8 ms·
LibreOffice - A fresh page for OpenOffice
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- nervechannel 16y agoArgh, couldn't they have come up with a less clunky name??
- samstokes 16y agoThe new name sucks, but so did "OpenOffice.org" (at least going by the Ubuntu package names, they insisted on the .org being part of the name).
- pan69 16y agoAt least OpenOffice was something you could pronounce.
- RyanMcGreal 16y agoThe trick is to insert a glottal stop between Libre and Office.
- eru 16y agoSeems quite simple to me.
- ajuc 16y agoFor most of the world almost every piece of software has name in foreign language. It's all just sounds, with no meaning other than "the program with icon looking like ...". For people in Poland Windows and Word means computer programs, their real meanings are second thoughts, even if they even know what that words means. I'll agree - Libre Office sounds strange, but it is adventage - it makes brand stronger. And people will get used to it, if it will be good.
- cryptoz 16y agoThey insisted on the .org because it is a legal issue. From Wikipedia, > The project and software are commonly known as OpenOffice, but this term is a trademark held by a company in the Netherlands co-founded by Wouter Hanegraaff and is also in use by Orange UK,[8] requiring the project to adopt OpenOffice.org as its formal name.[9]
- danh 16y agoAt least it's better than go-oo.org.
- JoachimSchipper 16y agoThis article doesn't really explain why go-oo.org was not sufficient. Nonetheless, I wish them all the best (but will continue to use LaTeX.)
- acqq 16y agoAs far as I understand, behind the "LibreOffice" will be the non-profit "Document Foundation" and that's already a lot -- the better legal position and he companies can better relate to it or commit to support it -- companies simply need other company-like entities.
- krakensden 16y agoI understand this to be a merging of ex-Sun devs and the go-oo.org people
- devmonk 16y agoIs LibreOffice the first sign of Oraclepocalypse?
- devmonk 16y agoTo whomever downvoted this, you realize of course that Oracle's overly-litigiousness: http://www.google.com/search?q=oracle+lawsuit http://www.google.com/search?q=oracle+lawsuit and poor conferences for Java: http://www.google.com/search?q=javaone+oracle+sucked#sclient=psy&hl=en&safe=active&tbs=blg%3A1&q=oracle+javaone+sucked&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=&pbx=1&fp=3552031fb57c042d http://www.google.com/search?q=javaone+oracle+sucked#sclient... are what I'm referring to, right? Oracle has seriously been screwing up lately. I think that the kids are taking their ball and going home with LibreOffice, leaving Oracle behind because of its anti-open-source attitude.
- agscala 16y agoFingers crossed on a possible vim-style input plugin/integration
- hakl 16y agoGoogle is sponsoring a free competitor to one of their proprietary solutions. I wonder why.
- dbingham 16y agoProbably something to do with the whole "don't be evil" thing. Google has always done a pretty good job of that. Sometimes doing the right thing isn't the same as doing the thing that's best for business. In fact, REALLY OFTEN doing the right thing isn't the same as best for business. Also the vast majority of Google employees are probably open source users and fans themselves.
- bad_user 16y agoIt's not direct competition ... I'm using Google's docs to keep my documents online / and for collaborative editing. I haven't tried any plugins yet for OpenOffice, but it would be awesome if there was a plugin for syncing back and forth to Google Docs.
- Symmetry 16y agoWhile Microsoft Office has the majority of the market, growing the network of relatively compatible alternatives is going to help Google Docs.
- mthoms 16y agoGoogle is sponsoring a free competitor to one of their proprietary solutions. I wonder why. Simple. The enemy of your enemy is your friend.
- krschultz 16y agoFreeOffice wasn't an option? Open Source Office? Anything-other-than-LibreOffice? OpenOffice is something that I can explain to my mother when I install it for her instead of MS Office, Mom, it's just like Office but it is open source. In fact she didn't notice for a long time. Libre Office? She'll question that for sure, and then what am I going to do, explain the GNU manifesto to her? Come on. I like the use of the word Libre instead of Free among people who know what we're talking about, but from a marketing/branding standpoint, this is horrible.
- hakl 16y agoDid you explain to her what source code is and explain OSI's definition of open source (you know, DFSG rebranded)?
- blasdel 16y agoAnd after that he can explain how the freedom is really for the source code and not for her!
- rbanffy 16y agoNot really. If it's GPL, it's freedom for her from the developer.
- gaius 16y agoAssuming she has both the skill and the time to understand and patch the codebase herself. Otherwise she will be just as beholden to said developer as she is to Microsoft. More in fact; at least MS has some incentive to add features its users want rather than those that are merely interesting to code...
