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> What we need is, something combines ODF and PDF. You can add binary file to PDF document like some layer.

Already exists:
http://www.oooninja.com/2008/06/pdf-import-hybrid-odf-pdfs-extension-30.html
(scroll down a little)

I know this wouldn't be too helpful to openoffice and the FOSS world in general in terms of getting a leg up on native format overlords but it would help me not just deploy it in a large office by saving myself some clicks as I'm running around installing it but it would also enable me to hand out a CD to someone with an openoffice installation on it if I could somehow modify it to set the default save formats to Microsoft's. I also realize there's a risk such users should know, that they may lose certain formatting in doing this (and maybe I'd want to encourage them to crank out PDFs on final drafts), but most people just don't have the technical acumen to change these settings themselves and would have little interest in an editor that would only save a new document in an MS format if they went out of their way to specify it each time. Being able to double click an icon, type something, hit save and email to someone else who will then be able to open it with or without openoffice without having to do any extra steps would be a strong selling point.
 
So is there any way, a simple way without having to sift through all the source code, to modify some kind of openoffice installer to use ms formats by default? Maybe something like this exists already?
 
Ideally MS would be kind enough to support oo formats...
 
While I'm posting here's a link for MS fonts and another for Vista fonts for OO, works on all platforms OO works on according to what I found on google just now. Oh yeah, and back to my question, how about modifying an installer package to toss in fonts like this? Again, dealing with people who can barely click through a simple installation, not people who know where to find the basic settings of this kind of software.

Why distribute a .DOC file? The .ODF, Open Document Format, is the international standard.

In my opinion: The .DOC format is proprietary and buggy, and very expensive due to forced upgrades and general proprietary quirkiness. The .DOC format is supplied by a company that makes more money if it spaces improvements over ten versions, rather than making all improvements in one version. The .DOC format is supplied by a company that makes more money if the .DOC format is implemented in an abusive manner. Why open yourself to abuse?

The best way to send documents that will not be changed is as .PDF files. That's a simple menu choice in Open Office. Or, use PDF Creator from any application.

Microsoft's ODF Support Falls Short It's just another proprietary format, from a company that makes money by locking people into proprietary formats.

"Out of the box OpenOffice.org version 3 opens Microsoft Office 2007 documents, but often odf-converter-integrator converts with better quality." I haven't tested that myself.

References:

OpenDocument Format Alliance. OpenDocument Format Alliance on Wikipedia

OpenDocument software

OpenDocument

OpenDocument adoption

Are there around some tests about other open source software that could help us understand the problem ? We can find some on open office : http://www.oooninja.com/2009/03/multiplatform-benchmark-30.html Or Tomcat : http://mediakey.dk/~cc/tomcat-performance-linux-faster-than-windows/ But that does not seem to gie a clear understanding of what's happening.

How does Free go about breaking this lock-in? I know for me if it wasn't for entertainment software I would be all over GNU. Wine steps in and fills that void somewhat but currently does not have enough compatibility to bring me over to the good side. I like Linux, I want to use it, but my games don't play in it and thats the only thing that keeps a closed OS on my desktop.

You do it by buying a Playstation or Xbox360 or Wii, and play your games there - and watch your movies there. Use your PC for personal computing and skip the "entertainment" stuff.

I'm prefacing this with the fact that I ran Linux as my only OS for a year (SuSE 9) then I switched back to Microsoft. Linux and GNU are a superior development process - inclusive and plural - but Microsoft right now has the superior ecosystem.

And as far as Windows having the "superior ecosystem"? I don't think so. There's lots of stuff broken in Windows and other Microsoft products. OpenOffice.org Ninja often runs benchmarks against Microsoft and Free. Bad Vista has a list of lots of things that are wrong, but as this is from the FSF, the angle is mostly about freedoms. Or check out Linuxinexile for things that just don't work "right" under Windows, compared to Linux:

• Windows boots slower than Linux (although it's better since XP)
• Windows printing stops if you switch to another app
• Windows "favorite links" makes login slow
• Windows can't open multiple files at once (specifically, different extensions)
• (the list goes on) ...

Doesn't sound like a "superior ecosystem" to me. But hey, to each his own, I guess.

Warm? In my a previous benchmark (I wrote the article in question) I saw an interesting performance gain from Prefetcher on Windows XP. For the first few cold starts (about three times), cold start would get a little faster. It caused outliers on the charts (indicated by dots).

Andrew

I've been using the MacOS X port for years via X11. I was obviously quite happy that 3.0 had a native MacOS X version. However, version 3.0 is severely lacking in terms of MacOS X UI compliance. Example: the command and control keys are wrongly used by OpenOffice (wrongly = different than in all other apps on MacOS X). I learned via this link provided in another /. story yesterday, that there are 47 issues directly targeting MacOS X and that the keyboard shortcuts have been fixed it seems. Great! Hope the 3.1 will be become a real good software for the Mac! :-)

I've been meaning to test out Go-oo, which is purportedly faster.

Go-OO is the slowest of all based on these benchmarks from the same site as in the OP.

One thing to keep in mind is that Go-OO is the Novell version of OpenOffice.org and what with the patent threat due to their Microsoft agreement (best explanation of this threat is here) you should be careful not to tie yourself to one particular office suite through proprietary formats. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately) the ODF format is like HTML and you can reference and include proprietary files in it.

There are extensions out there for converting (relatively painlessly) docx to odt and you could use scribus as a basic replacement for indesign (and it works with windows, too).

Seriously, between scribus, gimp, and inkscape (equivalents for indesign, photoshop, and illustrator respectively) I don't use any adobe products anymore except digital editions for library e-books.

