OpenOffice 3.2 Lands Amid Critical Changes

OpenOffice.org this week released the newest version of its office suite. While the release doesn’t focus on breaking much new ground, the open source effort behind it is undergoing dramatic changes.

What’s likely to come now that Sun Microsystems, the project’s chief backer, is now a part of Oracle? One key developer from Novell, another major player in the project, sees Oracle’s leadership as being able to help address some of the obstacles facing OpenOffice. Datamation has the story.

The concept of an office suite, with word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software, is one that is well understood by users, which is also why it’s often difficult to improve them. Users already expect their office suites to do certain things, making the job of office suite developers often one of fit and finish.

That’s the case with the new open source OpenOffice.org 3.2 (OOo) office suite release this week.

With the OOo 3.2 release, developers have fixed bugs, made the suite faster and improved compatibility with file formats from Microsoft.

The release also comes during a period of transition, as Sun Microsystems — the leader of the OOo effort — is now part of Oracle. While Sun has been directing OOo, it has been joined by multiple participants in the OOo ecosystem, among them Novell, which considers itself to be the No. 2 contributor to OOo development.

Read the full story at Datamation:


Open Office 3.2: Faster, More Office Compatibility