Talk:OpenOffice.org

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Contents

[edit] Java

As Java is opensourced now, the java section needs an update —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.135.64.162 (talk • contribs)

Hello. Don't forget you can edit Wikipedia to include this. Be bold! --h2g2bob 02:07, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lightning

Not much time on my end to update properly, but I think OpenOffice.org's planned use of Lightning to make a personal information manager should be included in the article.

Source: [1] Oberiko 17:58, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Difficulty getting contributions upstream into Sun build

I put this line in, with a reference ... and some helpful soul deleted the reference! I've restored it now: [2] - David Gerard 10:49, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Versions

Nothing is mentioned here about versions - i.e. 2.04 or 1.5 etc-- Flutefluteflute Talk Contributions 16:36, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

I suggest we remove the information about non-stable (pre-release) builds. Not only is that information somewhat confusing to the casual reader, but it is constantly changing, and the people who need to know that usually hang out on the OOo mailing lists and wiki. 71.126.197.128 20:21, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Basic

The Basic stub mentions a main article about Basic, but that link redirects to the OpenOffice.org page

[edit] Security

From the article:

OpenOffice.org developers have responded by noting there has been no published vulnerability, but have been in talks with the researcher to fix the vulnerability.

This sounds fairly self-contradictory. Can someone who knows what this is intended to mean explain and/or rephrase this? --S0uj1r0 07:19, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I think I cleaned it up. This "news" is a few months old. Has something changed yet? --Karnesky 14:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] File format

I added this section on 2007-03-27, but my modification was removed. I see no explanation for this, so I added the section again. Please discuss this if you think the section is not worth. Luca Mauri 12:41, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

It's a good section, a good start, worth expanding. I added a source and deleted one of your opinions, so it should be OK now. BomberJoe (talk) 19:13, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cost

It isn't clear from the article whether or not there is a fee associated with the software. Although article says that it is "free software", according to the FSF and the GNU project, this term is used to indicate that the software comes with certain freedoms, and is not necessarily without cost. They say think of "free" as in "free speech", not as in "free beer." SlowJog 23:54, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

No, they mean "free" as in not costing anything as for as monetary value or anything else.--Tomglima 22:26, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Follow the link "free" in the main article. They clearly mean "free" as in "unconstrained", not as in "no cost."SlowJog 23:48, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Overview

Two paragraphs of the text in overview sounds like they were either written by OO.o themselves, or taken out of an advertisement for them

According to its mission statement, the OpenOffice.org project aims "To create, as a community, the leading international office suite that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an XML-based file format."[3]
Federal Computer Week issue listed OpenOffice.org as one of the "5 stars of open-source products."[7] In contrast, OpenOffice.org was used by The Guardian newspaper to illustrate what it claims are the limitations of open-source software, although the article does finish by stating that the software is better than MS Word for books.[8]

One who's reading about Open Office, does not need to know what they state in the mission statement, as the functionality of it is written further down the article and the two articles being referred two have little to do with Open Office it self, other than promoting it. It should either be removed, or moved to another section of the article. Cloud02 17:15, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I added it back in. I'm ambivalent towards the mission statement. Of course it comes from OO.o themselves--it is cited as such "According to its mission statement...." and contains a quote. It is short & not too spammy. I wouldn't strongly object to removing it, but it seems relevant in the overview section.
I feel strongly that the FCW praise and the Guardian's (mixed) criticism are relevant, don't sound like they were written by OO.o, and seem to fit best in the overview (of the currently available sections). --Karnesky 17:58, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Too much PDF Format

Every OOo application can save in PDF format, telling so in every application description section is too repetitive. It should be said only once, as a common feature of OOo. Besides, I don’t see why this feature should get so much attention throughout the article, considering the fact that making PDFs is easy in Microsoft Office applications with, for instance, Adobe software.

Joey 21:44, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

It is important because Microsoft Office does not yet support exporting to PDF out of the box. User:Kushal_one --69.150.163.1 18:15, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Of course it does! [3] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.168.125.19 (talk) 15:17, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
That isn't out of the box (because, as the MS Office article explains, of Adobe). --Karnesky 18:02, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] English Documents

It is good to note that OpenOffice has various Language localizations and can produce documents in multiple languages, but as this is the english version of wikipedia it may be better to show demos of it with english menus and text. (Currently only one of the three examples are completely readable in english) WikipedianYknOK 00:39, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Comparable?

