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Review of KOffice 2.0 Alpha 8 – On Windows

Posted by timothy on from the didn't-see-that-coming-did-you dept.

4WebChimps writes "As featured previously on Slashdot, the KOffice project is working towards a cross-platform, open source office suite for Linux, Windows and Mac OS X. The most recent release, KOffice 2.0 Alpha 8, achieved that goal by being the first release for all three operating systems simultaneously. Want to try KOffice on Windows? TechWorld has a review (with screenshots) of KOffice on Windows, including the installation process which is as simple as clicking a few buttons (the online installer does the rest). Hopefully it won't be long before KOffice sits alongside OpenOffice.org as a usable cross-platform open source productivity suite."

12 of 162 comments (clear)

  1. euch by abigsmurf · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Anyone else really hate online installers? I hate downloading a 20meg program, getting ready to install and use only to find out that you've then got to wait for the real 200meg program to download.

    Some people like to start a download then go off and have lunch whilst something downloads, not to come back and find out it wants you to download some more stuff.

    1. Re:euch by MrHanky · · Score: 5, Informative

      The benefit is that the installer will take care of dependencies, so that the user doesn't have to install a >100 MB package for each program she wants, or to install a huge package of apps if she only wants a few.

      I can't think of a reason why this shouldn't be obvious.

    2. Re:euch by Ginger+Unicorn · · Score: 5, Insightful
      it seems to be a kind of mini package manager that runs on windows, that allows you to install kde apps the same way you do on linux. so this installer thing doesnt just install koffice - it stays on your system and allows you to install and uninstall any other kde apps that become available for windows in the future.

      i think i heard that kde have a long term plan of being able to run a full KDE desktop session on top of windows - presumably this package manager is the foundation of that ultimate goal.

      --
      (1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons
  2. Review? Really? by knutert · · Score: 5, Informative

    Calling it a review is stretching it...in short, he installed it and noticed that it ran slow, which is probably because it is alpha software.

  3. Re:Why ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Because the older versions of Qt that the old KDE was built on was only free/Free on Linux. Windows Qt used to be only available with a expensive commercial license, and nobody from KDE felt like paying for the privilege of supplying free software to Windows users.

  4. Re:Why ... by entrigant · · Score: 5, Informative

    QT was not GPL on windows until version 4

  5. Re:kwrite? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
    What do you mean native? MSOffice uses it's own toolkit, not the standard windows toolkit. KOffice is using QT, so that's non-standard too.

    Look, think about it as a positive. Lots of people are testing the same UI on different platforms so any bugs found on Linux will be fixed in Windows too. Also users can move between operating systems without having a radically different interface.

    Strategically KOffice matters to the Office File Format debate... OpenDocument (ODF) vs Microsofts OOXML.

    Healthy competition in standards is needed like it is in the browser market. KOffice uses ODF (of course it couldn't use OOXML without reverse-engineering) and by being the second most popular implementation it helps keep OpenOffice.org honest (not that there's any sign that they're not honest). When MSOffice support ODF then KOffice will be more important still -- it will help evaluate ODF compliance and interoperability.

    Microsoft Office earns them 10 billion and a part of that is coming out of your country's economy -- competition in the form of KOffice is very good indeed. It's particularly good that they're embracing Windows -- it worked for Firefox.

  6. Re:Excellent news by tomtomtom777 · · Score: 5, Informative

    My personal favorite is Krita, which IMHO is surpasses GIMP in many ways. Full CMYK support, much more friendly user interface and better intergration with the Office suite.

  7. FLOSS flood by zarlino · · Score: 5, Interesting

    in a year or two, as this ports mature, Windows and OSX are going to be flooded with KDE free software: Amarok music player, Gwenview image viewer, Digikam photo manager, Kopete instant messenger, and many many more. I think this is exciting news but probably a bit scary for commercial ISVs...

    --
    Check out my cross-platform apps
  8. 1997 called... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... and they want their UI back.

    1. Re:1997 called... by xtracto · · Score: 5, Funny

      MacOSX and Linux called and want their UI back from Vista ....

      Oh yeah??
      Xerox called, they want their Windowed GUI paradigm back from OSX, X-Window, MS Windows, et all.

      --
      Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
  9. Re:Good Free Software WordPro Recommendation? by maxume · · Score: 5, Funny

    Uncheck "Gremlins" on the advanced options tab.

    --
    Nerd rage is the funniest rage.