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ZDNet Reviews KOffice

Posted by timothy on from the doesn't-kill-makes-stronger dept.

Spotted over at dot.kde.org -- this review of KOffice. The review isn't overwhelmingly positive or negative -- seems like a rather balanced picture of both what's up to par, and what's still missing, for mainstream acceptance in the Normal Workplaces of the world.

5 of 268 comments (clear)

  1. Re:staroffice is java based? huh? by questionlp · · Score: 5, Informative

    According to Sun's StarOffice FAQ:

    12. Is StarOffice 5.2 software written in the Java language? Will Sun rewrite the StarOffice suite in Java technology?

    StarOffice 5.2 software includes components written in the Java language, and provides the Java Virtual Machine for running software based on Java technology. However, the majority of the StarOffice 5.2 code is written in C++. Sun does not intend to rewrite StarOffice 5.2 in Java technology. The Sun Webtop architecture relies heavily on Java technology for the interaction between the browser-enabled client and the application services running on the portal.

    The FAQ can be found here: http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/5.2/fa q.html#12

  2. Yeah but the price is right! by Robber+Baron · · Score: 5, Insightful

    M$ Office: $200-300
    K Office: N/C (comes bundled with various distros)

    That in itself is an important feature...

    --

    You're using her as bait, Master!

    1. Re:Yeah but the price is right! by __aahlyu4518 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      As Ghoser777 pointed out in a response to your post: companies just know there is a catch... and (for now) there is:
      - No Support desk (in the traditional way)
      - No books (Koffice in 24 hours, Koffice for dummies etc). How is their secretary ever going to learn this thing ???
      - No courses. As with the books... How are their employees going to learn ? Want to take classes on MS-Word ? Open the yellow pages and take your pick.
      - Every time a new employee comes to work for the company they have to train that person. Using MS-Office in the company ? 95% of the new employees will know how it works allready... that will save them heaps of money.

      Yeah yeah.. I know.. learn through experience, helpfiles, irc etc etc... That is not how businesses work people ! Learning 'the hard way' really is the hard way... It takes a lot of time, and time is money.
      A good way is for people to get used to it at home and when a lot of people use it at home, they want to use it at their job as well, which will be less of a problem because they don't have to be trained.
      Staroffice/OpenOffice has a better chance than Koffice IMHO, because of the big SUN behind it (which will be trusted by companies more easily) and because it is multi-platform. That way people can use it more easily at home, because most of them will probably run a MS-OS....
      But I guess there is a place for both of the suits... Choice is good, and should be encouraged... It will keep office-creators from getting lazy ;-)

      -

  3. Re:Two Things that will Help... by NutscrapeSucks · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "Rich text format seems to be the preferred document format among open-source word processors"

    "Heck, even MS-Word can read and save RTF!"

    RTF is a Microsoft format. It's essentially a text version of DOC. Modern versions support the same macro and embedded COM object capabilities that DOC does.

    It's true many independant vendors have implemented the Word2 or Word6 version of RTF, but that doesn't make it an open or completely documeted spec by any means.

    Your post does highlight the issue that there are no standard formats in the OSS/Unix world, and nor are there 'standard' applications (as MS Office has become on Windows and Mac), and that OSS/Unix users have to fall back to Microsoft formats to interoperate with each other.

    --
    Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
  4. SO5.2 might as well be in Java by hatless · · Score: 5, Interesting

    StarOffice 5.2 is so resource-hungry and slow that it might as well have been written in Java 1.1. Waiting a solid minute or so for it to fire up on a P2/300 with 192MB RAM, and running into its native widget set, it's easy to unserstand why someone might think it was written in Java. Less easy to understand is why ZDNet seems to have fired all of its fact-checkers.

    The OpenOffice development snapshots are definitely peppier, so StarOffice 6.0 should be fine in this regard.. but 5.2.. eek.

    Where Java does enter the StarOffice picture is that 5.2 has an open interface that lets you pick a JVM--or install one--to use as yet another macro language. This is a nice touch for all the Unix shops and others that have Java programmers on hand more readily than VBA people. You can use a nice, fast 1.3.x JVM with it, and develop with your existing tools and components. The other nice "Java" feature is SO 5.2's ability to use JDBC throughout for database access instead of native drivers or ODBC. Very useful and very elegantly cross-platform on Sun's part.

    And incidentially, the "other" major SO5.2 scripting language is a VB clone, both in syntax and coding environment. SO has a different document object model, so MS Office macros won't run unmodified, but at least VBA skills can carry over. KOffice's use of DCOP for automation allows the use of any available language, potentially doing things one better--but without integration with a development tool as one gets with VBA and StarBasic, it remains at a disadvantage. Maybe bidirectional KOffice-to-KDevelop hooks (for C++) and KOffice-to-Netbeans/Forte (for Java) are a way to go.