Open Office Plans To Party Like It's Version 3.0 396
penguin_dance writes "The Register reports that 'OpenOffice.org is throwing a launch party in Paris on 13 October' to celebrate eight years, and hopefully announce the release of version 3.0. Some notes: [OpenOffice.org 3.0] will support the OpenDocument Format 1.2 standard, and be able to open files created by MS Office 2007 and Office 2008 for Mac OS X." As maj_id10t notes, though the OO.o site does not yet carry an announcement, "Lifehacker has posted an entry stating the final release of OpenOffice 3.0 is available for download via their distribution mirrors."
Re:3.0? (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, I recently tried the release candidate for the OS X Aqua version. It's horribly ugly (just like on other platforms), but it does seem to work.
Yup. And since Microsoft has dropped the only compelling feature that set Office for Mac apart from other office suites (VBA macros) and STILL hasn't made Entourage into a first-class Exchange client, OpenOffice 3 is now just as good (though not quite as good looking). Grats, OO.o team; adios, billg.
Kerning by default (Score:4, Informative)
Doesn't Word have kerning disabled by default? [wikipedia.org] What do you recommend to people now? LaTeX?
Re:Openoffice? no thanks. (Score:3, Informative)
What exactly were you missing? My two major gripes with OpenOffice were poor implementations of comments and tracking changes in Writer, and those are fixed now.
Re:I would like to see a feature list. (Score:5, Informative)
I would love to see a feature list.
Took all of three seconds to go to the website and get it.
http://marketing.openoffice.org/3.0/featurelistbeta.html [openoffice.org]
Re:PowerPC? (Score:5, Informative)
The PPC version is hidden away with one of the openoffice "Projects" -- click on the projects tab, and then you're on your own, but eventually you get to an ftp site. I've found it to be very stable in light use (I mostly use the Linux version).
Re:3.0? (Score:2, Informative)
I believe they're adding VBA back next version. And if you want something native, Apple has iWork (Pages, Numbers, Keynote)
Re:Openoffice? no thanks. (Score:3, Informative)
You can use PowerPoint templates from within Impress and you can download many more from oooextras [smalldataproblem.org] and OO.o does have animations.
OO.o Calc has had some pitfalls, but version 3 is much improved. With several well-documented numerical errors that have survived in each new version of Excel, I don't know if that is the paragon to strive for.
Re:Kerning by default (Score:3, Informative)
the hell are you talking about? i'm still running OO.org 2.3.1 and it supports kerning just as Word does.
maybe you should stop using a fixed-width font like Courier/Fixedsys?
Re:Sure. (Score:4, Informative)
Miscellaneous Features
Re:I would like to see a feature list. (Score:4, Informative)
Feature list is available here [openoffice.org]
Release notes are here [openoffice.org]
It was just too slow for me. (Score:0, Informative)
I tried it back in 2004, and the thing that struck me most about it (besides the fact that it was free) was the speed. It took FOREVER to open and save. I was in a phase when I was trying to move over to as much open source software as possible to save money, but OpenOffice just ended up frustrating me. Also, I recall fighting against the program to do simple things in spreadsheets.
I use and love Gnumeric now for spreadsheets, but I resolved that I'd rather pay for MSOffice. It isn't perfect, but I was willing to pay.
I was always so confused about it too, because my initial exposure to open source taught me to expect this kind of software to, as a rule, always be leaner, smaller, cleaner and faster than "bloated" MS products, but I walked away from OO feeling IT was more bloated.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
KOffice2 will be coming soon (Score:2, Informative)
Re:pdf saving and editing (Score:4, Informative)
Version 3 has the ability to edit pdf - that could be a killer feature.
Why? PDFs are useful for distributing material in a reliable way. They have never been designed to be an easily editable format, other than for forms and the like perhaps, and it would be crazy to start treating them as such.
Also, in case you didn't realise, PDF export from Word is available as a freebie plug-in from MS in Word 2007, and it doesn't have all the font bugs OO Writer has! (See my earlier posts in this discussion for details.)
