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In an open letter, Patrick Durusau suggests that companies involved with both formats should follow the example of Novell, which participates in both ODF and OpenXML development.

"If we had a co-evolutionary environment, one where the proponents of OpenXML and OpenDocument, their respective organisations, national bodies and other interested groups could meet to discuss the future of those proposals, the future revisions of both would likely be quite different," he writes.

"Co-evolution

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means that the standards will evolve based on the influence of each other and their respective user communities. Both remain completely independent and neither is subordinate to the other."

Durusau has stayed out of the increasingly vitriolic war of words between supporters of the two formats, which one analyst recently claimed had "turned into a riot".

Durusau's olive branch follows Microsoft's announcement last week that it planned to open up to competitors and allow developers to plug-in additional document formats.

The move has been seen by some as an attempt to ease concerns over its commitment to maintaining OpenXML as an open format, and an effort to grease the wheels towards adoption by the International Standards Organisation. "Open XML was underlying the entire thing," says Ovum's open-source research director of Microsoft's announcement on interoperability. "The timing is smart enough for Microsoft to achieve what it wants to achieve [with Open XML winning ISO approval]."