODF as a standard file format last year, the official response to Ecma's vote on Open XML was noncommittal but open.

"Microsoft's decision to bring their new software format to an international standards body and [Ecma's] vote validate our efforts to adopt open standards," acting Massachusetts CIO Bethann Pepoli wrote in an e-mail response to questions.

Pepoli added that the IT division will review the standards work done by Ecma's Open XML committee and will consider including the format in the next version of the state's Enterprise Technical Reference Model blueprint. Work on the revision "is about to begin," she wrote. The current version of the ETRM lists ODF and Adobe Systems Inc.'s Portable Document Format as acceptable open formats for state agencies.