Tag: libreoffice

Open Source's worst enemy is itself not Microsoft/SAS/SAP/Oracle

The decision of quality open source makers to offer their software at bargain basement prices even to enterprise customers who are used to pay prices many times more-pricing is the reason open source software is taking a long time to command respect in enterprise software.

I hate to be the messenger who brings the bad news to my open source brethren-

but their worst nightmare is not the actions of their proprietary competitors like Oracle, SAP, SAS, Microsoft ( they hate each other even more than open source )

nor the collective marketing tactics which are textbook like (but referred as Fear Uncertainty Doubt by those outside that golden quartet)- it is their own communities and their own cheap pricing.

It is community action which prevents them from offering their software by ridiculously low bargain basement prices. James Dixon, head geek and founder at Pentaho has a point when he says traditional metrics like revenue need o be adjusted for this impact in his article at http://jamesdixon.wordpress.com/2010/11/02/comparing-open-source-and-proprietary-software-markets/

But James, why offer software to enterprise customers at one tenth the next competitor- one reason is open source companies more often than not compete more with their free community version software than with big proprietary packages.

Communities including academics are used to free- hey how about paying say 1$ for each download.

There are two million R users- if say even 50 % of them  paid 1 $ as a lifetime license fee- you could sponsor enough new packages than twenty years of Google Summer of Code does right now.

Secondly, this pricing can easily be adjusted by shifting the licensing to say free for businesses less than 2 people (even for the enhanced corporate software version not just the plain vanilla community software thus further increasing the spread of the plain vanilla versions)- for businesses from 10 to 20 people offer a six month trial rather than one month trial.

– but adjust the pricing to much more realistic levels compared to competing software. Make enterprise software pay a real value.

That’s the only way to earn respect. as well as a few dollars more.

As for SAS, it is time it started ridiculing Python now that it has accepted R.

Python is even MORE powerful than R in some use cases for stat computing

Dixon’s Pentaho and the Jaspersoft/ Revolution combo are nice _ I tested both Jasper and Pentaho thanks to these remarks this week 🙂  (see slides at http://www.jaspersoft.com/sites/default/files/downloads/events/Analytics%20-Jaspersoft-SEP2010.pdf or http://www.revolutionanalytics.com/news-events/free-webinars/2010/deploying-r/index.php )

Pentaho and Jasper do give good great graphics in BI (Graphical display in BI is not a SAS forte though probably I dont know how much they cross sell JMP to BI customers- probably too much JMP is another division syndrome there)

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LibreOffice News and Google Musings

Tux, the Linux penguin
Image via Wikipedia

Official Bloggers on LibreOffice- http://planet.documentfoundation.org/

Note- for some strange reason I continue to be on top ranked LibreOffice blogs- maybe because I write more on the software itself than on Oracle politics or coffee spillovers.

LibreOffice Beta 2  is ready and I just installed it on Windows 7 – works nice- and I somehow think open Office and Google needs an  example to stop being so scary on cautioning—— hey,hey it’s a  beta – (do you see Oracle saying this release is a beta or Windows saying hey this Windows Vista is a beta for Windows 7- No right?)-

see screenshot of solver in  LibreOffice spreadsheet -works just fine.

We cant wait for Chromium OS and LibreOffice integration (or Google Docs-LibreOffice integration)  so Google starts thinking on those lines (of course

Google also needs to ramp up Google Storage and Google Predict API– but dude are you sure you wanna take on Amazon, Oracle and MS and Yahoo and Apple at the same time. Dear Herr Schmidt- Last German Guy who did that ,  ended up in a bunker in Berlin. (Ever since I had to pay 50 euros as Airline Transit fee -yes Indian passport holders have to do that in Germany- I am kind of non objective on that issue)

Google Management is busy nowadays thinking of trying to beat Facebook -hint -hint-

-buy out the biggest app makers of Facebook apps and create an api for Facebook info download and upload into Orkut –maybe invest like an angel in that startup called Diaspora http://www.joindiaspora.com/) see-

Back to the topic (and there are enough people blogging on Google should or shouldnt do)

-LibreOffice aesthetically rocks! It has a cool feel.

More news- The Wiki is up and awaits you at http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation

And there is a general pow-wow scheduled at http://www.oookwv.de/ for the Open Office Congress (Kongress)

As you can see I used the Chrome Extension for Google Translate for an instant translation from German into English (though it still needs some work,  Herr Translator)

Back to actually working on LibreOffice- if Word and Powerpoint is all you do- save some money for Christmas and download it today from
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LibreOffice Beta 2 (Office Fork off Oracle) launches!

 

Windows 7, the latest client version in the Mi...
Image via Wikipedia

 

Announcement from Code Ninjas at Document Foundation

10 years after the StarOffice code has been opened as OpenOffice.org, The Document Foundation is proud to announce the availability of LibreOffice Beta 2 for public testing. Please, download the suitable package(s) from

http://www.documentfoundation.org/download/

 

Ajay- Note that first beta was downloaded almost 100,000 times

install them, and start testing! Should you find bugs, please report them to the FreeDesktop Bugzilla:

https://bugs.freedesktop.org

If you want to get involved in this exciting project, you can contribute code:

http://www.documentfoundation.org/develop/

translate LibreOffice to your language:

http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/LibreOffice/i18n/translating_3.3

or just donate:

http://www.documentfoundation.org/contribution/
A list of known issues with Beta 2 is available in our wiki:

http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Beta2

Beta Release Notes

This beta release is not intended for production use!