Re:Openoffice? no thanks. (Score:1, Informative)
This is the same attitude that's been holding Linux back for years. Blaming the user because something doesn't work like they want it to may make you feel better but it does nothing to improve the adoption rate nor strengthen the user base. I agree with your claims but your attitude does nothing to improve the situation.
Re:pdf saving and editing (Score:2, Informative)
[PDFs] have never been designed to be an easily editable format, other than for forms and the like perhaps, and it would be crazy to start treating them as such.
Forms are exactly what I had in mind. In the last week I've used Openoffice to fill in a pdf criminal records check form and an thirteen (!!) page professional license application form.
Re:3.0? (Score:5, Informative)
Meh. I use Keynote as my main presentation software, but I am thinking of switching back to PPT. It is very easy to use, and looks great, but when you're going to a conference, you end up exporting to PPT anyway, and then you have to edit that PPT in Powerpoint to fix all the things that didn't make the jump. It's wonderful if you're sure that your laptop is going to work perfectly.
Have you tried exporting to PDF? Unless you have some fancy animations is the best way to have a portable persentation. Almost every pdf viewer has a full screen mode for presentations.
Re:Looking forward to 3.0 (Score:2, Informative)
OpenType Fonts (Score:4, Informative)
As a Mac user, I'm excited to finally be dumping NeoOffice. I hate the system-deep installer. With OO.o v3, it's a proper single-directory bundle. Installation is just drag-and-drop. And no more random boat - the OO.o icon is slick and looks great in the dock.
My biggest complaint with OO.o (and I use it exclusively now, and have moved over my parents from MS Office with no issues) is a frustrating bug with OpenType fonts. They always render fine, but exporting to PDF (something I do often) converts them to some other random font.
Looks like it will be fixed, but not until 3.2 — which feels like forever, since this has been an issue for a very long time. It's especially frustrating since some of the best free fonts out there are OTF fonts.
If you to help increase the visibility of this bug, please vote for Bug #43029 [openoffice.org].
Re:Font Embedding in PDFs (Score:3, Informative)
I waited for rectangular cut and paste for about 3 years.
Version 3.2 isn't far away.
It will happen.
Do you mean block selection mode?
In OO 2.4 you can find it under Edit -> Selection Mode -> Block Area
Or you can use Alt + Shift + F8
Re:Openoffice? no thanks. (Score:3, Informative)
No, it's not. Some times, you just have to recognise that some people are full of shit, and fullgandoo is definitely one of them.
Re:Kerning by default (Score:1, Informative)
Re:3.0? (Score:3, Informative)
It's like the difference between The Gimp [gimp.org] and Pixelmator [pixelmator.com].
Both do image editing (and in this case The Gimp is a more powerful tool) but Pixelmator fits in with the look and feel of OS X and works extremely well with other Mac apps. In fact look at the two websites - The Gimp's site looks like crap. Having used both to some degree and not needing the full power of The Gimp, I dumped it for Pixelmator a long time back. The UI is unbelievably far ahead of The Gimp.
If you're going to use an app for any length of time, it should be as comfortable as possible. This is obvious for cars, for furniture, for workplaces but somehow it's a debated point for software applications. Aesthetics are important, and for some reason Mac users care a lot about the concept.
That's a long answer to your somewhat troll-y question, but there it is. Mac users can certainly use apps that work on Linux and Windows, we just choose not to if something more usable exists.
Re:3.0? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Using OpenOffice with no problems?! (Score:4, Informative)
Re:3.0? (Score:3, Informative)
If your CD is damaged, you could install the Keynote Demo (http://www.apple.com/iwork/trial/) and just type in your license key...
This assumes that you where using the latest Keynote, but it is probably possible to get a demo for an old release somewhere.
Re:Always felt a bit clunky to me oh and a questio (Score:3, Informative)
Check out Scribus [scribus.net] -- it's a F/OSS desktop publishing program. From the Scribus web site:
However, a major essential feature it's missing is import filters to migrate away from other publishing programs - especially that crap Microsoft Publisher so many people have locked themselves into. However, there are free services to convert the files [zamzar.com] to free oneself from the grip of Microsoft Publisher.