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Introduction
OpenOffice.org is both a product and an open-source project. If you are
new to OOo, its open source development, and the community that
produces and supports it, you should read this appendix.
A short history of OpenOffice.org
The OpenOffice.org project began when Sun Microsystems released
the source code (“blueprints”) for its StarOffice® software to the open
source community on October 13, 2000. This allowed Sun to use the
technical expertise and rapid development times of an open-source
project in the development of its own software products. All recent
versions of Sun’s StarOffice use source code developed by the
OpenOffice.org community. However, the products do not provide
exactly the same features due to the copyrights of third parties that
are not compatible with open-source licensing.
OpenOffice.org 1.0, the product, was released on April 30, 2002.
Read more about OpenOffice.org’s history and organization at:
http://about.openoffice.org/
Information about StarOffice can be found at:
http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/
The OpenOffice.org community
OpenOffice.org's Mission Statement is:
“To create, as a community, the leading international office suite
that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all
functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an
XML-based file format.”
The OpenOffice.org project is primarily sponsored by Sun
Microsystems, which is the primary contributor of code to the Project.
Our other major corporate contributors include Novell, RedHat,
RedFlag CH2000, IBM, and Google. Additonally over 450,000 people
from nearly every curve of the globe have joined this Project with the
idea of creating the best possible office suite that all can use. This is
the essence of an “open source” community!
With its free software licence and active Native Language
Confederation, OpenOffice.org is a key player in the drive to eradicate
digital exclusion and preserve minority languages threatened by being
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OpenOffice.org: Background Information
44
on the wrong side of the digital divide. For tens of thousands of
community members, this makes the OpenOffice.org community their
volunteering opportunity of choice.
The OpenOffice.org community invites contributors. Whatever you do
best, you can do it for OpenOffice.org. As well as software developers,
the Community welcomes translators, artists, technical writers and
editors, testers, people offering user support, sales and marketing
people, lobbyists, donors... the list is long. The Community operates
internationally in all time zones, linked by the internet.
How is OpenOffice.org licensed?
OpenOffice.org is distributed under the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
approved Lesser General Public License (LGPL).
The LGPL can be viewed on the OOo website at:
http://www.openoffice.org/licenses/lgpl_license.html
For more general information on OOo’s licensing, please refer to:
http://www.openoffice.org/license.html
What is “open source”?
The ideals of open-source software can be explained by the four
essential rights, which are embodied within the Free Software
Foundation’s
General Public License
(GPL):
•
The right to use the software for any purpose.
•
Freedom to redistribute the software for free or for a fee.
•
Access to the complete source code of the program (that is, the
“blueprints”).
•
The right to modify any part of the source, or use portions of it in
other programs.
Another view of this philosophy comes from the
Open Source
Definiton
:
“The basic idea behind open source is very simple: When
programmers can read, redistribute, and modify the source code for
a piece of software, the software evolves. People improve it, people
adapt it, people fix bugs. And this can happen at a speed that, if one
is used to the slow pace of conventional software development,
seems astonishing.”
What is “open source”?
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38
For more information on Free and Open Source software, visit these
websites:
Open Source Initiative
(OSI): http://www.opensource.org
Free Software Foundation
(FSF): http://www.gnu.org
What is OpenDocument?
Starting with Version 2.0, OpenOffice.org by default saves documents
in Open Document Format (ODF). OpenOffice.org 3 has adopted
version 1.2 of the OpenDocument standard.
OpenDocument is an XML-based file format for office documents (text
documents, spreadsheets, drawings, presentations and more),
developed at OASIS, an independent, international standards group.
Unlike other file formats, ODF is an open standard. It is publicly
available, royalty-free, and without legal or other restrictions;
therefore ODF files are not tied to a specific office suite and anybody
can build a program that interprets these files. For this reason ODF is
quickly becoming the preferred file format for government agencies,
schools and other companies who prefer not to be too dependent on a
particular software supplier.
File formats OOo can open
OpenOffice.org can open a wide variety of file formats in addition to
the OpenDocument formats.
Opening text documents
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odt, .ott, .oth, and .odm),
Writer 3 can open the formats used by OOo 1.x (.sxw, .stw, and .sxg)
and the following text document formats:
Microsoft Word 6.0/95/97/2000/XP) (.doc and .dot)
Microsoft Word 2003 XML (.xml)
Microsoft Word 2007 XML (.docx, .docm, .dotx, .dotm)
Microsoft WinWord 5 (.doc)
WordPerfect Document (.wpd)
WPS 2000/Office 1.0 (.wps)
.rtf, .txt, and .csv
StarWriter formats (.sdw, .sgl, .vor)
DocBook (.xml)
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OpenOffice.org: Background Information
VB.NET PDF - Annotate PDF with WPF PDF Viewer for VB.NET Line color. Select the line color when drawing annotations on PDF document. 15. Description. 17. Text box. Click to add a text box to specific location on PDF page
how to add text to pdf document; how to add text fields to a pdf
40
Unified Office Format text (.uot, .uof)
Ichitaro 8/9/10/11 (.jtd and .jtt)
Hangul WP 97 (.hwp)
T602 Document (.602, .txt)
AportisDoc (Palm) (.pdb)
Pocket Word (.psw)
When opening .htm or .html files (used for web pages), OOo
customizes Writer for working with these files.
