14 DAY TRIAL // A new release of the resource designed to provide developers with the strongly typed part and content classes that can be leveraged with Open XML documents is now available for download from Microsoft. The latest version of the Open XML software development kit went live on the Microsoft Download Center the past week, providing a new iteration over the December 2009 Community Technology Preview offered by the software giant. Devs can turn to Open XML SDK 2.0 for Microsoft Office in order to manipulate Open XML documents. Open XML is the Redmond company’s answer to the Open Document Format (used in OpenOffice), and the standard at the foundation of the default file format implementation of Office 2007 and Office 2010.
“The tools package contains the Open XML SDK v2.0 Productivity Tool for Office and the documentation for the Open XML SDK v2. The Open XML SDK 2.0 Productivity Tool for Microsoft Office provides a number of features designed to improve your productivity and accelerate your learning while working with the SDK and Open XML files. Features include the ability to generate Open XML SDK 2.0 source code based on document content, compare source and target Open XML documents to reveal differences and to generate source code to create the target from the source, validate documents, and display documentation for the Open XML SDK v2.0, the ECMA376v1 standard, and the Microsoft Office implementation notes,” Microsoft reveals.
Brian Jones, a program manager in Office, published a very interesting post at the end of February 2010, in which he is detailing the usage of Open XML SDK and Office Services in concert. The Office Solutions blog is an excellent resource for information on how to take advantage of the Open XML SDK in a variety of scenarios, including pushing and pulling data into and out of Open XML files and, obviously, manipulating Open XML files.
“I am going to show you another functionality of Word Automation Services that will allow you to perform file format conversions on the server. For example, you can leverage the service to convert Word documents into PDF. In addition to Word Automation Services, I am going to show you how to leverage Excel Services to recalculate charts and formulas within a workbook,” Jones states. “[In the latest] post, I am going to show you how to leverage all three components, the SDK and the two Office services, to create a very cool mash up document assembly solution.”
Open XML SDK 2.0 for Microsoft Office is available for download here.
Office 2010 Beta 14.0.4536.1000 is available for download here.