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The Ubuntu team has decided that instead of OpenOffice.org 3.0, released last week, the default version of the office suite in the Ubuntu 8.10 release will be OpenOffice.org 2.4.1. It’s not a decision that many Ubuntu fans are happy with and Launchpad is filled with discussion on the issue, with many users arguing that not including OpenOffice.org 3.0 undermines Ubuntu 8.10.
The Ubuntu developers, however, argue that delays in the OpenOffice.org 3.0 release and insufficient time forced them to exclude it.
Ubuntu’s Colin Watson is the man taking much of the flak for the decision. Tectonic asked him why this decision had been taken.
Will OpenOffice.org 3.0 not be included by default in Ubuntu Intrepid?
That’s correct.
What will be the default OpenOffice.org application in Intrepid?
OpenOffice.org 2.4.1.
Could you explain briefly why the decision was taken to exclude OpenOffice.org 3.0 from the default Intrepid release?
We’d originally been hoping to include OpenOffice.org 3.0 in Ubuntu 8.10. Our original plan had been to provide packages that could be installed alongside 2.4.1 (rather than replacing it) once 3.0 reached the late beta or release candidate stage. However, a couple of factors made this much harder than we originally expected.
Firstly, the 3.0 release schedule has slipped quite a bit. At the beginning of May, the release candidate was due on 25 July with the gold release on 2 September. By the end of July, release candidate was due on 8 August and gold on 16 September. Throughout August the release candidate was gradually pushed back until it eventually landed on 5 September, a week after our feature freeze for 8.10. There were then a series of release candidates until the gold release finally came out on 13 October. If the original release schedule had held then including 3.0 wouldn’t have been a problem, but on a six-month release schedule with many other applications involved we have to place an absolute premium on predictability.
Secondly, parallel packages turned out to be infeasible due to a number of technical problems. (In any case, we had only ever intended this as a stopgap measure so that we could test out 3.0 in Intrepid without having to be completely committed to it.)
The bottom line is that we wanted to avoid shipping anything other than a gold release of OpenOffice.org, and by the time we had a reasonable assurance that we would be able to include a gold release of 3.0 in Ubuntu 8.10 and shake out any new bugs, we were already well past beta and beginning to prepare for our release candidate, so it was too late.
We’ve learned that sometimes it is better to wait and deliver a well-tested product rather than trying to cram everything in at the last minute. With a six-month release cycle, it is never all that long for users to wait until the next one along; we fully expect 3.0 to be part of Ubuntu 9.04. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/TimeBasedReleases answers a number of common questions about this practice.
Finally, one of the headline features of OpenOffice.org 3.0 that many people have asked about is support for Microsoft Office 2007 documents. Thanks to our use of the Go-oo patch set, we already support this important feature with 2.4.1.
Related stories:
- Ubuntu Intrepid release candidate out
- Install OpenOffice.org 3.0 on Ubuntu
- OpenOffice.org 3.0 officially out, site swamped by fans
- Ubuntu 8.10 beta goes live
- What to expect from Ubuntu 8.10
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@KimTjik:
Well I guess I have no means to find out, as the official version does not work for me at all, but I think, that the particular bug I’ve mentioned is ubuntu specific. Well what I know for certain is, that it does not exist in the windows version of OOo, so that and the experience that the ubuntu Oo packages never really work that well at first, makes me think it might be ubuntu…
[...] unlike Ubuntu, which decided to leave OpenOffice.org 3.0 out of its 8.10 release at the end of last month, Fedora 10 includes the latest version of the office suite. The decision [...]
[...] – Ubuntu explains OpenOffice.org 3.0 decision (24 867 [...]
Hi,
Just my thoughts on this…
I installed Ubuntu 8.10 a few days ago, and I’m very happy with it. I’ve already reduced my Vista install down to practically nothing and don’t miss it at all.
After a few days of testing out various program variations [starred are the versions I'm using now due to the hardware I have] (Rhythmbox* vs Banshee; Evolution* vs Thunderbird; OO.o 2.4.1* vs 3.0.0; Totem* vs (Mplayer w32codecs)*; HPlip 2.8.7 Ubuntu-native vs HPlip 2.8.10 from HP*), I think I’m finished testing!
I’m using OO.o 2.4.1 because it integrates with Evolution’s Address Book for address mail merges. OO.o 3.0.0 worked fine when I installed it – all that didn’t work was the Evolution integration (the wizard didn’t move past the initial screen when the Next button was pressed no matter which one of the radio buttons were selected). I’m trying to get a friend of mine to switch to Ubuntu and this is one of his prime needs, along with complete Palm syncing.
–
Steve
I finally managed to get OOo 3.0 working too… I really don’t know what it had been that had caused it to crash on every startup but after deleting the configuration directory and playing a bit with the installation settings – works… Of course in contrast to ubuntu packages – no gnome integration, but on the other hand no ubuntuish crashes, freezes and weird bugs either… No evolution integration is rather small price to pay for that, especially if one does not use evolution in the first place.
[...] because 3.0 release schedule has slipped quite a bit. Just like The Ubuntu Team has said in this site . Well, that’s not a big problem! I’m going to give you an easy method to install [...]
Yes, glorinand, I’d probably be using something other than Evolution as my mail client. Evolution nicely, but slowly (UI choice in the wizard, not coding flaw) imported all of my TB mail perfectly. But, I did find out that Evolution has “outgoing filters” so nothing has to stay in the Sent folder. I like to keep entire threads of messages in their own subject folder.
There are *very* few mail clients that do this, on any platform. I’ve tested as many clients as I could find, on MacOS, Windows and Linux, in my search for the “perfect” email client. Toying with computers is my hobby.
KMail on KDE/Linux, PocoMail (email) and Barca(Pro) (like Evolution) for XP (not Vista) are the only other email clients I know of that have this feature. Thunderbird can’t ever have it, because of the way it’s architecture is designed.
Hope you’re happy with whatever you’re using
[...] for users to wait until the next one along; we fully expect 3.0 to be part of Ubuntu 9.04." http://www.tectonic.co.za/?p=3447 En gros Linux c’est stable si on touche rien. Enfin si, ceux qui savent ils peuvent l’installer, [...]
dear god
so i have to use WINDOWS if i wish to use open office 3 ??
i have tried to install office 3 but no luck
this is why we always will be behind ms windows !!!!!!!
ubuntu the easy linux os for newbies !!!!! ????
@glenn:
No. It is in fact perfectly possible to use OpenOffice 3.0 (and 3.1 now for that matter) in Ubuntu 8.10. I’ve used it for 3 months or so now and it works nicely.
Secondly – I beg to differ – we are not behind Windows.