Generally training and file format compatibility were not an issue. The initial draw to OpenOffice.org was not having to count licenses (so tedious!), and later it helped us switch half the systems to Linux (most on a terminal server).

One 'gotcha' was that the accountant needed Excel to use Quickbooks because it interfaces directly over a COM API.

The second in charge (an Apple fanboy ironically) wanted to switch to Microsoft. He didn't give a good case why.

To increase compatibility reading OpenXML, install odf-converter-integrator. To understand how it works, read "A Better Docx Converter".

Generally training and file format compatibility were not an issue. The initial draw to OpenOffice.org was not having to count licenses (so tedious!), and later it helped us switch half the systems to Linux (most on a terminal server).

One 'gotcha' was that the accountant needed Excel to use Quickbooks because it interfaces directly over a COM API.

The second in charge (an Apple fanboy ironically) wanted to switch to Microsoft. He didn't give a good case why.

To increase compatibility reading OpenXML, install odf-converter-integrator. To understand how it works, read "A Better Docx Converter".

What exactly are the virtues of proprietary software? It seams to me that it has to be your forced to do something you may not want to. want to use an ipod? Got to use itunes! want to use OS X? Got to use expensive mac hardware! want to work with people using the latest version of office? Got to use the latest version of office! If proprietary software has virtues why bother with lock-in, surely it could compete by itself on a level playing field?

Proprietary software can compete on a level playing field. Just look at SubEthaEdit. Where's the lock-in there? Its a text editor - no proprietary formats at all. Yet, it manages to compete by making things like collaborative editing significantly easier than its competitors, both free and proprietary.

Same thing with all the software you've listed. No one's forcing you to use an iPod, a Mac or even the latest version of Office. There are competing MP3 players, competing computer systems, and OpenOffice has handled all of the docx I've thrown at it, once I've run it through ODF Converter/Integrator.

If you don't like proprietary software, don't complain - vote with your wallet and buy hardware that does support the standards and formats you want.

• The framework and getting it more modularized, so that various large projects making their own branded software will only use the components that they need. The situation is best described here, here and here.
• File format support and compatibility. This is mostly related to Office Open XML (known as MS Office 2007 format). That work is rather extensive, because so far there's some stuff that is yet to be done wrt pre-MS Office 2007 formats, while OOXML support needs continuous improvement and is still raw at places.
• Mac Aqua port. So far, OO.o had to be run through X11 on Mac OS X.

One of the best things framework-wise they did so far is getting the extensions system working. Michael Meeks is right about the number of committed developers; the extensions system should now make it easier for third party developers to create required functionality that can be quickly added, while taking some heat off the main developers. The extensions system also made it possible to ditch the bulky and inflexible way dictionaries were managed.

The Linux kernel
The benefit of running the latest 2.6.xx kernel instead of 2.4.xx is better overall security, resource management and better hardware support. The Linux 1.x tree probably doesn't support ext3 and other advanced stuff, because that depends on newer libraries, which in turn want a newer kernel to function. If you still want to run something on a very old machine, then perhaps give any of the *BSD's a try. That's how I see it.

Also, all the leading distros ship Go-OO's version.

I'd hope not it's the slowest of all the versions of OpenOffice.org, See http://www.oooninja.com/

You can share spreadsheets
Not sure about Writer documents, though.

• Is OpenOffice.org Getting Faster?
• Benchmarking Microsoft 95 through 2007

It's called Wirth's Law

• Is OpenOffice.org Getting Faster?
• Benchmarking Microsoft 95 through 2007

It's called Wirth's Law

It runs MySQL, will run Open-Xchange with some tweaks (a distro better suited to server work like Red Hat/Fedora would be the obvious choice for a server), with Evolution replacing Outlook since you don't seem to know much about Linux apps, and can run OpenOffice, which is about to run clean over the MSXML speedbump. What functionality are you missing?

Just at a NSF conference and the keynote speaker tried to pull up a ppbx, not a ppt. It did not work.

I know there are converters for free. I know breaking compatibility helps drive sales. But sometimes, things don't open like you want and most people don't know (or care) why.

They have a converter for docx to doc, maybe oo can get it to work with wine so open office can automagically open everything? Or maybe it already has docx support?
http://www.oooninja.com/2008/02/office-compatibility-pack-review.html

> This "standard" is completely irrelevant as a standard. No one, absolutely no one, is going to implement it. Not even Microsoft.

BS: Microsoft has pledged to support it in public. So assuming that the OpenOffice implementation of OOXML continues, it will support it too.

> No company is going to be allowed to implement it and become a competitive threat to Microsoft. Microsoft will shut them down with Patent Violations.

Again BS: The OSP pretty much crushes that arguement. Even the main point in the SFLC anaylsis about future versions has been addressed.

Your core arguements seem to be strictly Proof by Assertion

Are you using the Ubuntu OpenOffice.org edition? For all its goodies, it has some bugs too. I always use the vanilla OOo edition from http://www.openoffice.org/ . I have no problems with slide shows of your size.

RTFA and ye shall receive:

http://katana.oooninja.com/w/openoffice.org/performance_improvements

>As it stands, when someone sends me a .docx, I need MS Word to read it

That is absolutely false. I have been opening "docx" files under Linux and OpenOffice for a long time.
Oh, and by the way, now you can also open/convert .pptx and .xlsx

http://download.novell.com/Download?buildid=GuM6LMM9SR4
http://www.oooninja.com/2008/01/openxml-translator-odf-converter-11.html