[Am-info] Apple and StarOffice

[Sujal Shah]

On Sat, 2002-07-27 at 21:40, Mitch Stone wrote:
[SNIP]
> If anyone can tell me what StarOffice would offer to Mac owners that they 
> can't already get from several other sources, then I'd like to know what 
> it is.
> 

The same thing you implied as the primary value proposition for
office:mac: compatibility with the other staroffice and openoffice users
out there, as well as one of the better office alternatives.

If you're looking for extra features or the reason why people will buy
this over any of the alternatives for OS X, the answer is pretty simple:
features/price.

I've used AppleWorks (came with my iBook), ThinkFree, Mariner Write 3.0,
and a couple of others (is there one called Nisus?  I think I tried
that).  All of those are inferior to Word in what I'd consider business
user features.  OpenOffice is the closest to Word as far as features are
concerned.  And, of all of the options I've tried, has the best Word
compatibility.  The only issue I have is with fonts/character sets
getting confused between Windows/Word and my Linux/OO box.

Sujal

> Mitch
> 
> On Saturday, July 27, 2002, at 01:58 PM, Paul Rickard wrote:
> 
> >
> >     Anyone remember the discussion here a few days ago about replacing
> > office:mac when the Microsoft-Apple agreement expires in a couple weeks?
> > I said Apple might take portions of StarOffice and incorporate them into
> > AppleWorks 7 or start backing SO for the Mac. Well, here's the story.
> >
> > http://news.com.com/2100-1001-946714.html / Sun to push StarOffice for
> > Apple's OS X
> >
> > "Apple Computer and Sun Microsystems are cooperating on a version of
> > Sun's StarOffice productivity software for Mac OS X, the companies said.
> > Sun has been looking for hardware allies in its long-running quest to
> > popularize StarOffice, which competes against Microsoft Office. To date,
> > no major PC makers have pledged to heavily promote StarOffice. .."
> >
> > "The partnership is expected to produce a Java-based version of
> > OpenOffice by the end of the year, followed by a commercial StarOffice
> > release sometime in 2003. "
> >
> > and my favorite part:
> >
> > "Sun executives, however, say Apple knows what it's doing. "Historically,
> > Apple was a little bit worried about working with us because of their
> > relationship with Microsoft," Siress said. Now, "Microsoft is mad, and
> > Apple's coming at them hardcore.
> >
> >    Looks like Sun is planning to give Apple source code to work on the UI
> > and let the company bundle it for free with their professional hardware.
> > Looks like I nailed this one.
> 
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------ Sujal Shah ---- sujal@sujal.net

	   http://www.sujal.net/