OpenOffice 3.1 for Windows, Mac, and Linux introduces several new improvements that should make the programs within the open-source suite function a bit better.
OpenOffice 3.1 changes the default highlighting color in Writer.
(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)The biggest change is that graphics viewed in OpenOffice are now anti-aliased, meaning graphics will appear smoother, especially when you place one shape over another. It's kind of surprising that OpenOffice hasn't supported this until now. File-locking has been improved, so if you're using the suite for cross-platform document sharing you should notice fewer glitches.
Writer, the OpenOffice MS Word analog and the one I use the most, is notably changed in this version. Highlighting will now appear as a toned background gray with darker gray font, instead of white on black. On Macs, the background shows up more blue than gray; apparently this is easier to see, but I wonder if color-blind users will find the change helpful or obnoxious. There's also stronger support for comments on documents, with a new context-menu Reply option. Other Writer changes include a new grammar-checking framework to support the grammar-checking extension, and outline levels within paragraphs.
Calc, the Excel analog, includes the zoom slider that Writer was given in OpenOffice 3.0, hot hints for commonly used formulas, and double-click renaming for sheets. Chart now supports flexible axes and offers users more options for dealing with missing data points.
A detailed summary of new features can be read on OpenOffice's Web site. You can also check out the technical changelog.
Although I didn't perform any benchmarking tests, version 3.1 felt like it took longer to install and appeared to hang for a few seconds randomly during use. If you notice similar conflicts or slow-downs, let me know in the comments.
$60 for the office suite--if you can prove you're a student.
(Credit: Microsoft)Over 90 percent off its original asking price, Microsoft's sale of its productivity suite, Office Ultimate, for $59.95 to bona fide students seems nothing short of a stellar deal.
That is, until you consider that the tools to download an entire office suite to your Windows computer for free has long been available to everyone, not just registered college kids with an e-mail address ending in '.edu'. Sun Microsystem's popular but still undersung productivity suite OpenOffice.org is freeware with all the office essentials that students--and most everyone else--use in daily computing, including word processing, spreadsheets, presentation and database tools, and drawing software.
Read more on OpenOffice.org and other freeware alternatives to popular photo-editing, painting, and security mainstays in our collection of price-busting programs for Windows.
Demand for OpenOffice.org 3 has been so high on its first day of out of beta that the official Web site crashed.
In the meantime, users can also download it for Windows and Mac from Download.com, and there are a couple of torrents being shared as well on the usual big-name trackers.
OpenOffice's redesigned landing page.
(Credit: CNET Networks)After using OpenOffice's MS Word analog, Writer, all day, I can confirm that this update is worth it for the improvement in response and load times, if nothing else. The installation is still enormous, with an installer about 130MB for Windows users and 160MB for Mac, but the installation process is smoother. From start to finish, it clocked in at around 5 minutes, significantly faster than installing OpenOffice 2. People who use OpenOffice as their primary productivity suite should take advantage of the OpenOffice Quickstarter, which noticeably accelerates program launch times and has been made even faster in version 3.
Mac users will also be pleased to see that they no longer need to grab a separate installation of X11--the new installer will run natively on OS X, and Windows Vista users should encounter fewer problems than before.
Many of the new features are only noticeable depending on how much of the OpenOffice suite you use. If you're a rebel and you use it in your work environment when everybody else is still on Microsoft Office, the compatibility with Office 2007/2008 file formats is hard to ignore. Finally getting native support for DOCX and XLSX, for example, is long overdue. If my tests jumping back and forth between XLSX and XLS files were any indication, though, the formats are now seamlessly integrated. However, OpenOffice can not yet save files in the new MS Office format.
Upgrades to OpenDocument Format 1.2 were glitch-free.
Other improvements to the two most-used programs in OpenOffice include multiple page viewing, improved notes and commenting, and improved PDF creation and importation in Writer, and a Solver feature and spreadsheet sharing in Calc. As you can tell, though, most of these changes bring OpenOffice up to the new standard of MS Office. Besides the OpenDocument Format support, there's little here that you can't get in Office. Of course, the benefit of OpenOffice being freeware can't be understated.
The new Start Center should appeal only to users who like having a landing page or only want to have one link on their desktop. It opens up a slightly redesigned window that highlights all of the OpenOffice tools with big icons. I find the Quickstarter to be a more effective and less intrusive way to do the same thing. Unfortunately, the interface within each program in the suite has gone largely unchanged. It looks fine when compared with MS Office 2003, but not so much when up against the Office 2007/2008.
One useful change involving the landing page is that it now shows up whenever you close a document but don't exit the program. This streamlines the work flow when jumping between applications, as well as giving you something to look at besides a big gray expanse of nothingness.
