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StarOffice Dropped From Google Pack

Posted by timothy on from the stardom-is-temporary dept.

Barence writes "Sun's StarOffice suite has been mysteriously dropped from the Google Pack of free software. The office suite has been axed without any warning or explanation on the Google site. Is Google trying to drive more people towards its own online suite of office applications? Or has it been stung into action by Steve Ballmer's recent comment that Microsoft Office faces stronger competition from StarOffice than it does Google Docs and Spreadsheet?"

27 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. If there's one thing I wouldn't do... by davidbrit2 · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...It's use the frothing rants of Steve Ballmer as the basis of my business strategy.

    1. Re:If there's one thing I wouldn't do... by rodrigoandrade · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Unless your business strategy involves some future negotiations with Microsoft.

    2. Re:If there's one thing I wouldn't do... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      In which case, you're obviously not an office furniture supplier.

  2. Why not OpenOffice? by Shin-LaC · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The answer might be obvious to the people involved in the project, but as an external observer I'm left to wonder why they were using StarOffice in the first place. Why not OpenOffice?

    1. Re:Why not OpenOffice? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      StarOffice has some proprietary parts that couldn't be put into OpenOffice. In particular, Sun Microsystems licensed information about the format of Office files from Microsoft, to gain better compatibility.

    2. Re:Why not OpenOffice? by David+Gerard · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "In particular, Sun Microsystems licensed information about the format of Office files from Microsoft, to gain better compatibility."

      [citation needed]

      --
      http://rocknerd.co.uk
    3. Re:Why not OpenOffice? by radimvice · · Score: 5, Funny

      [citation needed]

      Anonymous Coward. "Re:Why not OpenOffice?" Weblog comment. 10 November 2008. "StarOffice Dropped From Google Pack." Timothy Lord. Slashdot. 10 November 2008 (http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1023681&cid=25702165).

      Hope that helps~

  3. It's obvious.... by i_want_you_to_throw_ · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Google Apps. Google's only obligation since becoming a publicly traded company (GOOG) is this...

    Making a profit for shareholders

    Including StarOffice does nothing to that end.

    Honestly why is anyone surprised when Google acts like a real company?

    1. Re:It's obvious.... by noshellswill · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Classic short-sight! GOOGLES value largely depends on how web_usrs view it as an "honest broker". Usrs revalue the company every day. GOOGLE is one-button-click away from bankruptcy and that button must be considered & re-chosen constantly. Other buttons abound. It's not like GOOGLE makes toilet-seats.....

  4. Support by dreamchaser · · Score: 4, Insightful

    When an enterprise deploys office software they want at least some kind of support from the vendor.

    1. Re:Support by bmo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      What support?

      Really, what support from the vendor? Have you /read/ your EULA for any software you've used? Ever?

      YOYO.

      You're On Your Own.

      Every EULA should have "YOYO" printed at the top of the first page (typically of dozens) or just say "You're On Your Own" in 28 point type in the middle of a blank page. It would greatly simplify things.

      That support myth is so old. I don't know which myth is older, that one or the "someone to sue" myth.

      Seriously, stop repeating this bullshit.

    2. Re:Support by morgan_greywolf · · Score: 3, Informative

      Agreed. Most EULAs are pretty much this: a notice that states whether or not redistribution is allowed (usually it is not), a notice that states how many computers you can install it on, a notice that says not to reverse engineer it, and a complete disclaimer of all warranty and sometimes even a covenant not to sue.

      You can, of course, usually purchase additional support, sometimes even warranty coverage.

      How does this differ from free/open source software? Not at all. One can purchase support for any major free/open source software package and one can also often purchase some level of support for various small packages, in addition to free support for all widely used packages.

      --
      My blog
    3. Re:Support by blincoln · · Score: 3, Informative

      Really, what support from the vendor? Have you /read/ your EULA for any software you've used? Ever?

      I know it's popular on Slashdot to claim that vendor support doesn't exist, but if you work for a large customer of a particular vendor and ask intelligent questions of the right person working for that vendor, you will generally get good support.

      In most situations, it doesn't make economic sense for everyone to have someone on staff who knows the ins and outs of every product they work with as well as a dedicated support person at the vendor does. I tend to get into the nuts and bolts of what I support a lot more than most people would, but there's only so much time in the day, and I support a *lot* of different software for my employer.

      My experience has been that - while there are some vendors who have terrible support overall - generally it's just the first tier that's like that, to act as a buffer because most people who call their vendor's support line are not highly technical and only need basic support (IE something they could have learned from the manual). If you are willing to do the necessary investigation beforehand and put together a package of information (network captures, etc.) you will usually get good results.

      --
      "...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
  5. staroffice? by sdnoob · · Score: 5, Interesting

    was google PAYING sun for (the commercially licensed) staroffice? perhaps this is just the first step in replacing staroffice with (the free) openoffice to eliminate that (unnecessary) expense.

    note that staroffice 8 is also over three years old (derived from openoffice 2.0), compared to openoffice 3, which was recently released... google could simply be moving to openoffice to stay more current with the software.

    but i wouldn't put it past 'em to be removing it completely in order to drive users to their (less capable) web applications; as the article suggests. if they do not actually replace staroffice with another offline equivalent (e.g. openoffice), though, there may be some user backlash.

    1. Re:staroffice? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Or maybe they're following the IBM route, and making their own fork of OpenOffice.org, only in their case with better integration with Google apps (e.g. storing documents on their servers and sharing them via Google Apps).

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  6. Well, the important thing... by Spasemunki · · Score: 4, Interesting

    is that we begin right away with the baseless speculation about which of many conspiracies is responsible for this omission. God forbid someone email someone at Google, or wait until they make a blog post or something.

    1. Re:Well, the important thing... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      Maybe we at Google like reading your nutty conspiracy theories. Don't stop on our behalf.

      -- Eric Schmidt

  7. Doesn't make sense by toxygen01 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    How in the first place could have been staroffice included in "Google Pack of free software" when it's proprietary?

  8. Re:It's because staroffice is slow and a resource by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Applications written in interpreted languages are for prototypes and programs that you don't run often.

    Modern industry is held together by custom scripts.

    For everyday use, you want something that loads fast, is responsive, and doesn't take bazillions of Mbytes from both your RAM and Disk Space,

    I use a text editor, sc and awk; YMMV. Most people seem to use Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office which discounts your theory entirely.

    I also think that Vista sucked because it's probably written in .NET, obviously.

    Wrong although I can't disagree completely, Vista does suck!

  9. Seems fairly obvious... by biscuitlover · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Maybe Google are removing a competitor to their own office applications because... they are a competitor to their own office applications.

    In order for Google to make any kind of inroads into Microsoft's customer base, they have to convince people that online apps are just as viable as their offline counterparts. So providing an offline office suite in the Google Pack - ostensibly to keep the doubters happy - might be considered by some to be an admission that Google Docs won't do the job.

  10. What Google should do by teslatug · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Google should develop a really good plugin for OpenOffice.org that makes it a client for Google Docs. It should handle uploading, downloading, synchronizing, merging conflicts, etc. That would scare MS off a lot more, and it would actually make both OOo and Google Docs more useful.

  11. Why not axe Norton first? by MazzThePianoman · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Forget about StarOffice, axe Norton Security Scan. I am wondering why they are having anything to do with Norton who makes the most bloated, resource wasting, performance sucking, software on the planet. There are better solutions out there that don't kill the usability of your computer.

    --
    "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" Franklin
  12. How were they giving it away in the first place? by sorak · · Score: 3, Insightful

    How were they giving it away in the first place? If you go to Sun's website and try to download Star Office normally, it's $70. So how was Google able to give it away for free, and why isn't "sun wanted cash" a possible explanation for Google dropping the product?

  13. Re:It's because staroffice is slow and a resource by Fred_A · · Score: 4, Informative

    What do you think OpenOffice is written in ?? BASIC ? Perl ? Intercal ?

    (Hint : it uses this esoteric language that has a name that starts with C and ends with ++)

    --

    May contain traces of nut.
    Made from the freshest electrons.
  14. Re:How were they giving it away in the first place by H0p313ss · · Score: 3, Funny

    How were they giving it away in the first place? If you go to Sun's website and try to download Star Office normally, it's $70. So how was Google able to give it away for free, and why isn't "sun wanted cash" a possible explanation for Google dropping the product?

    Don't bring logic into this, that way leads only to madness.

    --
    XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
  15. Microsoft Signs MSN Toolbar Deal With Sun by Vandil+X · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Here's why!

    Microsoft Signs MSN Toolbar Deal With Sun

    Google caught wind of a Microsoft/Sun deal.

    --
    Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, START
  16. Sun's deal with MS probably prompted this by hakawati · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sun just signed an agreement to distribute the MS Search bar with it's java download http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/11/10/sun_stows_ms_search_on_java/ I would guess this has a lot to do with Google not promoting the StarOffice suite anymore.