Interview With Gary Edwards of OpenOffice.org

silentbob4 writes "Hot on the heels of yesterdays interview of Sun's Florian Reuter posted on Slashdot comes a two page interview with OpenOffice.org's Gary Edwards. In this installment, Gary discusses the importance of open document formats and hints to the release date of OpenOffice.org 2.0: 'No one knows for certain when OpenOffice.org 2.0 stable will be released, but Mad Penguin's bet is that the stable 2.0 release will come before any recently purchased cartons of milk expire in your refrigerator.'"

Comments

Geez

[Reality Master 101]

Open document formats are NOT important right now! I wish they would get a clue on this issue.

What's important is what the standard document format is RIGHT NOW, and right now, it's the binary office format. Until is OpenOffice absolutely, positively 100% compatible with no headaches, it will continue to be a project that people shy away from.

Yes, yes, yes, I know it's relatively undocumented. But that's not an unsolvable problem. If they really want OpenOffice to be adopted, they need to solve this problem. Have a big "bug drive" where everyone sends in MS/Office documents that don't open right in OpenOffice, and vice-versa!

Why is compatibility such a hard concept for people to get that it's the single most critical feature? OK, they're volunteers, and maybe they don't care about people adopting their program. But if they do care, then they need to clue in.