Dear Friends, You may have heard by now. NeoOffice 1.1 is out. I trust I do not have to go into details here. On behalf of Patrick, Ed, Dan and all the rest of the community at trinity.neoffice.org I would like to thank everyone at OpenOffice and especially in the Mac porting project (past and present) for making this possible. It could not have been done without you.
Please do not hesitate to send your friends to try it out :). We hope you will all appreciate what we did with OOo 1.1.4. If you are curious to see how NeoOffice will go on from here, please consult http://trinity.neooffice.org/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=1481 Best wishes, Oscar van Vliet P.S. And now, without further ado, the official press release: Introducing NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 Sunnyvale, California, USA - Planamesa Software and the NeoOffice.org community are proud to introduce NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1, a Mac OS X-native version of the OpenOffice.org office suite that includes Microsoft Office-compatible word processing, spreadsheet, presentation and drawing applications. "This release is the culmination of many thousands of volunteer hours," said NeoOffice(r)/J creator and primary developer Patrick Luby. "As a result of this tremendous effort, we have a very stable, full-featured office suite for Mac OS X that supports dozens of languages." NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 is available today as a free download from the Planamesa Software website at http://www.planamesa.com/neojava/. A Feature-Complete, World-Class Office Solution NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 provides compatibility with Microsoft Office and Corel WordPerfect and offers a robust feature set common to all major office suites, including the ability to track changes as a document is forwarded from one user to another. NeoOffice(r)/J can export to many formats such as PDF, HTML, Flash, Word, Excel and PowerPoint. Its native file format is open and XML-based, freeing users' documents from vendor lock-in, a frequent complaint against proprietary office suites. NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 also offers localized user interfaces in forty languages and supports text entry in Roman and non-Roman scripts, including South Asian, East Asian, right-to-left and complex text layout scripts. This has allowed individuals and organizations across the globe—from schools to non-profits to corporations—to adopt NeoOffice(r)/J as their primary office suite. "We've leveraged OpenOffice.org's amazing internationalization efforts, which makes NeoOffice(r)/J a great solution for Mac OS X users all around the world," said core engineer and NeoOffice.org founder Ed Peterlin. A Simple Idea "When I started the NeoOffice(r)/J project, there really was no viable alternative to Microsoft's Mac version of Office," noted Luby. "There were other Mac word processors, but few that included spreadsheet and presentation support. The cross-platform OpenOffice.org suite incorporated all three and featured strong compatibility with Microsoft Office documents. So creating a native Mac OS X version of OpenOffice.org seemed like a good idea." Seamless Integration of OpenOffice.org with Mac OS X Based on the latest stable OpenOffice.org codebase, NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 offers extensive integration with Mac OS X. Key Macintosh features include a standard Mac OS X installer, a native Aqua menu bar, use of the Mac OS X printing system, full clipboard support, drag-and-drop, Mac "command" key shortcuts, mouse scrolling, integration with major Mac email clients and native support for Mac fonts. NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 is compatible with Mac OS X 10.2 or later. "NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 is a standalone, double-clickable Mac application and does not require additional X11 software," said Peterlin. "Our goal is to make NeoOffice(r)/J 100% indistinguishable from any other Macintosh application in look-and-feel. Version 1.1 is a major step in that direction." Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" Spotlight Support NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 also includes NeoLight, a plugin for Spotlight, the new search feature in Apple's Mac OS X 10.4. "With this plugin, your NeoOffice(r)/J files will be indexed and can be searched instantly in a familiar, Mac-like fashion," added Peterlin. "It's just another way we're working to integrate with the full Mac OS X experience." Open Source Development NeoOffice(r)/J uses the open source development model to leverage the resources of a global community of volunteer programmers, users and testers. "My goal was to create a self-supporting, volunteer-based project to build an office suite for Mac OS X," said Luby. "I felt that if people really wanted an application like NeoOffice(r)/J, they would help by reporting bugs, answering support questions, and maybe even making donations." "As the user base has grown and become more involved, NeoOffice(r)/J has benefited and improved accordingly," Luby added. "It is the combined contributions of our users that have made NeoOffice(r)/J what it is today, and this release is only the beginning." Availability Released as free, open source software under the GNU General Public License, NeoOffice(r)/J 1.1 is available now at http://www.planamesa.com/neojava/. Users are encouraged to download and freely distribute the software. Development of the application is ongoing by volunteer programmers, beta-testers, artists and writers. Interested parties are invited to visit http://trinity.neooffice.org/ for more information about helping with the project. More Information Homepage: http://www.planamesa.com/neojava/ Community: http://trinity.neooffice.org/ Download: http://www.planamesa.com/neojava/download.php Press Kit: http://neowiki.sixthcrusade.com/index.php/NeoOffice/J_Press_Kit Screenshots: http://neowiki.sixthcrusade.com/index.php/NeoOffice/J_Screenshots About Planamesa Software Planamesa Software is a software development consulting company owned and operated by Patrick Luby. Luby has spent nearly a decade working as a software developer in a variety of commercial and open source projects including OpenOffice.org and Apache Tomcat using the C, C++ and Java programming languages on a variety of operating systems such as Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris and Windows. About NeoOffice.org NeoOffice.org is home for the NeoOffice(r)/J open-source community and features news, downloads, FAQs, discussion forums, a bug reporting system and more for NeoOffice(r)/J developers and end users. NeoOffice(r)/J's "Aquafication" and other development is ongoing, and interested parties are invited to help with all aspects of the project. About OpenOffice.org To learn more about OpenOffice.org, visit http://www.openoffice.org/. NeoOffice(r) is a registered trademark of Edward H. Peterlin. Other product and company names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
