Filed under: Software, Open Source
Sun joins OpenOffice Mac Porting Project
Fans of OpenOffice, the open source alternative to MS Office, rejoice! Sun, the company that puts the dot in .com, has just announced that they are joining the OpenOffice Mac porting project. What does this mean? It means that the chances of a Aqua version of OpenOffice materializing has just gone way up. Jim Parkinson even suggests that Sun might port StarOffice (which is the version of OpenOffice that Sun distributes itself) to OS X.Thanks, Mark.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Goingblind said 12:18PM on 5-03-2007
thats just a java app, slow to load and a resource hog, not a true port
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Chris said 12:21PM on 5-03-2007
Have you even installed 2.1? Personally I think it's great, albeit java.
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northfork said 12:22PM on 5-03-2007
great news!
love the sun
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Brian said 12:43PM on 5-03-2007
I can hear the sound of angelic choirs singing in praise.
Seriously though, I am way excited to hear this.
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Quix said 12:45PM on 5-03-2007
Ah Sun, always a day late and a dollar short...
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James Bow said 12:58PM on 5-03-2007
Well, good luck to the OpenOffice people. I'm quite happy with NeoOffice, but if a full port does occur, I'll pay attention, try it out and give it a fair test.
There's always room for more people in the Mac pool.
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Ron said 1:04PM on 5-03-2007
Memo to Sun: Please, please add WordPerfect backward compatibility and a "Reveal Codes" function. Thanks in advance!
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Leonard Nimrod said 1:08PM on 5-03-2007
How does the OO.o license work? Can Apple build there own suite around OO.o and then sell it as part of iWork?
Any chance they have been working on this? I imagine they would want a contingency plan if MS ever decides to play hardball again with MS Office for Mac.
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5cents said 1:09PM on 5-03-2007
NeoOffice is fantastic if a bit slow due to it's Jave foundation. If the actual OpenOffice port is zippy when it does come, it will be a welcome addition (and perhaps kill NeoOffice for OS X).
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timsamoff said 1:20PM on 5-03-2007
I'm a bit concerned about the NeoOffice development as well... Version 2+ is Aqua native (i.e., it doesn't need Xcode to run anymore). It is VERY zippy on my G5s!
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Edgar said 1:25PM on 5-03-2007
I agree the new Neooffice 2.1 is very very nice. just a look at openoffice makes you cant to cry after you have looked at the new version.
its awesome. very pretty
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Kevin said 1:34PM on 5-03-2007
Great news... the sooner i can rid myself of neooffice, the better.
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kisco said 1:57PM on 5-03-2007
officially the name is "OpenOffice.org" !
Open Office = nothing
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Mark S said 2:03PM on 5-03-2007
The NeoOffice developers have done a pretty good job, but honestly they just don't have the time nor funds to make NeoOffice as good as we would want it. Maybe they can contribute their code back to the OOo project and Sun can improve upon it with the help of the community. I personally would not mind seeing StarOffice become an OS X native suite. I think a new contender is needed since I don't believe Corel ever had plans to port Word Perfect Office, and there aren't too many real office suites on the Mac. The only ones that I am aware of (other than Microsoft Office of course) are Think Free Office, the Mariner Pak (Mariner Write and Calc), and Papyrus Office (it only does database and word processing). iWork is great and I enjoy using it, but it's not quite up to par with the other full suites.
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FultonKBD said 2:06PM on 5-03-2007
I give another nod for NeoOffice. It takes a while to launch but after that... it performs well enough.
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Catt said 2:15PM on 5-03-2007
NeoOffice 2.1 is pretty snazzy on my G4 once it loads. A true port would be welcome though coz I like the whole Open Office idea. I wish someone would take Koffice and make that Mac native. Kvio just rocks.
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michel said 3:01PM on 5-03-2007
it will use also the experiences of Neoffice. so nothing is a waste.
and Sun has many many opensource projects, you cannot expect sun to finance and put workers to everything at once.
do not forget sun finance the OpenOffice.org for years (and it is not alone)
no, Apple can't use openoffice and insert it in iwork or iwork should be open source too. Of course sun could write a specific licence for apple, but Sun never stated they sell specific licences to develop new closed products with it
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qwert said 4:12PM on 5-03-2007
i would love to have native OO.org on osX!
OO.org X11 is slow, and not too pretty, but it works.
Neooffice looks better, but is even slower.
Koffice is a nice alternative, but unfortunately the pre alpha releases of KDE for osx are very very unstable, at the moment.
http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/16/native-kde-applications-coming-for-os-x/
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Todd Partridge said 7:06PM on 5-03-2007
Port jeesh. How much is there to do? Producing an interface takes alot of workers, please.
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shanee said 9:26AM on 5-04-2007
Personally, Ive used and like Neo Office.
If there is going to be a real serious contender to MS Office, then it has to be a collaborative work. Why doesnt everyone get onboard with NeoOffice. It is already a pretty decent app. With a bit of spit and polish, it would become a really viable alternative - probably with alot less work (less aquafying to do!)
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