When Bill Gates showed off the new Metro document format in Longhorn at a hardware conference last week, some analysts were quick to call it a PDF killer.
OASIS announced that OpenDocument v1.0 will be recognised as the OASIS standard for documentation. Several open source office suites including Openoffice 2.0, Koffice and Abiword (Planned) will support the new standard.
This release specifically introduces the database management application Kexi, the image editor Krita and upgrades the major KOffice components to use the OASIS Open Document format, an industry standard allowing better interoperability across applications and platforms.
According to this Linuxworld article, OpenOffice.org 2.0 will be delayed until at least June or July because of the level of feedback received on the beta. The project's other significant problem, according to developers at this year's OpenOffice.org conference in Canberra, Australia, is the shortage of developers not tied to Sun.
When it comes to importing generic XML into OpenOffice, the user is on his own. This article offers a quick XSLT tool for this purpose and demonstrates the Calc import of records-oriented XML. In addition to learning a practical trick for working with Calc, you might also learn a few handy XSLT techniques for using dynamic criteria to transform XML.
Aditya Nag recently got the chance to ask the OpenOffice.org team a few questions about OpenOffice.org in general, and their upcoming release. The interview is fairly long and detailed, and there are a few interesting tid-bits, like Louis' assertion that there will come a day when there will be no proprietory file formats for Office Suites.
A long-time Gnome user takes a week to try out SimplyMepis to see what all the hubub is about. The result is not only a favorable look at a capable Linux distro, but an examination of the state of the Desktop Environment landscape, and the areas in which KDE can tempt even a dyed-in-the-wool Gnome fan.
The Sun-sponsored OpenOffice.org project based on open sourced StarOffice code has released a preview of the upcoming OpenOffice 2.0 product. This version touts better MS-Office loading and parsing, strict XML compliant output, a new database program that mimics Microsoft's Access, and much more. The Inquirer took it for a spin.
Gnumeric is intended to be a drop in replacement for proprietary spreadsheets. It imports your existing Excel, 1-2-3, Applix, Sylk, XBase Quattro Pro, Dif, Plan Perfect, and Oleo files among others. The latest version 1.4.0 brings some major new features including:
Novell hacker Jan Holesovsky has announced a build of OpenOffice.org that has both KDE and GNOME support. When launched within KDE, KDE support is activated, similarly when launched within GNOME, GNOME support is activated. Jan's next project will be to plan for OOo 2.0.
This is Marcel Gagné's third book with Addison-Wesley following, Linux System Administration: A User's Guide and Moving to Linux: Kiss the Blue Screen of Death Goodbye!. Marcel is also the well-respected author of Linux Journal's, Cooking with Linux. The author has written this excellent book with near-perfect timing.
The Internet went all abuzz last week when a report by Todd Bishop of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer posited that Microsoft was keeping open its legal options against licensees of OpenOffice.org. Commonly known as OpenOffice, the software is a freely downloadable open source productivity suite that constitutes a significant portion of Sun's commercially offered StarOffice. It also exemplifies the threat that the open-source movement poses to Microsoft.
The KOffice team released the third bugfix package that builds upon the previous 1.3.x versions, with many fixes, mainly in the core libraries and in some filters.
Before I start, let me tell you the little story, how I got the idea for writing this article. When I wrote my first article for OSNews, one of the screenshots I included showed my diploma thesis. I merely wanted to show that OpenOffice.org in Fedora Core 2 features native icons, nothing more.
While the just-released first service pack for Microsoft's Office 2003 primarily rounds up security and bug fixes, it also enhances features in the 2003 versions of OneNote and InfoPath.
When I was first asked to review this book, I was somewhat taken aback by the title. I wondered if it could be construed as blasphemous. The dictionary came to my rescue with this definition: damn, adj., beyond doubt or question.
Along with the capable Scribus and the advancing Passepartout, GrassHoper LLC has released PageStream 5.0.1 for Linux (using GTK+: screenshot) along with many other platforms including AmigaOS, Windows, MorphOS and a pending Mac OS X version. For what's new on 5.x of this legendary DTP system (out and about since 1986 for AtariST), check here.
