OpenOffice.org 2.0 Released

Da Massive writes "The official release of OpenOffice.org 2.0 has been pushed to the download servers, as of Thursday the 20th." From the article: "OpenDocument is an XML file format for saving office documents such as spreadsheets, memos, charts, and presentations. It was approved as an OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) standard at the beginning of this year. OpenDocument, set as a default in OpenOffice, is cited by proponents as a way of fighting vendor lock-in associated with proprietary formats. Already, it is the required office format for internal archives of the US State of Massachusetts." You can download, or read past coverage including a preview or a comparison with MS Office. Update: 10/20 17:22 GMT by Z : Made date reference more topical.

It's on time!

[bcat24 (914105)]

My milk hasn't expired yet.

you eeeeediot moderators

[djdavetrouble (442175)]

Off topic my shiny metal ass... a simple google search for openoffice milk expired would have led you to this article. [slashdot.org] Now wait until after noon before you smoke any more crack.

Re:It's on time!

[VStrider (787148)]

Parent is not offtopic. :) See http://interviews.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/1 0/12/1610249&threshold=-1&tid=102&tid=11 [slashdot.org]

the stable 2.0 release will come before any recently purchased cartons of milk expire in your refrigerator.

Re:It's on time!

[Rude Turnip (49495)]

I'm lactose intolerant, you insensitive clod!

They promised...

[jferris (908786)]

...it would be before my milk expired. Well, they are a day late. This is just udderly devastating.

Re:They promised...

[SimilarityEngine (892055)]

Better lait than never :-)

Re:They promised...

[dmaxwell (43234)]

Why are you getting so excited about one day? There's no need to get all cheesed off.

why is this under Linux?

[aurelian (551052)]

Surely cross-platform nature of OO.o is the whole point?

Re:why is this under Linux?

[Iriel (810009)]

I see your point, but keep in mind that when OO.o has been a major factor in companies switching from Windows systems to Linux ones.

"What will happen to all our Word documents, and spreadsheets, oh! oh! and what about PowerPoint?"
Say it with me together now: OpenOffice!

Yes, MSOffice compatibility has become a nearly ubiquitous feature by now, but not too many offices switch from Windows to use Joe. So the strength it has given to the Linux community as an alternative to 'get everyday tasks done' can't be stated enough. Hence, this appears in the Linux section of Slashdot.

This public service annoucement was brought to you by penguins, and a OSS/Linux advocate.

Speaking of milk...

[by Anonymous Coward]

Directly after the release this morning, Mad Penguin published a lengthy interview with OOo's Lois Suarez-Potts which represents part 3 of their OpenOffice.org interview series [madpenguin.org] (part 1 [slashdot.org] and 2 [slashdot.org] were covered previously on Slashdot). The article is 3 pages long but an excellent read all the same.

Bittorrent / P2P download links

[by Anonymous Coward]

http://distribution.openoffice.org/p2p/download.ht ml [openoffice.org]

MS Office will catch up

[krygny (473134)]

Soon, MS Office will have native support for PDF (like OOo has always had). Now, all they have to do is add support for ODF, give it away free along with the source code, and it will be almost as good as OOo.

Torrent Links

[lawpoop (604919)]

This page [openoffice.org] has bittorrent links.

Re:Torrent Links

[squoozer (730327)]

You've got to just love P2P for things like this. My country mirror is already doing a good impression of a three legged dog but the torrent has more seeds than a farmer at harvest time.

Grrrr

[squoozer (730327)]

I don't believe it! I only downloaded and installed RC3 4 hours ago. Grrrr.

Re:Grrrr

[sucker_muts (776572)]

No problem, apart from it's name, RC3 is 100% identical as 2.0.

They just updated the version number thoughout and made sure beta was mentioned nowhere anymore. Once they were sure no (major) bugs were found in the latest beta they could push it as a final version.

Just keep your RC3, it's the same as 2.0 final.

Must not be for real

[Odocoileus (802272)]

It is not in portage yet, therefore it must not exist.

