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Where Do I Go Now That Oracle Owns OpenOffice.org?
eldavojohn writes "So I noted that there was better support for my processor in the latest BIOS for my mainboard. After downloading the update, there was a .doc file containing flashing instructions. No matter, I have OpenOffice.org installed on this machine and just opened it up. And, as should be no surprise, there was an Oracle logo splash screen while OpenOffice.org 3.2 started up. At my job, I've had a less than favorable history with Oracle that I'm not going to get into — rather let's just say I never want anything to do with them again. Including installing any of their software on my machine. So I'm facing a dilemma. I've looked into the forked LIbreOffice but that's still in beta and I'm a little wary of depending on that. Has anyone used LibreOffice (it's installing as I type this) extensively? Does it handle complex Powerpoint files okay? Is there some alternative out there that I'm completely overlooking for open source? Can anyone convince me that there's no reason to fear the Oracle OpenOffice.org? Will it remain the de facto standard? Will it eventually lock me into a commitment with Oracle? If you get by without one of these heavyweight monster editors, what do you use and how do you handle doc, ppt, (etc.) extensions?"
For now would have thought Libreoffice's support for Powerpoint etc would be on a par with OO as the fork is based on the 0O 3.3 code base...
--- Users are like bacteria -> Each one causing a thousand tiny crises until the host finally gives up and dies.
As long as images aren't an issue, you could use Antiword to convert it into a (somewhat) styled text file. That's what I did when I ran into the same thing with BIOS updates.
Try Google Docs or Zoho. Google 'em.
Does it handle complex Powerpoint files okay?
Heh. How different would LibreOffice have managed to become in like the month and a half it's been split from OpenOffice.org?
About stability, I think most of the changes that have been integrated so far has already been somewhat tested by being included in distribution patches or similar, but I admit that I probably don't really know enough to make much of a statement.
Latest version of Lotus Symphony is yet another fork and it has the best Excel compatibility of all the ooo variants. It is free but not open source however (look at SISSL license conditions).
Do anything, anywhere, anytime.
For now. They're in the process of merging in a lot of code from the Go OO.org folks. Should make for better compatibility with MS Office.
One of the first reactions of the split between Libre/OpenOffice is the dependency on Java is being reduced.
That just means that the kernel maintainers don't want any bug reports from you since you are running a kernel that contains code that they do not have access to the source of. When you install a closed-source driver you become dependent on the supplier of that driver since only they have have full access to the source code for your kernel. If you trust that supplier that's cool but the kernel maintainers can't help you.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Obviously this is a joke but... I just got done editing a file using Office 2007 SP2.... on my Arch Linux box using Crossover. Office 2010 isn't supported yet, but I have a feeling it will be in the first half of next year. I also use Openoffice on a daily basis for making drawings with OODraw. I did a master's thesis and all my law-review related work in OOWriter. Unfortunately, right now I need MS Office for compatibility since my daily use involves ping-ponging documents back & forth with other people using track changes.. an area where OO still sorely lags even using the ODF document formats.
AntiFA: An abbreviation for Anti First Amendment.
They don't care about all those users, they just want money from Java-users. They don't care if they loose or piss off the smaller users, the really big enterprise users can't switch in 10 years time anyway. That is where the money is, usually banks and other big companies/institutions.
New things are always on the horizon
The only difference between OpenOffice and LibreOffice is branding.
if you weren't slow, you'd have done some research, and worked out the taint name is used for a lot of things and predates the binary drivers.
But I suppose being an idiot isn't your fault, probably genetic.
LibreOffice still depends on Java, which is also Oracle branded. OpenJDK doesn't release binaries, and Oracle still controls OpenJDK anyway. So Oracle seems pretty unavoidable right now.
Well, "libre" is also a french word which means "free" (in fact, there are two words in french, one for each meanings of free in english, but I think I might be going of topic here).
So, unless you have also a problem with France, something I can understand, you should go safely with LibreOffice.
Go-oo have announced that they are going to close down their project and support LibreOffice, but in the mean time until LibreOffice comes out of beta Go-oo is a viable choice if you want a stable release with no Oracle logo.