Opening spreadsheets
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.ods and .ots), Calc 3 can open
the formats used by OOo 1.x (.sxc and .stc) and the following
spreadsheet formats:
Microsoft Excel 97/2000/XP (.xls, .xlw, and .xlt)
Microsoft Excel 4.x–5.0/95 (.xls, .xlw, and .xlt)
Microsoft Excel 2003 XML (.xml)
Microsoft Excel 2007 XML (.xlsx, .xlsm, .xlts, .xltm)
Microsoft Excel 2007 binary (.xlsb)
Lotus 1-2-3 (.wk1, .wks, and .123)
Data Interchange Format (.dif)
Rich Text Format (.rtf)
Text CSV (.csv and .txt)
StarCalc formats (.sdc and .vor)
dBASE (.dbf)
SYLK (.slk)
Unified Office Format spreadsheet (.uos, .uof)
.htm and .html files, including Web page queries
Pocket Excel (pxl)
Quattro Pro 6.0 (.wb2)
Opening presentations
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odp, .odg, and .otp), Impress 3
can open the formats used by OOo 1.x (.sxi and .sti) and the following
presentation formats:
Microsoft PowerPoint 97/2000/XP (.ppt, .pps, and .pot)
Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 (.pptx, .pptm, .potx, .potm)
StarDraw and StarImpress (.sda, .sdd, .sdp, and .vor)
Unified Office Format presentation (.uop, .uof)
CGM – Computer Graphics Metafile (.cgm)
Portable Document Format (.pdf)
File formats OOo can open
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60
Opening graphic files
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odg and .otg), Draw 3 can open
the formats used by OOo 1.x (.sxd and .std) and the following graphic
formats:
BMP
JPEG, JPG
PCX
PSD
SGV
WMF
DXF
MET
PGM
RAS
SVM
XBM
EMF
PBM
PLT
SDA
TGA
XPM
EPS
PCD
PNG
SDD
TIF, TIFF
GIF
PCT
PPM
SGF
VOR
Opening formula files
In addition to OpenDocument Formula (.odf) files, Math 3 can open the
format used by OOo 1.x (.sxm), StarMath, (.smf), and MathML (.mml)
files.
When opening a Word document that contains an embedded equation
editor object, if the option for it is checked in Tools > Options >
Load/Save > Microsoft Office, the object will be automatically
converted to an OpenOffice.org Math object.
File formats OOo can save to
Saving in an OpenDocument format guarantees the correct rendering
of the file when it is transferred to another person or when the file is
re-opened with a later version of OpenOffice.org. It is strongly
recommended that you use ODF as default file format. However, you
can save files in other formats, if you wish.
Tip
When sharing a document that you do not expect or want the
recipient to modify, the safest option is to convert the document
to PDF. OOo provides a very straightforward way to convert
documents to PDF.
Saving text documents
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odt and .ott), Writer 3 can save
in these formats:
OpenOffice.org 1.x Text Document (.sxw)
OpenOffice.org 1.x Text Document Template (.stw)
Microsoft Word 6.0, 95, and 97/2000/XP (.doc)
Microsoft Word 2003 XML (.xml)
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38
Rich Text Format (.rtf)
StarWriter 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 (.sdw)
StarWriter 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 Template (.vor)
Text (.txt)
Text Encoded (.txt)
Unified Office Format text (.uot, .uof)
HTML Document (OpenOffice.org Writer) (.html and .htm)
DocBook (.xml)
AportisDoc (Palm) (.pdb)
Pocket Word (.psw)
Note
The .rtf format is a common format for transferring text files
between applications, but you are likely to experience loss of
formatting and images. For this reason, other formats should be
used.
Saving spreadsheet files
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.ods and .ots), Calc 3 can save
in these formats:
OpenOffice.org 1.x Spreadsheet (.sxc)
OpenOffice.org 1.x Spreadsheet Template (.stc)
Microsoft Excel 97/2000/XP (.xls and .xlw)
Microsoft Excel 97/2000/XP Template (.xlt)
Microsoft Excel 5.0 and 95 (.xls and .xlw)
Microsoft Excel 2003 XML (.xml)
Data Interchange Format (.dif)
dBase (.dbf)
SYLK (.slk)
Text CSV (.csv and .txt)
StarCalc 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 formats (.sdc and .vor)
Unified Office Format spreadsheet (.uos)
HTML Document (OpenOffice.org Calc) (.html and .htm)
Pocket Excel (.pxl)
Note
The Java Runtime Environment is required to use the mobile
device filters for AportisDoc (Palm), Pocket Word, and Pocket
Excel.
File formats OOo can save to
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Saving presentations
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odp, .otp, and .odg), Impress 3
can save in these formats:
OpenOffice.org 1.x Presentation (.sxi)
OpenOffice.org 1.x Presentation Template (.sti)
Microsoft PowerPoint 97/2000/XP (.ppt and .pps)
Microsoft PowerPoint 97/2000/XP Template (.pot)
StarDraw, StarImpress (.sda, .sdd, and .vor)
Unified Office Format presentation (.uop)
Impress can also export to MacroMedia Flash (.swf) and any of the
graphics formats listed for Draw.
Saving drawings
Draw 3 can only save in the OpenDocument Drawing formats (.odg and
.otg), the OpenOffice.org 1.x formats (.sxd and .std) and StarDraw
format (.sda, .sdd, and .vor).
However, Draw can also export to BMP, EMF, EPS, GIF, JPEG, MET,
PBM, PCT, PGM, PNG, PPM, RAS, SVG, SVM, TIFF, WMF, and XPM.
Writer/Web can save in these formats
HTML document (.html and .htm), as HTML 4.0 Transitional
OpenOffice.org 1.0 HTML Template (.stw)
OpenOffice.org 2.x HTML Template (.oth)
StarWriter/Web 4.0 and 5.0 (.vor)
Text (OpenOffice.org Writer/Web) (.txt)
Text Encoded (OpenOffice.org Writer/Web) (.txt)
Frequently asked questions
Is this software a “demo”
version?
No, this is a fully functioning software suite.
May I distribute OOo to
anyone?
Yes.
How many computers may I
install it on?
As many as you like.
May I sell it?
Yes.
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OpenOffice.org: Background Information
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