This falls into the "man, that's excellent!" department. CNET is reporting that Google is going to hire developers to work on our fave Office suite, OpenOffice.org. The article specifically mentions trying to reduce RAM requirements and the size of the download, currently around 80 MB. It isn't like Google is going to create a web-enabled version of OOo that we all can use via our web browser - at least, not now - but this is still fantastic news. I can't wait to see what Google adds to make OOo even better. (Check out all of my posts on OpenOffice.org and Google.) ...

My fave open source office suite, OpenOffice.org (AKA OOo), is about to see the release of version 2.0, which I've been using in beta for months, & I can assure you heartily that it rocks. However, in the meantime, the OOo developers have released 1.1.5, which now supports importing the new standard OpenDocument-formatted documents that will be the default in 2.0. If you're feelin' brave (& it's not that dangerous), try out 2.0; if you want to be a bit more careful, use the newest kid on the block, 1.1.5. (Check out all of my posts on OpenOffice.org.) ...

OpenOffice.org is a great office suite, but it's lacking good templates. Sure, there are a couple of templates, but they're not the greatest. Anytime anyone provides more free templates for OOo, that's a good thing. I don't use labels much, but lots of folks do, and they'll be particularly excited at this news: "OOo Label Templates 1.0 Released". We're talking 50 labels, all sized for 8.5 x 11, for CDs, DVDs, and mailings. And more! I'm definitely downloading this, since ya never know when you'll need a label. And thank you, Worldlabel.com, for providing these labels! (Check out all of our posts on OpenOffice.org.) ...

I'm not really a clip art kind of guy - as I used to tell my Web Design students, "You know what the problem with putting clip art on your web pages is? It looks like clip art!" - but when it comes to text documents, clip art is a different matter. Used in moderation, it can be a nice way to spiff up a flier or newsletter. If you use OpenOffice.org, be aware that you can install additional clip art that will work with that software. If you use Debian, run the following command: apt-get install openclipart openclipart-openoffice.org openclipart-png openclipart-svg If you use an RPM-based system, head over to the Open Clip Art Library site and download a package appropriate to your system. Finally, if you installed MSFT Office & want to use that clip art with OOo, read Importing MS Office clip art to the OO Gallery. Quite handy! (Check out all of my posts on OpenOffice.org.) ...

Me personally, I made my own very simple white text on a black background OOo Impress templates. Most templates, whether they're for PowerPoint or Impress, completely suck. Ugggggly. This dude on The Linux Box put up a few OOo Impress templates at Open Source Presentation Templates that Will Make Proprietary Office Suites Jealous that don't completely suck. If you're into presentation templates, in fact, they're not bad at all. (Check out all of our posts on OpenOffice.org.) ...

OOo 2 is out now, & there are a lot of big changes, almost all of them much for the better. One of the biggest differences involves the toolbars. Before, one of the toolbars altered according to what you were doing on the page - the same space was always taken up, but the toolbar icons in that space would change. I liked that, but it was a bit disorienting the 1st time you used it. Now you have separate toolbars that appear as you create and use your document. A very good 2-part article that covers the changes in OOo toolbars is the cleverly-named "Toolbars in OpenOffice.org 2.0, Part 1" and "Toolbars in OpenOffice.org 2.0, part 2". It's worth the quick read it requires. (Check out all of our posts on OpenOffice.org.) ...

A few weeks ago, I talked about how to upgrade K/Ubuntu to OpenOffice.org 2; today I want to point you to a page that explains to you how to turn the RPMs for OOo into Debian package. It's actually quite easy, so just head over to "Installing OpenOffice.org 2.0 for Debian", read what's there, & follow the instructions. In a few moments, relatively speaking, you'll be running the lastest 'n greatest versions of OOo on your Debian - or Debian-based - box. And let me tell you: if you thought OOo1 was good, OOo2 kicks ass. And here's a bonus: once you've run through the instructions, you'll have a better understanding of the alien software tool, which is a neat way to translate RPMs into DEBs, & vice-versa. (Check out all of our posts on OpenOffice.org 2 and alien.) ...

OpenOffice.org 2.0 is coming out soon, as in a few months, and I thought you might like to find out more about what's going to be in it, straight from the horse's mouth: "OpenOffice.org 2.0 Office Suite Guide to New Features". Goodies for Writer, Calc, Impress, and the brand new Base … all are explained, elucidated, and spelled out. Heck, I found out a new feature for the current version of Writer I didn't know about: "Now, not only does Ctrl+Alt+Key Up/Down move a paragraph up/down but Ctrl + Key Up/Down does the same." Dang - that's cool, and incredibly handy. Can't believe I didn't know about that before! ...