- rbanffy 16y ago> Otherwise she will be just as beholden to said developer as she is to Microsoft. She can buy a book and learn how to bend the program to her will. It may be a daunting task, but it's possible because she has the source code. In the Microsoft product case, she can't because she doesn't have the source. Actually, she can, but she will have to learn how to program, apply for a job opening at Microsoft for the desired group, get hired and then convince the product manglers the change she wants deserves to be included in the product. Reading the book doesn't seem that daunting now.
- jarin 16y agoI can understand the concerns with the dual licensing and copyright assignment, it's the same problem I had with Diaspora's licensing.
- e1ven 16y agoIn general I'm in favor of moving things out of Oracle's control, since they have acted as an untrustworthy partner in many places, but why not use the existing fork? The article dismisses Go-oo as not having enough support.. Why not give them more, rather than splitting the community further?
- thristian 16y agoI believe one of the first actions of the new organisation was to apply all the changes from Go-oo, so it's not like they're completely splitting...
- krakensden 16y agoMichael Meeks and other Go-oo developers are on the board, as well.
- ars 16y agoSo why do they need another name and another project?
- rabelaisian 16y agogo-oo.org wasn't a fork. It is an alternative build of the upstream code that includes missing plug-ins that were excluded from the oo.o build because the developers hadn't assigned the copyright to Sun. The go-oo build has been the default for most Linux distributions since whenever.
- bstrong 16y agoWhen I saw the headline, I has hoping for something more like the Firefox/Mozilla or Drizzle/MySQL forks (only pull over the good parts, leave most of the bloat behind). That would have been something to get excited about.
- jrockway 16y agoI don't get why people are against the name. Yeah, it's not "mom-friendly", but neither is any software. Everyone uses Word at home because it's what they use at work. They don't think of software packages as being discrete elements, they think of "a computer" and "that place where I type memos". Microsoft wins by default. OO.org and LibreOffice should target two demographics: industries where everyone needs to be trained anyway, and for enthusiasts. If you work for megacorp-with-Word and you got Word for free with your computer, and you don't enjoy using computers, then LibreOffice's advantages are minimal. No need to cater to that demographic, because they simply don't care. (Incidentally, I wrote a book in OO.org a few years ago. HORRIBLE. NEVER AGAIN. But I wouldn't use Word, either.)
- joeld42 16y agoNames are really important. This is a bad name. Gimp, the image editor, is another victim of OSS naming. I know many serious artists who won't give it a try simply because of the name. They don't take it seriously. The fact that it's free is unimportant to them. With a better name a decade ago, Gimp could be a serious competitor to Photoshop now, instead of a footnote. In this case, the developers are putting a clumsy emphasis on the price and "freedom", which is unimportant to someone who just wants to write a letter or make a presentation. Read "LibreOffice" literally .. "A free alternative to MS Office". Which is not untrue but this immediately raises the question "Can you afford the REAL MS Office? And are you worth it?" Most people will answer, "Yes, I can and I am certainly worth it". Starving students may answer "No, but it's less work to pirate it than to install this weird thing." My belief is that for an OSS office suite to dethrone MS Office, it needs a clear focus, and one other than "free". Brainstorming some directions they could have taken: LessOffice - A streamlined office suite, fast and bloat-free, that never crashes. (Of course, OpenOffice is pretty far from this in reality) CopyDesk - A word processor for writers, not for bureaucrats. DeFacto - An office suite that interoperates seamlessly with every other system. It never asks what format something is in, it just works. BloatOffice - Has every feature from every other office suite. Combined. The most complete office suite on the planet. (A bit self-deprecating, but could turn a perceived weakness, bloat, into a feature, completeness). Folio - An office suite without the learning curve. In any case, this market is long overdue to be disrupted. Google Docs isn't going to do it. I'm a writer, and I can't even get it to do proper manuscript format. A typewriter can do that. Developers: If you REALLY want to help the free software movement break MS's stranglehold on Office, don't write another office suite. Write a self-contained, standalone library that reads and writes .doc files, that works perfectly for the features it supports and clearly indicates to the caller when it's going to break and what it's breaking on. Once you can write a 200 line example program that converts most docs to nearly identical .pdfs, you've won. Not that that's easy.
- cabalamat 16y agoI'm not a big fan of some of those names: LessOffice - people with think it does less. CopyDesk - is is a photocopier? BloatOffice - calling something bloated is an insult. If you want to emphasize completeness, how about PowerOffice, and use the slogan "PowerOffice -- it does it all".