He's not just some guy, he's David Arlie. He's done work on Xorg stuff, including the nouveau driver. You should be honoured that he called you an idiot, especially since it's his second comment on Slashdot, after the first posted in 2005.
I'm not getting into the argument, just thought I'd point it out, considering that he is kind of a public person in these circles.
I'm guessing his dog must have died and he had to vent, taking these factors into consideration.
I quit using OO.org when I found Koffice. Koffice builds much faster for me in OpenBSD, and it can open the microsoft formats, and export to PDF, which is what I use it for anyway. I used LibreOffice on my windows box, as Koffice is not easily available (it requires a beta version and using a KDE installer that didn't work for me on windows 7).
It's all damned lies and statistics!! I mean 47% of all people use statistics to back up their arguments.
You mean except for all of the actual executable code being Oracle's?
Except for it being opensource so its not, and it was managed by Sun which is not Oracle. Oracle bought Sun, rebranded OpenOffice from Sun to Oracle (as should be expected) and that's about it.
Switching to LibreOffice should be the same as the original Sun OpenOffice except rebranded by the Document Foundation, and they are patching in enhancement by RedHat and Go-OOo that were never accepted by Sun.
I think some of the LibreOffice developers do have dreams about removing Java dependencies, after all it's only a very small part of LibreOffice that requires Java... My point is that with LibreOffice you're on the right path... Rome wasn't built in one day, and the alternative to Sun OpenOffice.org isn't going to be built in one day either...
No, not really. Some advanced stuff might still need Java, but I've installed LibreOffice recently on a system with no JRE at all, and aside from some complaint on the first launch, it's now working fine.
And if you don't want to wait download go-oo
All the Go-OO patches should have been merged into LibreOffice and the Go-OO project is discontinued (e.g. developers are now hacking LibreOffice).. But if you insist on having something that is called stable, as opposed to running the LibreOffice beta, go a head a download latest Go-OO release (http://go-oo.org/)...
But remember to upgrade when LibreOffice releases a stable!
Currently Libre Office may still be dependent on Java, but it is a specific goal to reduce Java dependence in the future. I consider that a good thing and a realistic approach.
So while I agree that ATM OO.o and LibreOffice is virtually the same, have they said ANYTHING about MS Office compatibility on their roadmap?
Yes, see the latest announcement. It specifically mentions VBA macro support, which is even dirtier than just supporting MS formats. At the same time the announcement mentions reducing Java dependency which is probably a good thing. Java probably wasn't integrated by Sun to fulfill a real need, but as a Java marketing method.
Or just use LibreOffice now. I did it the day they released it, and have noticed no usability or stability problems at all, personally. Or at least no more than usual for OO. It'd be different if we were talking about a server, but this is just office software on a personal machine. Roll the dice!
http://lists.kde.org/?l=koffice-devel&m=128782551919625&w=2
"Dear fellow members of the community,
As you might be aware, after months of discussions, it has been concluded that
the best solution is to split the community.
However, the split is going to happen at application level. The maintainer of
each application will be asked to consult his fellow developers to decide in
which group, A or B, the application will lived. The other group is free to
fork the application under a different name. It is also possible for the
developers to change the application name and ask that the current name is not
used by any of the group. This can be used as an opportunity for a fresh
start.
Currently, to the best of my knowledge the groups are composed of the
following applications:
Group A: KWord
Group B: KPresenter, Krita, Karbon, Kexi
Since the license give the right for a fork, I can already mention that Group
B will come with a fork of KWord, under a name that has yet to be decided.
Group A is free to fork any application of Group B under a different name.
Maintainers have until Sunday October 31th to decide with which group to go.
Applications that have not choosen a group will have to be renamed by each
group.
The KDE e.V. board will be asked to decide what happen to the KOffice name,
the KOffice website, the KOffice mailing list, KOffice.org, KOffice wiki and
the KOffice bugzilla product. The recommendation from members of the CWG is to
retire the name KOffice altogether, which will allow both side to start on a
fresh start and leave the past behind. Then the application maintainers and
developers of each group will have one week to find a new name for their
suite, and move to another place in the KDE subversion tree and to rename or
remove the applications that are in the other group.
