AbiWord 0.7 release

thomasd writes "AbiSource have just released development version 0.7 of their GPLed wordprocessor, which runs on Unix, Windows, and BeOS. There's still a fair bit missing, but it's now quite usable for producing simple document, and it's starting to look very polished. For the lazy, there are now binary packages as well as source code. "

Comments

AbiWord notes

[Camelot]

For those who are not familiar with the economics of running a start-up company, it should be pointed out that aren't necessarily making any money, and it's not altogether necessary that they should at this point. Like their FAQ says,

We will be selling...

Who knows what else these guys are doing while are waiting for the business to start blooming ? It doesn't matter if you doubt their business model as long as their investors don't.

Secondly, using XML as a native file format is one of the most brilliant ideas, as far as I am concerned anyway. This would mean that I could do less abiworddoc , and, if necessary, I could write some quickie perl script to do some processing and formatting for output myself if AbiWord wasn't available. (Does it look like a document format like this would make sense to MicroSoft ? Didn't think so). Of course, in an ideal case, I wouldn't need to.

I, for one, will support the development of AbiSource if for no other reason than helping them set an example (if there is such an example to be set after the success of RedHat). It should show that Open Source is the best development model - not because it brings the most money to the company, but because it brings out the best software - which is what every user should want.