Office Key...

[Buddy_DoQ (922706)]

I just recently restored my laptop, and rather than go fishing for my MS Office 2001 disk with the faded product key, I opted to give OpenOffice.org a shot. For me, a casual .doc reader who just needs something light and quick to open and read with, OO.org is a great solution. It does just about everything a cheap guy like me could want. Plus I didn't have to dig in that dreaded closet of PC past and type in a cd key I can barely make out anymore. I had no idea a new version was coming out so soon, so this is great news to me! I even began spreading whispers about it at work, it may not be the juicy Lost roundtable, but a free alternative to something Microsoft for our Macs always perks some ears.

Fantastic

[damm0 (14229)]

This is great! Congratulations to the OpenOffice folks. Now all OpenOffice needs is a good vi keymap.

Looks like they didn't solve the Java problem

[raitchison (734047)]

I have the distinct feeling I'll be losing some Karma for saying this but I'm REALLY disappointed that they didn't solve the Java issue.

According to the System Requirements [openoffice.org] page it still requires the Sun JVM.

Last I heard (admittedly sometime last year) they had found a likely solution in the ability to compile the Java stuff into binary for each platorm, I guess that didn't pan out.

I've said it before but I really don't see the advantage of having an OSS product if you are still dependent on a definitively non-open product. Ofr course I know it's completely different sice Sun isn't evil like Microsoft is.

Re:Solution to MS Office + OpenDocument

[maxwell demon (590494)]

I guess the printed version would lack all logical markup. No problem if all you want to do is to view or print it, but a big problem if you want to work with it.

Re:Solution to MS Office + OpenDocument

[DrXym (126579)]

When you print from an application you essentially open a device context and send it a bunch of instructions to draw text here, a line there and so on. This can be captured PDF but is totally unsuitable to printing out an .odt file for instance. In the process of conversion you'd lose all meta info, any revision history, digital signatures, styles, hidden text, rulers, margins, links to other documents / graphics and basically anything else which goes to producing a document but doesn't appear in the end result. In short, a "Print to OpenDocument" would be worse than useless.

On the other hand, an import / export filter for MS Word to Open Document would be very useful. I assume that such a thing is quite possible, but how far along anyone is with producing such a thing (as open source), I have no idea.

Re:Solution to MS Office + OpenDocument

[julesh (229690)]

Can someone explain to me why the gang at OpenOffice can't create a printer for windows ala Adobe Acrobat in order to "Print to OpenDocument"?

Simply put, the reason is this:

Printers take layout-oriented information (e.g. 'this character goes at this precise position, a line is drawn from here to here, start a new page for everything from this point on', etc.) and print it to a page.

PDF takes similar layout-oriented information and displays it on screen, and gives you an option to print.

OpenDocument, like most other word processor formats, uses structural information (e.g. 'these words are grouped into a paragraph, this paragraph has a box around it, these paragraphs should be on the same page as each other'), not layout information.

Re:Ehh

[Mjlner (609829)]

"Did some one read the date wrong? 20/10/2005 is the 20th, not the 10th."

Argh... All these problems stemming from different systems. We non-US people always forget that the American year has 30 months (sometimes 31) and 12 days in a month.
In other news:
Rest of world still waiting for America to adopt the metric system

Sure, mod me a trolling flamebait, you humourless twat.

Re:Excellent!!!!

[Wornstrom (920197)]

I push openoffice on anyone who asks me if I have a "copy" of office they can "install" on their new computer. Now with the more advanced Access style database stuff and general improvements, I couldn't imagine the "need" for MS Office anywhere. Except maybe in schools where the classes they teach on basic computer skills require that students have a copy of the latest version of Office. That is one thing that needs to be changed. Users are getting their basic education in productivity applications without any alternatives. Amazon is preselling the openoffice 2.x resource kit for $32.99, which comes with the cd with several versions (MS, Linux, Solaris, Apple) of OOo, plus macros and such. Might make a good gift for someone with the in-depth manual that explains how to do everything.