There are a number of known issues being worked on:

  • The Windows build is an International build – you can choose the user interface language that is suitable for you, but the help is always English. We are currently working on improving the delivery mechanism to be able to provide you with the localized help. We are also working on smaller problems like wrong description of several languages.
  • The Linux and MacOSX builds are English builds with the possibility to install language packs. Please browse the archives to get the langugage pack you need for your platform.
  • The LibreOffice branding and renaming is new and work in progress. You may still see old graphics, icons or websites. So please bear with us. This also applies to the BrOffice.org branding – applicable in Brazil.
  • Filters for the legacy StarOffice binary formats are missing.

I tested it- it seems okay enough. Once again Open Source tends to underplay expectations (when was the last time you saw that in enterprise software?)

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Libre Office

Some ambiguity about Libre Office and why it needed to change from Open Office- just when Open Office seemed so threatening on the desktop

FROM- http://www.documentfoundation.org/faq/

Q: So is this a breakaway project?

A: Not at all. The Document Foundation will continue to be focused on developing, supporting, and promoting the same software, and it’s very much business as usual. We are simply moving to a new and more appropriate organisational model for the next decade – a logical development from Sun’s inspirational launch a decade ago.

Q: Why are you calling yourselves “The Document Foundation”?

A: For ten years we have used the same name – “OpenOffice.org” – for both the Community and the software. We’ve decided it removes ambiguity to have a different name for the two, so the Community is now “The Document Foundation”, and the software “LibreOffice”. Note: there are other examples of this usage in the free software community – e.g. the Mozilla Foundation with the Firefox browser.

Q: Does this mean you intend to develop other pieces of software?

A: We would like to have that possibility open to us in the future…

Q: And why are you calling the software “LibreOffice” instead of “OpenOffice.org”?

A: The OpenOffice.org trademark is owned by Oracle Corporation. Our hope is that Oracle will donate this to the Foundation, along with the other assets it holds in trust for the Community, in due course, once legal etc issues are resolved. However, we need to continue work in the meantime – hence “LibreOffice” (“free office”).

Q: Why are you building a new web infrastructure?

A: Since Oracle’s takeover of Sun Microsystems, the Community has been under “notice to quit” from our previous Collabnet infrastructure. With today’s announcement of a Foundation, we now have an entity which can own our emerging new infrastructure.

Q: What does this announcement mean to other derivatives of OpenOffice.org?

A: We want The Document Foundation to be open to code contributions from as many people as possible. We are delighted to announce that the enhancements produced by the Go-OOo team will be merged into LibreOffice, effective immediately. We hope that others will follow suit.

Q: What difference will this make to the commercial products produced by Oracle Corporation, IBM, Novell, Red Flag, etc?

A: The Document Foundation cannot answer for other bodies. However, there is nothing in the licence arrangements to stop companies continuing to release commercial derivatives of LibreOffice. The new Foundation will also mean companies can contribute funds or resources without worries that they may be helping a commercial competitor.

Q: What difference will The Document Foundation make to developers?

A: The Document Foundation sets out deliberately to be as developer friendly as possible. We do not demand that contributors share their copyright with us. People will gain status in our community based on peer evaluation of their contributions – not by who their employer is.

Q: What difference will The Document Foundation make to users of LibreOffice?

A: LibreOffice is The Document Foundation’s reason for existence. We do not have and will not have a commercial product which receives preferential treatment. We only have one focus – delivering the best free office suite for our users – LibreOffice.

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Non Microsoft and Non Oracle vendors are indeed going to find it useful the possiblities of bundling a free Libre Office that reduces the total cost of ownership for analytics software. Right now, some of the best free advertising for Microsoft OS and Office is done by enterprise software vendors who create Windows Only Products and enable MS Office integration better than  Open Office integration. This is done citing user demand- but it is a chicken egg dilemma- as functionality leads to enhanced demand. Microsoft on the other hand is aware of this dependence and has made SQL Server and SQL Analytics (besides investing in analytics startups like Revolution Analytics) along with it’s own infrastructure -Azure Cloud Platform/EC2 instances.

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Unbreakable Oracle Linux- and Unshakable-Libre Office-

Tux, the Linux penguin
Image via Wikipedia

Oracle announced Unbreakable Oracle Linux (which is the first time I have seen Unbreakable word used in a formal software name)- Hats off to good ol’ Larry chutzpah. It is also quite a fast form of Linux for Enterprises-as the stats say at http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/linux/ubreakable-enterprise-kernel-linux-173350.html

LibreOffice is a new fork from OpenOffice– Basically people who want to ensure OpenOffice remains free. It basically consists of efforts from everybody except Apple, Microsoft and Oracle (http://www.documentfoundation.org/supporters/) and it’s a new kind of workable office productivity suite-determined to remain free. I have used it- a bit shaky- but I really liked the new design and willingly will test it (and auto submit bugs) . It would be interesting to see the reaction of enterprise vendors like SAS, IBM,Dell, HP (and Lenovo)  and etc -as their support would be critical to both Unbreakable Oracle Linux and Unshakable LibreOffice.

See more here-http://www.documentfoundation.org/download/–

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