Overall, though, the interface isn't detrimental to using OpenOffice--it's just not a selling point. If it's the features that you use the suite for, then there's no reason not to upgrade.
If you go to OpenOffice's Web site right now, you will be greeted with this:
Apologies - our website is struggling to cope with the unprecedented demand for the new release 3.0 of OpenOffice.org. The technical teams are trying to come up with a solution.
Fortunately, however, you will also find links to download the latest version of the well-known, well-loved, and open-source OpenOffice.org suite, the alternative to the notoriously overpriced Microsoft Office.
After a lengthy development time, the company finally released its new 3.0 version of the software suite on Monday, and the download frenzies have forced the company to close all parts of its Web site to dedicate bandwidth for the downloading demand.
Apart from the fact that it's free and open source, the OfficeOffice.org suite is the only office suite that's available in all platforms including Windows, Linux, Solaris, and Mac.
Like previous versions, the OpenOffice.org 3.0 includes applications for word processing, spreadsheets, presentation, drawing, and databases. The new version's initial release offers only read-only support for Microsoft Office 2007 file formats including DOCX (Word), XLSX (Excel), and PPTX (PowerPoint), but can convert them into Office 2003 file formats.
The installer of OpenOffice.org 3.0 for Windows is only about 140MB in size, but it took me quite a long time to download due to the heavy traffic to the site. However, my colleague Seth Rosenblatt said he could get that done much faster using BitTorrent. You can also download the files from Download.com, for Windows and Mac.
Open-source freeware alternative to Microsoft Office, OpenOffice.org, has released the third release candidate of its next major-point upgrade for Windows and Mac. The full version of OpenOffice.org 3 is due next week, so it's extremely doubtful there will be any major changes from this point on.
While Sun Microsystems is making sure that all its T's are crossed and I's are dotted, OpenOffice 3 Release Candidate 3 offers quite a few new features, including much-needed support for Office 2007 file types, Microsoft Access database support, a multipage view in MS Word-analog Writer, nearly unlimited character support in sheet names, Google Doc-style collaborative editing of a single spreadsheet simultaneously, and a refreshed interface.
The full changelog can be read here.
OpenOffice has pushed their popular Microsoft Office freeware alternative into release candidate territory. Available for Windows, Mac, and Linux, open-source OpenOffice is a productivity suite analogous to and compatible with Microsoft's near-ubiquitous tool. There is more to recommend OpenOffice 3 than the price tag, though.
New features you can test out now include Microsoft Access database support and a multipage view in Writer, the Word analog, nearly unlimited character support in sheet names, Google Doc-style collaborative editing of a single spreadsheet simultaneously, and much-needed support for Office 2007 file types.
Empirically, OpenOffice 3 seems to start marginally faster than the slow-to-go current version, although I did not perform benchmark tests on this.
You could create every document, spreadsheet, and presentation you work on from scratch, but if you're like me, you'll likely spend more time futzing with the file's layout and design than entering the data that comprises it.
That's why I rely on the many free templates and extensions for my favorite productivity apps. I've written in the past about places to find add-ons for Microsoft Office, but there's also a wealth of free extensions and templates for OpenOffice.org's Writer word processor, Calc spreadsheet, and Impress presentation program.
Start at OpenOffice.org's Extensions page. Click one of the options at the top left to list the extensions by application, category, popularity, or other criterion.
One extension that workgroups may find helpful is O3Spaces Workplace Community Edition, which offers version control, check in/check out, and other collaboration features for OpenOffice.org and StarOffice apps. The add-on combines an AJAX Web client with a desktop component that you can access via a system-tray icon. It even works in mixed Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org/StarOffice environments.
I'm less impressed with OpenOffice.org's templates for Writer, Calc, and Impress. Still, I have to admit that they're better layouts than I would be able to devise on my own. One compilation of OpenOffice.org templates that business people will likely find indispensable is Sun Microsystems' own Professional Template Pack, which provides an abundance of templates for business letters, presentation backgrounds, and worksheets.
Preview your templates in OpenOffice.org apps
Before you can select the right template for your needs, you need to be able to see it. Previewing templates in OpenOffice.org apps isn't as easy as you might think. If you click File > Templates > Organize, you see the templates installed on your system and can place them in new or different folders, but you can't see what they look like.
You can view some of the templates via the applications' wizards: click File > Wizards, and choose one of the top five categories. When the wizard opens, choose From template and select one of the templates listed in the window below the radio buttons.
Preview the templates in OpenOffice.org by running a wizard and selecting "From template" on the first screen.
(Credit: OpenOffice.org)Another way to get a glimpse of your templates is to click File > New > Templates and Documents. With Templates selected in the left pane (it should be highlighted automatically), double-click a folder in the middle pane to view the templates in that category. Select one to preview it in the right pane. When you find one you like, click Open and start entering your data.
