4 ms·
I was commenting on the remark that the fork should be merged. You cannot modify the source of Microsoft Office. Comparing office suites is an entirely differe
by bkor 15y ago
I was commenting on the remark that the fork should be merged.
You cannot modify the source of Microsoft Office. Comparing office suites is an entirely different topic.
I don't see a divided community. One project is really active and alive, then a year later OOorg tries to start something else.
It seems inefficient to have this split. But that is the same for everything. Why have different languages, multiple OSes, multiple distributions, desktop environments, etc. Might be inefficient, but unless you take away peoples freedom to do what they want, I don't see this changing.
Trying to compete with Microsoft Office seems futile anyway. I'd rather have a focus on making a good office suite. It doesn't really matter if it can do everything that Microsoft Office can.
- dutom 15y agoI believe IBM still support OOo. At the time of the fork, they were (and still are) making Lotus Symphony (free as-in beer, based on OOo code) OpenOffice.org - Apache License LibreOffice - LGPLv3
- bkor 15y agoI know that is the reason for starting the OOorg on Apache, so the license stuff is easier for IBM. I just don't think it'll work. Most distribution companies prefer GPL because in that case everybody benefits. You cannot take the work of all companies, then do your on thing on top and don't give back. Believe it would be easier to not have Lotus Symphony open source. That, or change strategy and rely on brandname. I don't think it matters much that something is fully open sourced and can be reused by another company. Marketing, trademark and strong brand (meaning: trusted, supported, reliable) goes a long way. Can still ask money for it, and if someone wants to give it away for free they'll have to use a different name for it (similar to the Firefox name in Debian).
- pwaring 15y agoThe Iceweasel name in Debian is not because Debian give away Firefox for free (as in no cost), it's because Mozilla only allow you to call the software Firefox if you use an official build (or get permission for non-official builds), and I believe the artwork also has a proprietary licence, making it non-free by Debian's definition.