This word is at least a mild overstatement. The Writer is by far not comparable to the features of Word - this is something I have found after 10 years of Word and more than 5 years or OO. It is simply not there yet. The same goes for Draw which is definitely not comparable to Corel Draw. As for Calc the statement might be valid. BUT: These statement are thrown without any references to objective comparisons. What does "comparable" mean, anyhow. It may mean just about anything and should not be used in Wikipedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.41.51.136 (talk) 23:04, 1 August 2007

'Comparable' in the sense of most users being able to accomplish most of the same tasks on either software package (with relative ease). Longtime and experienced users are able to discern differences between both office packages more easily anyway, because they are more likely to notice the changes in how the user interacts with the UI and vice versa and how much this differs from their entrenched habits, which they took up in time, when learning to use something they are most familiar with.
Another thing is not to have too high expectations wrt Draw and CorelDRAW just by inferring from both software titles (which I think is unprofessional), because OOo Draw is not supposed to draw on features of CorelDRAW, as the latter is very much near or at the top of the league in its field to begin with. Neither is CorelDRAW a part of Microsoft Office, which makes it a moot point to compare it with OOo Draw in the first place, just as much are there other free software tools that have a stated goal of providing similar functionality to CorelDRAW's feature set. — Which should hopefully facilitate reasonable cause to actually compare image processing applications of MSOffice and OO.o instead, now that you were at it :-).
Fore more, see Comparison of vector graphics editors.
-Mardus 15:08, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
I do agree with you on OOo Writer, as I have used the same functionality (Comments in Word/Notes in Writer) on both Word and Writer and Word is certainly better in this respect. -Mardus 03:41, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
I agree with unknown user above. it is not right to say that OOo Draw is comparable to the Corel Draw. Well i think it's just wrong. I think it should say something like: OOo Draw is simple vector drawing application, within OOo suit, with basic functionality of such. -psycho_NIX 09:27, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
Do we agree that we can remove the "comparable to CorelDraw" statement? BomberJoe 02:34, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Does it support docx?

The article says, "This allows OOo to open .docx files created in Microsoft Office 2007." What does it mean? Can OpenOffice.org open *.DOCX, *.XLSX, and so on? User:Kushal_one —The preceding signed but undated comment was added at 14:49, August 25, 2007 (UTC). --69.150.163.1 18:14, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Novell released an extension that will, in theory, open MSO 2007 documents. In theory this extension will also open documents that utilize Microsoft's failed ooxml submission to ECMA.jonathon 18:00, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Trademark Issue, Revisited

The trademark issue should be covered more in this article. Currently, there's a small blurb in the introductory text regarding the trademark issue, but there's no mention of who owns the "Open Office" trademark. Some light Web searching brought me to http://www.openoffice.nl/ through the article at http://news.com.com/U.K.s+Orange+launches+Open+Office/2100-1039_3-6205817.html. Here's the relevant piece from the article:

The only reason that those behind the OpenOffice.org software suite do not use the name "Open Office" is that it is registered as a trademark in the Netherlands by an Ubuntu Linux-affiliated company. The co-founder of that Linux company, Wouter Hanegraaff, told ZDNet UK that his firm still occasionally must deal with confusion generated by OpenOffice.org's internationally implemented nomenclature, but he wished Orange well with its U.K.-based venture.

"We think Orange has chosen a really great brand name," Hanegraaff said on Monday. "As long as it's the U.K., we're not too worried. Should Orange want to extend their Open Office product to the Benelux (the economic union comprising Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxemborg) under the same name, I'm confident that they'll contact us, as the Benelux Office for Intellectual Property has our brand nicely registered

Unfortunately, I don't speak Dutch, so I don't know what exactly Mr. Hanegraaff's company does. Based on my understanding of German, it seems like his company integrates Open Source solutions, such as Ubuntu Linux and, ironically, OpenOffice.org, into the workplace. I'd add trademark info to the article myself, but I'm just guessing here. Any Dutch-speakers in the crowd?

-- Christopher C. Parker t c 18:31, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Hanegraaff's organization is the Benalux partner of Canonical, LTD. This means that they provide IT support and migration services for organizations that use Ubuntu. One of the things they offer is training people how to use OOo.jonathon 18:21, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
Open office is either a trademark, or service mark in at least ten countries.OpenOffice.org is either a trademark or service mark in half a dozen countries. In most, if not all instances, Sun owns neither the trademark, nor the service mark. jonathon 18:21, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
If you include a sub-section Trademark/Service Mark Issues, what would it include other than a list of countries, and who owns the trademark/service mark in that country? In creating that section can one stay within WP:NOR?jonathon 18:21, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Programming Language?