Preview the templates in OpenOffice.org via the Templates and Documents dialog box off the File > New menu.
(Credit: OpenOffice.org)A wonderful resource for OpenOffice.org templates, tips, and tutorials is Kaaredyret's all-purpose site.
Monday: customize Windows' context (right-click) menu.
Sun Microsystems has released the first beta for OpenOffice.org 3 for Windows and Mac. The new version of OpenOffice, which is a popular open-source competitor to Microsoft Office, looks to offer users improvements on every component from interface to features to behavior.
OpenOffice.org 3 Start Center
(Credit: CNET Networks)OpenOffice now natively supports OS X, so Mac users won't have to install the X11 module before running the suite. Full Vista support is also included in the beta, and didn't cause any problems during light testing. Notably, OpenOffice 3 includes filters for the new Microsoft Office document formats such as DOCX and XLSX as well as continuing support for standard Microsoft formats. Support for Microsoft Office 2007 for Windows and Office 2008 for Mac has been lacking until now.
The user interface doesn't look to have undergone many changes, besides getting a slightly snazzier gradated background and slightly larger icons. However, the new features more than make up for this. Enhancements include support for OpenDocument Format 1.2, a Solver feature, spreadsheet sharing to facilitate collaboration, improved PDF creation and importation, and improvements to the Notes feature in Writer.
The new Start Center should appeal to users who like having a landing page or only want to have one link on their desktop. It opens up a window that highlights all of the OpenOffice tools with big icons. Another of the more exciting OpenOffice extensions also being released is a Wiki Publisher tool that should make uploading wiki information from the program to a MediaWiki server a snap.
In-depth details of the changes planned for OpenOffice 3 can be found at the OpenOffice.org feature list and release notes.
Safe and dependable software old-timers WordPerfect and WinZip have been bestowed with some upgrades. WordPerfect gets a major overhaul with Version X4, while WinZip's 11.2 adds some new features to the program, the first update in a year.
WordPerfect X4 gives users a choice of interfaces and defaults at startup.
(Credit: Corel)You can read the full CNET Reviews analysis of WordPerfect X4 here, but in short, it's a good, solid improvement on what has gone before in the suite even if it is cost-prohibitive and not quite as spiffy as one would hope. It's able to gracefully handle more than 60 document formats, including the nascent Open Document Format, a stark contrast to Microsoft Office's decision to create its own "open format" instead.
It's also useful that WordPerfect displays different interfaces for different purposes, with a different look for the main interface, for WordPerfect 5.1, for MS Word, and for Legal mode. The WordPerfect suite includes spreadsheet-creating Quattro Pro and PowerPoint analogue Presentations, both of which have improved with the times--but not dramatically so.
The two new apps in the suite are Lightning and Mail. Mail is an e-mail client comparable with Outlook, but lacks built-in configurations for handling Gmail, Yahoo, and other Web-based e-mail systems as Mozilla Thunderbird does. Lightning was somewhat disappointing for Corel's answer to Web 2.0. Online services provide 200MB of storage for free, a file navigator indexes your hard drive, and a lightweight viewer and text editor round out the package. While it offers a lot, the workflow isn't always intuitive.
Besides the price, though, other problems included difficulty managing multiple documents opened simultaneously in WordPerfect, and a lack of refinement to many of the newer features. Users who are turned off by Microsoft's changes in Office 2007 might find X4 to be a suite worth investing in. Personally, I used WordPerfect for nearly 20 years, but gave it up last year to jump to OpenOffice.org.
WinZip now supports a second interface that looks more like Explorer.
(Credit: CNET Networks)WinZip's changes are far less extensive, but should please people who are still loyal to the program. Native LHA support has been added, so that WinZip can create and manage LHA files, and unicode support has been extended to sharing files that have names with international characters. ARC and ARJ support has been removed.
I was actually surprised, though, by some of the newer features I hadn't picked up on when versions 11 and 11.1 came out. Most interestingly, there's now a new spreadsheet-style interface that I found to be easier to use and far more pleasant to look at than the old open interface that is also still available. RAR and BZ2 extraction support was added, too, both long-overdue compatibility issues.
It's great to see both WordPerfect and WinZip still kicking around after all these years, but if news of open-source software's rising dominance is to be believed, these programs will have an even shorter lifespan than I'd thought unless they make some drastic changes.
More than a mere rival to Microsoft Office, the open-source OpenOffice.org (for Windows and Mac) includes the powerful applications for creating text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, diagrams, and databases that make it a serious Office competitor. It lets you edit basic documents and save them in a variety of formats, it's robust enough to handle equations and complex multipart documents with bibliographies, reference tables, and indexes, and on top of all that, it's extensible and uses less RAM than MS Office. What's not to love?
