In the last newsletter, I wrote about a great free program for
Windows, Linux and Solaris. StarOffice by Sun Microsystems offers an excellent
word processor, spreadsheet, personal calendar, and more. It is roughly equivalent
to Microsoft’s Office, a software suite that contains Word, Excel, PowerPoint
and Outlook. There is one major difference, however: StarOffice is free while
Microsoft Office costs more than $400. I also described the new StarOffice beta
version 6.0 and told how to obtain it. You can read the full article at www.ancestry.com/library/view/columns/eastman/5041.asp.
Apparently a lot of people downloaded this beta version and tried
it. Quite a few people wrote to me with concerns about the following statement
in StarOffice’s README file:
This beta version will expire on 31 March 2002. After expiration
you will no longer be able to start the program!
Some people interpreted that statement to mean that either no
version would be available after 31 March 2002 or that perhaps the program’s
creators would start charging for it. Not true!
Such statements are quite common in beta software. In this case,
it simply means that a release version of the program or perhaps a later beta
version will be available before 31 March 2002. That future version is to replace
the beta version that is available today.
Most beta software does have built-in expiration dates, and StarOffice
is no exception. Previous beta versions of StarOffice also had expiration dates.
Production versions of the software have always appeared before the beta expiration
dates. Production versions of StarOffice have always been free and do not have
expiration dates. Anyone using a beta version has always been able to later
update to the production version at no charge, and users of Beta 6.0 will be
able to do the same.
In fact, Sun Microsystems recently released the source code to
StarOffice, and a new group is now taking over development of the program although
they are sponsored by Sun Microsystems. StarOffice is being renamed to OpenOffice,
and the program will remain free to everyone. You can expect a free updated
version will be released before March 31, 2002. OpenOffice will still be available
for Windows, Linux and Solaris. The new group is also porting OpenOffice to
Macintosh OS X. A new Web site is now online with full details at: www.openoffice.org.
Dick Eastman Online