This page (unless I am half blind) doesn't seem to explicitly say that "OpenOffice.org" (or programs within it) is (primarily) written in (programming language(s) here)" Although by the looks of it, I get the feeling that it's written in Java. Of course I understand that parts of a program can be done in different languages. -kwifler —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.168.79.137 (talk) 05:21, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Most of OO.o is written in C++, but it has some optional stuff written in Java & some stuff written in Python & StarBasic. Karnesky 12:46, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Excel in Word ≠ Calc in Writer?

"One important difference between Writer and Microsoft Word is that in Writer, many functions and number formats from Calc (below) are available in Writer’s tables."

How is this any different than adding an Excel table into a Word document?--RAult 05:10, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Embedding Excel tables in a word documents effectively embeds a small Excel document via OLE, which causes all manners of editing troubles (when you edit one, excel stuff appears and overlaps, it bloats the filesize, the embedded excel doc is sometimes automagically converted to a picture and can't ever be edited anymore, etc.). Word has support for tables which avoid all those troubles, but those Word tables support only a very limited amount of formulas. 88.161.162.107 (talk) 15:33, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Learning OO applications?

I'm unable to find any learning materials on OO applications. Writer and Calc can be muddled through with Word & Excel experience, but I've not had much success with Base, Draw, or OO Basic. The OO forums are full of obstacles, not particularly useful - or friendly to outsiders. Are there books or online courses (in English) hidden away anywhere? BomberJoe 02:40, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Documentation can be found at http://www.OOoAuthors.org. Lulu.com has a number of books, of which the quality is unknown. jonathon 07:20, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
True, but this is a geek method. OO will never work for normal people without adequate teaching and learning materials for example, books). It should be pointed out that OO is really a package for free software geeks only. For example, has anyone here ever heard of ANYONE writing any kind of database application using OO Base? Now compare that to MS Access. BomberJoe (talk) 18:51, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure what is meant by "this is a geek method". OOoAuthors.org is where the primary documentation for OOo is written. A list of books on how to use OOo can be found at http://support.openoffice.org/index.html. http://bizdev.openoffice.org/consultants.html has a list of organizations that offer training in using OOo. There are database applications that use Base. For most projects MySQL, SQLite, or PostgreSQL are going to be more suitable. jonathon (talk) 08:40, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
I fully agree with the comment that Base is hideous. 78.86.18.55 (talk) 18:45, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] request

Could anyone please rewrite the following sentence?

The project is still essentially run by StarOffice staff, and getting external contributions into the core codebase is generally regarded as being more difficult than with other high-profile free software projects, even for the project’s other corporate sponsors.

Thank you, Kushal --Kushalt 21:42, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Done. I think any comparison with other open source projects is implied. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:05, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Market Share issues

I see that Thumperwad deleted the following claiming that it was "unsourced personal opinion".

Because OpenOffice.org is FLOSS, determining market share is beset with issues:

  • Revenue based figures ignores copies that were obtained gratis;
  • Download based figures ignores copies that were downloaded but never installed;
  • Download based figures ignores copies that were sold;
  • Surveying end-users results in answers that please the interviewer. This need not reflect the actual situation;

I'll grant I didn't cite a source for each of those statements.

The first one is supported by both http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1795 and http://knowledge.wpcarey.asu.edu/index.cfm?fa=viewfeature&id=1483

The second claim is simple logic. Not all downloads are successful. Not every application that is downloaded is installed. (You can read the OOo support list for specific examples of both types.)

The third claim is simple logic. Downloaded copies are not the same as copies distributed by CD. Whilst this ignores downloaded copies that are paid for, it also ignores CDs that are distributed gratis. (There are vendors on eBay that sell links for downloading OOo. Those downloads are ignored, unless the vendors are selling nothing more than a link to openoffice.org. In which case the copy is assumed to be distributed gratis.)

The fourth claim is indirectly supported by Statistical survey However a few papers on the prevalence of bias in surveys:

The point here is that bias in self-reporting surveys is a fact of life in the research world. That bias will affect the answers given about software usage, or anything else that one is asked.

A fifth point that I didn't make is that the same user may download the same file two or more times. Reasons for doing so can range from the accidental, to having to reinstall all of one's software due to reinstalling one's Operating System.jonathon 01:34, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Point six is a description in determining market share in the server market: http://www.linux.com/articles/30926 . jonathon 18:25, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Anyone is free to delete unsourced opinion within articles (not Talk Pages) without discussion. Therefore, source all your contributions. Then other people will defend them on your behalf. Your info was useful but, without relevant (on topic) sources, anyone can delete it. BomberJoe (talk) 18:58, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
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