In the meantime, I am suspending the KOffice release process, meaning that I
will release Beta 3, but that the date for the following release is undefined.
The reason is that I do not feel confident that the splitting will happen in
time before the RC1, and I do not think it is a good idea to ship a RC release
that will get different applications than the final release. If the splitting
takes more time, I will proceed with one more beta. I also advise each group
to ensure that they have a release coordinator.
I will urge readers of this letter to:
1) refrain discussion around the splitting outside the mailing list, or to do
so in private conversation
2) acknowledge, that at this point there is no sense in trying to place the
blame anywhere, we just have to accept the fact
3) remain civilised and polite in this difficult moment
--
Cyrille Berger Skott"
Apparently not http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go-oo and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LibreOffice indicate there are several differences. Also libreoffice is based upon version 3.3 of open office plus Go-oo enhancements hence the beta.
The reason to start steeping back from the Oracle version, is they are likely to push Oracle Office cloud and make Open Office undesirable to get more people to their cloud lock in. Of course if you are already heavily into Oracle cloud lock in, bonus, if not then transitioning to libreoffice makes sense.
You can also give http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Lotus_Symphony a shot as the current version is based upon open office. Interestingly enough software development is done IBM China Development Laboratory, located in Beijing, so there is very likely to be a huge surge in the number of users in the not to distant future.
The advantage of open source is made very apparent as a result of Oracle machinations, choice. Of course what will be the macro language in the future will also be an interesting question, Ruby would be nice.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Unfortunately, OOXML doesn't follow the ISO standard, even though the standard was based on OOXML and was arguably the result of Microsoft corrupting the ISO process. There are, to my knowledge, no reference implementations of ISO/IEC 29500 -- not even from Microsoft.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
PDF's principal raison d'etre is distribution for printing. It's used as distribution for on-screen viewing which is definitely round peg in square hole.
I seem to recall that way back in the day, PDF was pretty much exclusively a screen viewing format, while Postscript was used for print distribution. I certainly don't recall ever reading anything from Adobe suggesting they believe PDF is inappropriate for onscreen use - in fact they offer several ways to lock files so they can only be used onscreen.
If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
Not just open-source. Gnumeric is the best spreadsheet out there, period. As of recent versions, its numerical accuracy and featureset leave all other spreadsheets in the dust, along with some well-known statistical analysis suites.
The original Howling Frog is a fictional character and has no UID.
LibreOffice is unstable on OS X... crashes regularly under 10.5.8
PDF (Portable Document Format) was supposed to be effectively 'on screen postscript' to allow you to view content in a platform independent format which would render identically on any system.
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
Hey! Remember before there was Word and even Linux, we used to use WordPerfect under DOS? They're still around!
Anyone actually use it and have crap to say about it? ^_^
OneNote is far more than a notepad app for tablets. It is partway between a paint program and a word processor, and a wiki, and a presentation manager, with audio and video imbedding, spreadsheet and screen capture functionality thrown in as well. It has whiteboard sharing capabilities allowing for group collaboration. If you don't understand what OneNote is, then please refrain from making pathetic and worthless recommendations.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
OneNote is a extremely useful piece of software, and the primary reason I keep an Win7 VM around. It easily qualifies for "best tool for the job". Nearest piece of work I've seen is Jarnal (pen input) and/or Tomboy (wikiish notes). The handwriting recognition and math functionality is top-notch (realizing that the handwriting subsystem shipped with Win7).
"I've spent my whole life figuring out crazy ways to do things. It'll work." -- Montgomery Scott, "Relics"
Gentoo has a "java" use flag for openoffice - and presumably if this is turned off, openoffice will be built without java. And presumably libreoffice would be built without java if the same use flag was disabled. And presumably this removes any java, rather than what is already identified as optional.
So presumably java isn't a dependency unless you use a binary that has java enabled as one.
Presumably.
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Correction, it's Airlie, not Arlie.