It's official, Open Office.org 2.0 was released today. You can get yours here. The most exciting new features, most of which we've mentioned before are OpenDocument format, a edesigned user interface,  a new database module, improved PDF support, a redesigned spreadsheet module, and enhanced desktop integration, but there are a whole host of stability and speed imporvements under the hood. Go take a look. ...

NewsForge has an overview of the upcoming OpenOffice.org 2.0 on its site: "First look: OpenOffice.org version 2.0 beta". If you use OOo, or recommend it to others, or even if you use Microsoft Office, you owe it to yourself to read it. The good: a ton of new features, especially for Writer. Word count (finally!). A better installer (at least for Windows; since I use Debian Linux, installation is just an apt-get install openoffice.org for me). Better, more "normal" toolbar behaviors. Renaming "AutoPilot" to "Wizard" (the reviewer doesn't think it's necessary, but I think it'll help Windows users). The recent file list now shows 10, not 4, items (thank you!). Tables can now break across multiple pages (thank {diety}!). The adoption of the OASIS file formats (supported by everyone except … you know who!). Better mail merge, which I've complained about before. The bad: Charting still sucks. Some changes in OOo tools that limit functionality in order to be more like MSFT Office (wow ...

The latest versions of K/Ubuntu came with very, very late betas of OpenOffice.org 2, but since then OOo came out of beta, but K/Ubuntu hasn't been updated. Fortunately, in open source fashion, one Ubuntu user has compiled OOo2 & made it available for users to download. I'm using it, & things work just fine. To upgrade your OOo2, you need to edit your /etc/apt/sources.list file, AKA your repository list if you use Synaptic. I use the command line, so I first ran this: sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list Then I added this line: deb http://people.ubuntu.com/~doko/OOo2 ./ I saved & closed the file, & then ran the following commands: sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get upgrade APT wanted to update OOo2, so I told it to go ahead. A bit later, I had the latest & greatest OOo2 running on my Kubuntu machine. Beautiful. (For more on this stuff, see this post on the Ubuntu Forums.) (Check out all of our posts on OpenOffice.org, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, ...

LinuxPlanet has a nice, short, quick look at the upcoming OpenOffice.org with "A First Look at OpenOffice.org 2.0". It's not a deep analysis, but he does spend a bit of time on Base, the new database app in OOo 2.0 that looks & acts a heck of a lot like Access. That's so cool - the one thing people keep saying over and over about OOo is "Where's the Access tool?". Now we've got an answer. (Read all my postings about OpenOffice.org.) ...

About a month ago I mentioned some of the good & some of the bad we can expect in the upcoming release of OpenOffice.org 2.0. Bruce Byfield has followed up with another article at NewsForge titled "Java fallout: OpenOffice.org 2.0 and the FOSS community" that does a good job discussing the ramifications of the OOo developers' decision to increase OOo's dependencies on Java. Since Java isn't really open source, that decision is causing a lot of headaches and issues throughout the open source world, as certain distros promise not to include OOo and certain others pledge to continue shipping it. Of course, all this could be avoided if Sun would just open source Java, but they're too busy trying to craft a strategy to save their behinds right now to keep their eye on that ball. Instead, it appears that the strong presence of Sun developers among the OOo community has led to the increased use of Java, and now it may blow up in everyone's faces. This really is not good at all. At this time, I ...

I just found some really, really, really nice OpenOffice.org tutorials covering Writer, Calc, and the new Base. Even better, they're for both OOo 1.1 AND the upcoming 2.0, so you can get an advanced look at the upcoming release. Even better than that, they're in Flash, so you can actually watch the tutorial and see what's being described (finally, a good use for Flash!). Even better than that, you can download the tutorials to watch 'em on your machine. And even better than that, they're packaged for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. And really, there's nothing I can find at this point that's better. I'm bettered out. ...

One thing that people tend to forget is that open source isn't just about Linux. Apple uses open source stuff in it's products - like it's kernel & web browser for instance - and even MSFT has released a couple of things as open source (and I'm not talking about their b.s. "shared source" license, which doesn't even deserve consideration). In addition, there's actually a lot of great open source software that runs on Windows. When I use XP, for instance, I don't use IE; I use Firefox. I don't use Outlook or Outlook Express; I use Thunderbird. I don't use Office; I use OpenOffice.org. ...