Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 1:07 am Post subject: Article in MacUser UK
MacUser have the following on their site:
"Free Microsoft Office for Mac rival updated 9:47AM, Tuesday 27th March 2007
NeoOffice, the free Java-based alternative to Microsoft Office, has been updated to version 2.1. The suite includes a word processor, spreadsheet and presentation application, which now also support Office 2007 Word documents and Excel macros.
NeoOffice is developed by volunteers, and the project site warns that version 2.1 may contain 'some undiscovered bugs that may cause NeoOffice to crash'. Further, it advises against installing older versions at this time. 'Only install the versions of NeoOffice that are listed on this web site,' it warms. 'Please do not install an unlisted version even if you downloaded it from this web site in the past. Using such unlisted versions is very risky as unlisted versions have bugs that we have fixed in the listed versions.'
The new edition is based on the OpenOffice.org 2.1 codebase and requires Mac OS X 10.3 or later, 512MB of memory and 400MB of available disk space. It is available as two separate editions, for PowerPC and Intel processors. Each is around 1.5GB in size, and can be downloaded from here."
I have added a comment to this article that quotes the wiki (So... is NeoOffice written in Java?) with a link to the wiki itself as well. Oh, and alerted them to the fact that the downloads are 146Mb, not 1.5Gb!!
If there's anything else glaring that needs correcting, please tell me and I'll add it.
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 8:36 pm Post subject:
Cool, thanks Yeah Java is quickly becoming less and less in certain areas. We're more like an API mashup
Hmm...interestingly it may be close to 1.5 GB total if you include both PowerPC and Intel builds as well as all of the language packs, but is prob. still shy. This go around the total of the PowerPC release disk images is hitting around 700 MB.
Joined: Nov 21, 2005 Posts: 1285 Location: Witless Protection Program
Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 10:07 pm Post subject: Re: Article in MacUser UK
yoxi wrote:
MacUser have the following on their site:
"Free Microsoft Office for Mac rival updated 9:47AM, Tuesday 27th March 2007
NeoOffice is developed by volunteers, and the project site warns that version 2.1 may contain 'some undiscovered bugs that may cause NeoOffice to crash'.
Further, it advises against installing older versions at this time. 'Only install the versions of NeoOffice that are listed on this web site,' it warms. 'Please do not install an unlisted version even if you downloaded it from this web site in the past. Using such unlisted versions is very risky as unlisted versions have bugs that we have fixed in the listed versions.'
If there's anything else glaring that needs correcting, please tell me and I'll add it.
- padmavyuha
I tried to see the comments - you have to REGISTER before reading the comments?!? wtf
And out of all the information in the Press Releases - what point is
"may contain 'some undiscovered bugs that may cause NeoOffice to crash'" or
"'Please do not install an unlisted version even if you downloaded it from this web site in the past."
I only wish MS was so ... honest and truthful. I can't tell you number of hours I've lost due to "undiscovered bugs that may cause MS Office to crash"
If Neo doesn't really take off now it never will (I mean even more than in the last 4 months). It's more compatible with the beast than ever, but more impotantly it's faster than ever (although it never will be for some, JAVA debate to continue another day but modern Mac HW has finally caught up) and it's just downright "Mac pretty" now. Those last 2 are huge in peoples' minds. Nice work by the icons volunteers. Of course, Pat and ed, and all the regulars your outstanding efforts are continually appreciated...[/i]
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Sat Mar 31, 2007 11:55 am Post subject: Re: Article in MacUser UK
LemonAid wrote:
And out of all the information in the Press Releases - what point is
"may contain 'some undiscovered bugs that may cause NeoOffice to crash'" or
"'Please do not install an unlisted version even if you downloaded it from this web site in the past."
I only wish MS was so ... honest and truthful. I can't tell you number of hours I've lost due to "undiscovered bugs that may cause MS Office to crash"
Yes it's definitely the kind of text you normally don't see in press resleases or download notes (I believe we have it on that page as well) but I think it's important enough to plaster everywhere we can. Our software is not perfect and we don't have the resources or volunteers to perform incredible amounts of QA.
GPL does include an "as is" clause, but I think it's better to ensure people are very aware of this from the get to.
Most people aren't aware that when they're paying for software they're also paying to support the infrastructure to keep it well-tested and maintained (and documented, etc.). Many people don't understand the complexity of large software systems. In the case of Office, I'm amazed at the price of the software given the functionality and stability it has, personally.
We simply don't have the resources to reach that level of QA and we never will. For some people software stability is really really important, so I think it's important for them to realize we do not have a formalized QA process and really, our software (and its lots of patches) may probably not be for them.
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Sun Apr 01, 2007 10:51 am Post subject:
I still think Office 2008 looks slicker myself and I always liked the semi-opaque floating formatting palette floating over document windows over the toolbar explosion method Still not sure about the entourage integration...some people I know still used to use the old OS 9 Outlook instead.
Joined: Nov 27, 2005 Posts: 108 Location: Salford, UK
Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 4:01 am Post subject:
OPENSTEP wrote:
I still think Office 2008 looks slicker myself and I always liked the semi-opaque floating formatting palette floating over document windows over the toolbar explosion method Still not sure about the entourage integration...some people I know still used to use the old OS 9 Outlook instead.
ed
a great catch 22 there, openoffice certainly need to overhaul their toolbars, but frankly the last thing you want is them messing up the work the Neo team have done
Joined: May 25, 2003 Posts: 4752 Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 8:55 pm Post subject:
Baggypants wrote:
OPENSTEP wrote:
I still think Office 2008 looks slicker myself and I always liked the semi-opaque floating formatting palette floating over document windows over the toolbar explosion method Still not sure about the entourage integration...some people I know still used to use the old OS 9 Outlook instead.
ed
a great catch 22 there, openoffice certainly need to overhaul their toolbars, but frankly the last thing you want is them messing up the work the Neo team have done
Oh it'll get messed up anyway. That's the nature when you're extending something instead of just recompiling. Also another reason we don't upgrade frequently because you never know just what's going to break/slow down/screw up the kerning/etc. etc. etc.
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Yeah Java is quickly becoming less and less in certain areas. We're more like an API mashup 
