Document standard

Draft

Definition

Document standards can be defined in terms of:

• Document file formats, i.e. text or binary formats for storing documents an storage media.
• Content structure, usually an XML application

Document file formats

There are a lot of these, see Wikipedia's document file format article or the full List of file formats

See also: e-book formats

Markup languages that separate content from style

These are somewhat human readable

• Docbook (XML or SGML) was originally intented for authoring technical documents but can be used for almost any kind of document.
• DITA
• XHTML strict
• TEX and related languages like Latex

Messy markup languages

These markup content, style and other things together and are not really human readable.

• OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications (ODF): Open Office XML Project
• Microsoft XML Refence Schemas (including WordML, SpreadsheetML, etc.): Office 2003 XML Reference Schemas
• Microsoft RTF, an older standard that is being phased out
• Framemaker *.MIF

Binary file formats

Not human readable

• Microsoft *.doc
• Framemaker *.fm

Specialized markup formats

These are usually combined within other formats

• MathML
• Vector Graphics, such as SVG and WML

Hardware

• Paper
• All sorts of computers with a monitor
• Mobile devices
• Refeshable electronic paper

Links

• Wikipedia's Comparison of document markup languages
• http://www.answers.com/topic/document-file-format
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_file_formats
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_document_markup_languages
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_office_document_formats_debate
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordprocessingML