Slashdot Mirror
Sneak Preview of New OpenOffice 3.2
omlx writes 'The last developer milestone (DEV300m60) of OpenOffice.org has been released. The next version of OpenOffice.org 3.2 has more than 42 features and 167 enhancements . The final version is expected to be available at the end of November 2009. Many companies have contributed to this version, like RedHat, RedFlag and IBM, making OpenOffice more stable and useful. I couldn't stop myself from seeing new features and enjoying them. So I downloaded the DEV300m60 version. After playing with it for many days I could say that OpenOffice developers have done very good work in it. Well done!"
One of the "fixes" is that it will convert text cells to numbers in formulae if it can. This is one of the major differences from Excel that led Microsoft to move all their formulae into a different namespace, in order to prevent users from seeing behavioural inconsistencies across products. That's the way they put it, The Internet described it as deliberately breaking interoperability. I'm agnostic on that distinction, but OOo is now in line with just about every other spreadsheet in existence including Excel, Gnumeric, and Google Docs in this respect. It will be interesting to see what happens to the msoxl namespace when this comes out. I don't know if 3.2 will convert the msoxl namespace formuale to the default namespace when it opens an Excel ODF file.
It's interesting to see how many companies are putting work into this product considering the gradual rise of online based office suites like Google Docs.
In early 2008 I went through some personal events that caused me to suddenly lose access to my primary desktop. When a co-worker introduced me to Google Docs, I immediately liked the idea of having all my important documents be stored somewhere that I could access from any Internet enabled device. Since then I've also come to appreciate the ease of collaborations using Google Docs. I've had whole discussions about requirements documents that went on completely through Google Docs - the client would type in some basic concept of what they'd wanted, I'd reformat it to more formal requirements while they watched, they'd edit, I'd start working and add in notes or questions as they came along, they'd add in replies... It's been absolutely fantastic for streamlining off-site development processes.
And now I hear Google is planning on capitalizing further on that aspect with the upcoming Google Wave... And Microsoft is planning to release an online version of Office 2010... And I'm yet to hear of similar plans from the OpenOffice scene.
Which makes me sad. I've been an OpenOffice user for most of the last decade... Started using it when it was still StarOffice, before Sun bought and open sourced it. I'd hate to see it fall by the wayside.
I just save all my OO.o documents as 'Office XP' docs & spreadsheets. ZERO problems with formatting so far when my buddy (using the latest and greatest MS Office) opens them. And I use some strangeassed templates, too...
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
I can only hope that some day, businesses will stop asking for Word Doc resumes and realize that it is NOT a display format. PDF is a proper vehicle, or plain text for the best searchability / compatibility.
But yes, as a student, OO.org has some major compatibility issues, especially in formatting of doc files or in some powerpoint files. Fortunately I have yet to get a complaint from a teacher receiving a PDF from me.
ERROR: SIG NOT FOUND (A)bort, (R)etry, (F)ail?:
Oh yes, sadly, I can only say that I have the same experience as the parent poster. Most Word documents sent to me render with minor issues in OO. Image alignment might be off, occasional problems with paragraph indentation, etc. Usually I can live with that. Documents with tables that are at least somewhat complex though (nested tables, numbered lists within tables, etc.) usually come out really screwed. Documents I create in OO and save in .doc format get mangled way too often, that happens most of the time for documents that go beyond simple formatting.
I'm a happy Ubuntu user, I like having open-source alternatives and all that. But several months ago, I finally gave up on OpenOffice and am now using Wine to run MS Office (by the way, kudos to Wine devs, Office runs really smoothly). Ultimately, OpenOffice wasn't just being an inconvenience with its compatibility issues, it made some people I send documents to think that my emails are unreliable because my documents would often be "damaged" (those are non-tech people that I guess haven't even heard of OO). I am willing to tolerate minor inconveniences to support open-source software, but when its use makes me unreliable in the eyes of others, it's time to consider other options.
Dear Sir,
this might be relevant to your interests.
Yours truly,
Anon
You should always send your reumes as pdf files unless they specifically ask for it in another format.
Sadly this is exactly backwards from what you should do if you want to get hired. As a techie I agree that this is what should happen but I've worked closely with lots of HR managers and recruiters and I can confidently say it is a BAD idea to default your resume to PDF. Your resume is likely to get 30-40 seconds consideration at most. The standard format nearly every HR department works with is MS Word. Too many of them don't even know what a PDF is - depressing as that sounds. If they can't or won't open it they won't read it. Some can read PDFs but virtually all of them can read Word. Sending a PDF formatted resume is unlikely to help you and it is very likely to hurt you. The proper thing to do is use Word (.doc NOT .docx) unless they specifically say they accept PDF.
I've also tried using OpenOffice to send Word formatted resumes. Generally works if the formatting is simple but not reliably enough I'd trust it for a resume. It is not at all uncommon for the resume formatting to get messed up. Even small formatting errors look REALLY bad on a resume. Guess who looks bad if this happens? Not Microsoft. The person doing the hiring is far more likely to assume you are an idiot and toss your resume in the figurative rubbish bin. Depressing but that's the way it is.