Microsoft held a conference call this morning with CEO Steve Ballmer, Senior VP Bob Muglia from the Server and Tools division, Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie, and general counsel Brad Smith to discuss significant changes in the company's approach to information sharing and interoperability commitments.

Today, the company is opening the kimono, publishing documentation for all APIs and protocols used by their "high volume" products internally. Also to be published will be Microsoft's documentation on their internal implementation of industry standards... and the company promises to "...work with other major implementers of the standard toward achieving robust, consistent and interoperable implementations across a broad range of widely deployed products." The company is also designing new APIs for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint to allow third-party developers to more easily use alternative file formats and for businesses to set these as the defaults, rather than the Microsoft's preferred OOXML standard. Finally, something called the Open Source Interoperability Initiative is being launched, which promises to improve coordination between commercial and community-based open source developers and the company. All this will be wide open and royalty free in non-commercial use.

What does all this mean? More after the jump.

This has significant implications for designers and builders of Service Oriented Architectures. Previously, Microsoft has signaled a steadfast commitment to their own products, frequently throwing a wrench into interoperability with use of proprietary protocols which contained hidden changes from version to version (ask the guys over at SAMBA about that some time). Now, with published protocols and specifications, as well as a commitment to working with the larger community with respect to standards, it should become much easier to build out an SOA using the traditional mix of Microsoft and other platforms found in the modern enterprise.

These moves appear at least in part to be a dramatic concession to European Union concerns over Microsoft's monopolistic tendencies, concerns which have found expression in a number of recent EU court decisions mandating certain types of information be shared by the company. General counsel Brad Smith acknowledged as much, stating that at least in part this is designed to fulfill the EU Court of First Instance decision, but also that it "...reflects the changed legal landscape" in which the company is now operating. This step appears to be considerably beyond the relatively narrow requirements imposed by the EU, but it may be an attempt to forestall other, broader decisions in the future. Indeed, as foretold by EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes, the anti-trust case there does seem to have set the precedent that has put this initiative in motion.

It also seems to represent an acknowledgment of some of the concerns that have been voiced over the proposed OOXML file standard. By presenting fewer obstacles to businesses which still desire to use the rival ODF format, Microsoft may be doing OOXML quite a favor; the arguments against Office as a standard in the enterprise based on file lock-in fall away. However, while it becomes harder to make a case against Office, it remains likely that once the product is in place, the Microsoft default will probably remain the business default. The fact that it can be changed doesn't make it likely that it will be in most organizations.

Much of the discussion during the call was about the recognition of the longevity of files and the need for continuing access over time, and, as Ballmer put it, "Microsoft's responsibilities to the world." Smith was adamant, however, that the company was not changing its stance on IP in general, and that the company would aggressively combat patent infringement by commercial users.

This seems to hang some more clothes on the company's other recent moves in attempting to arrange licensing deals with commercial open-source Linux vendors. In the past, Steve Ballmer particularly has represented all open-source projects, commercial or otherwise, as a grave threat to Microsoft's business, and quite understandably so... freely produced and available Debian Linux is just as capable as commercially produced Red Hat Linux. But the reality has been that most businesses which have been adopting Linux have been adopting commercial distributions. Microsoft appears to recognize this, and also to understand now that by fighting off those independent, non-commercial open-source developers with the same ferocity as the larger commercial open-source vendors, they have simply been mobilizing a larger force against themselves.

It's not clear that by attempting to mollify non-commercial OSS developers that Microsoft will garner any significant good will, but the move is sure to play well in the courts and in the long term it will undoubtedly improve the quality and capabilities of the software ecosystem built around the company's products... and that can only be a good thing for Microsoft.

More information on all these initiatives can be found on Microsoft's Interoperability website here.