By Daniel Carrera Last modified: May 13, 2004

OpenOffice.org is not an Office Clone

Greetings,

As an active member of the OpenOffice.org team, I often hear the misconception that OpenOffice.org is some sort of clone of MS Office. This view seems to be particularly popular among Microsoft employees. For exmample, in Chris Pratley's Blog, this Microsoft manager makes the assertion:

On a side note, some people asked about Open Office or Star Office. As a designer I find these applications rather uninteresting. Unlike the MacOS, or even WordPerfect, there is next to no originality there. Their stated goal is to clone Office97, and they are so focused on that that there simply isn't anything to learn from or appreciate.

As someone very involved in the project, I view these statements with a mixture of amusement and frustration. I can't imagine why Chris has this idea that our "stated goal" is to clone Office 97. I certainly didn't state that, nor did any of the main contributors. OpenOffice.org is a different product and we have no intention of emulating a product that is well known for being inconsistent and unreliable.

I guess that I understand the origin of the misconception. After all, part of what makes OpenOffice.org valuable is that we have implemented standard features in ways that actually work. Some obvious examples include:

However, it would be incorrect to assume that our only advantage is a superior implementatin of standard features. The fact is, OpenOffice.org is a different application with a different idea of what an document is, and what an office suite should be. It is in this paradign difference that real benefit of OpenOffice.org lies.

For starters, OpenOffice.org has a different view of a document. One that makes heavy use of styles. First, we extend the concept of styles to include page styles, character, paragraph and frame styles. We also provide a Stylist to make styles easy and accessible. OpenOffice.org also makes heavy use of fields. In addition to the flexibility they provide, fields also make the application more reliable. For example, they are the reason why numbered lists work more reliably in Writer than in Word.

For longer documents, OpenOffice.org provides master documents. Yes, technically Word has them too, but ours actually work. We also have a Navigator, which allows the author to easily browse through very long documents. Also, the Autocomplete feature can be a real life saver. OpenOffice.org will suggest words as you type based on the contents of the current document. That is, it learns what words you are likely to need in the document, and offers those.

During a recent study carried by eWeek, testers found OpenOffice.org to be more integrated than MS Office. They particularly appreciated the ability create any kind of document for any OpenOffice.org component. For example, you can create a new spreadsheet from Writer. Also, the Window menu lists all open OpenOffice.org documents. Unlike MS Office components which can only list documents for that component.

Other features mentioned include the ability for PDF and Flash export without having to resort to expensive third-party add-ons. They also appreciated Writer's Autocompletion, which I mentioned above.

At OpenOffice.org we also have a strong history of support for standards. We use XML for both configuration as well the basis for our file format. This is an area where Microsoft still has much catching up to do. Furthermore, our format is completley open and unencumbered by patents. It is no suprise then that the OASIS Foundation has chosen our format as the basis for a standard format for office productivity software. Members of the OASIS committee include several major IT companies such as Sun Microsystems and Corel Inc, plus a number of individuals and non-commercial organizations (such as the KDE League).

We, at OpenOffice.org also have a different idea of what components belong in an office application. In particular, OpenOffice.org comes with a vector graphics drawing application (OOo Draw). The inclusion of this component makes OpenOffice.org far superior to anything you could do in the narrow framework of MS Office.

For starters, you are not limited to just including images and charts in your text documents. Draw allows you to create your own images, or to add new content and modifications to previous images. Combine Draw with Writer's advanced options for positioning images, and you have the functionality of a Desktop Publishing application. OpenOffice.org can compete directly with Framemaker while still providing all the tools you would expect in an office producitivity package.

In a similar manner, the combination of Impress and Draw make for a powerful presentations package. You can make diagrams, do complex image editing, and then paste the results in your presentation. Imagine a full presentations package with all the drawing tools of a vector graphics program. Next to this, PowerPoint is a very dull and uninteresting application.

Draw is an integral and invaluable component of OpenOffice.org. Its addition to the package creates something much greater than the sum of its parts.

OpenOffice.org does not have an email client. I don't see a problem with that, since this is not an application for developing documents, but a tool for communicating with other people. It makes sense to combine an email client with an addressbook, calendar, PIM and instant messaging. These are tools for communication and organization. This arena is sepparate from document creation (which is what OpenOffice.org does).

Of course, there are ways in which these two applications could benefit from each other. For example, you might want to use the OpenOffice.org spell checker (with your customized dictionary) on an email you are. But this kind of feature is better served by making OpenOffice.org interoperate with your favourite email client. Your choice of email client or calendar should not be limited by your choice of document creation tool. We, at OpenOffice.org, seek to achieve that kind of interoperability.

The situation with databases is similar. It makes more sense for OpenOffice.org to interact with any of the excellent relational databases that exist in the market. For those who don't have strong database needs, we provide the non-relational dBase. For those who do have particular needs, OpenOffice.org allows the user to choose the database that best fits the job.

The concept of choice is very fundamental to the OpenOffice.org culture. You should be able to use your office program the way you want:

Finally, OpenOffice.org is arbitrarily extensible. The source code is available under an Free Software license (LGPL). You can extend the application using StarBasic, C++, Java, Python and Javascript. And more languages are being added all the time. The combination of an Free/Open license, and multiple languages, creates bonanza opportunities for ISVs hoping to create a product around OpenOffice.org.

Cheers,
Daniel Carrera
OpenOffice.org volunteer.