Apache OpenOffice

[Midas]

They have MONTHS to fix and continue to distribute an insecure program without any notice on the home page?

• Agreed, a notice would be real easy to put up and the bare minimum level of care displayed about the issue...

[SYSTEM]

Yesterday Apache promised that OpenOffice 4.1.2 is "coming soon": https://blogs.apache.org/OOo/entry/comi ... enoffice_4

I am curious to see when it lands as the planning page lists "late 2015" as the expected release date: https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/dis ... /AOO+4.1.2

They released it on October 28 in the end.

[smaragdus]

I do not know whether this is the right thread, but anyway:

OpenOffice 4.1.3 is out!!!

OpenOffice is not dead and we won't be left to the mercy of LibreOffice.

OpenOffice 4.1.3 downloads

The Portable Freeware has already announced the great news.

If I ever need an office package I will always come back to OpenOffice because it gives me freedom, in contrast with restrictive LibreOffice.

If only they could remove stupid Apache from the name.

[SYSTEM]

I do not know whether this is the right thread, but anyway:

OpenOffice 4.1.3 is out!!!

OpenOffice is not dead and we won't be left to the mercy of LibreOffice.

OpenOffice 4.1.3 downloads

The Portable Freeware has already announced the great news.

If I ever need an office package I will always come back to OpenOffice because it gives me freedom, in contrast with restrictive LibreOffice.

If only they could remove stupid Apache from the name.

OpenOffice 4.1.3 is not out. Not until Apache announces the release.

Apache is tracking the release process here: https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/dis ... /AOO+4.1.3

Also... in which way do you find LibreOffice restrictive?

[smaragdus]

@SYSTEM

Then what are these packages at SourceForge?

As far as I remember (in previous versions) OpenOffice allowed me to choose which components to be installed while LibreOffice didn't. Am I right? If I am not- please excuse me and I will withdraw my comment.

[SYSTEM]

@SYSTEM

Then what are these packages at SourceForge?

The packages are the upcoming release.

My point is that OpenOffice 4.1.3 is released when Apache says so - not immediately when the binaries have been uploaded. I linked above the wiki page where Apache tracks the release process: as you can see, OpenOffice 4.1.3 builds have been uploaded (task "Upload builds to SF mirrors" is completed), but Apache hasn't made any of the release announcements yet.

As far as I remember (in previous versions) OpenOffice allowed me to choose which components to be installed while LibreOffice didn't. Am I right? If I am not- please excuse me and I will withdraw my comment.

Well, yes, it's correct that LibreOffice no longer allows you to install only individual components.

However, in some areas LibreOffice is ahead of OpenOffice in configurability. For example, LibreOffice 5.2 added ability to customize context menus: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Rel ... figuration

[webfork]

Am I right? If I am not- please excuse me and I will withdraw my comment.

As SYSTEM points out you are correct, but my understanding is that there's so much overlap in terms of components that not installing a particular program set or package didn't really affect install size, making it a mostly cosmetic change.

That said, LibreOffice just keeps getting better and better and I find it far more customizable than OpenOffice or Microsoft Office.

[smaragdus]

It is well-known that OpenOffice lacks manpower and I read some disturbing articles about its possible shut down (here is one- OpenOffice, after years of neglect, could shut down). I am not among those who think that one free and open-source office package is enough, I always prefer to have a choice and I think that a competition is always better. About installing components- I do not care about saved space but I want to be able to choose what I need and what I don't- OpenOffice gives me this freedom of choice while LibreOffice, despite its name, doesn't. There is another thing about LibreOffice which irritates me- their Fresh/Stale releases- Alpha/Beta/Stable have been defined long time ago and there is no need The Document Foundation to reinvent/rename them. What is stale and what is fresh? Fresh is equal to Beta and Still- to Stable? For me this is ludicrous. Once I promised myself that I will never touch LibreOffice until it comes back to reasonable version scheme, no fresh/still releases for me. I do not claim that OpenOffice is better than LibreOffice (in fact I have not used any of these packages for quite some time), I am aware that the development of OpenOffice is extremely slow and I suppose it is the worse package but it gives me reasons to choose it. I hope that OpenOffice will not be shut down and that it will not be merged with LibreOffice.

[billon]

For this moment they deleted version 4.1.3 from SF

[smaragdus]

@billon

For this moment hey deleted version 4.1.3 from SF

You are right and this is strange- however version 4.1.3 can be downloaded from Apache server, direct download link for English (US) package.

[JohnTHaller]

I'd recommend against downloading before it's officially announced. It's quite normal for a project to let something mirror for a while before release. During the staging time, sometimes a showstopper bug can be found or an error in the build process that causes a release to be pulled.

[smaragdus]

OpenOffice version 4.1.3 re-appeared at SourceForge and the files are exactly the same.

[smaragdus]

OpenOffice version 4.1.3 can now be downloaded from official download page.

[webfork]

There is another thing about LibreOffice which irritates me- their Fresh/Stale releases

I actually run both on my computer and run them for different tasks: Fresh for opening files or conversions since it has the latest-and-greatest filters. Meanwhile I keep the Still version around for something that's more stable, as the Fresh version definitely crashes more often.

[webfork]

A few quick notes on the OpenOffice entry update:

• There was some question as to whether or not the project was going to shut down (discussed earlier in this thread and in entry comments), so I was waiting on that point. In addition to various project announcements discussed in another thread, v4.1.8 just came out and WinPenPack hasn't updated, so I've pushed it to the PA version.

• We are pointing to the v4.1.7 version because that's what's currently up on PA. Also, there's not much in the changelog indicating a whole heap of differences between 7 and 8, so most users won't see much difference.

• As noted elsewhere and at some length, OpenOffice has not been very responsive about security issues, so if that's a concern you should probably use LibreOffice, which has a more active development cycle to hopefully continue addressing security concerns, as well as more features and better file compatibility.