Thanks, Dave, very helpful. On 13 Mar 2012, at 17:17, Dave Fisher wrote:
> Hi Simon, > > These are all "facts" - however they do have a certain "negative spin". You > need to be "informed". :-) No better place to come. I'm sorry you found them spun; I felt they were concise answers to the questions I was being asked. > > On Mar 13, 2012, at 9:25 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: > >> Hi all, >> >> Probably because of all the progress being made towards a v3.4 release, I >> have been getting an increasing number of enquiries about the status of >> Apache OpenOffice from a variety of sources. I'm attempting, in good faith, >> to maintain an objective status summary the Apache OpenOffice incubator >> project to report to these enquiries. >> >> I've had a commentator assert that the statements below are uninformed and >> made-up. I believe based on my observations all of the following statements >> to be true about the Apache project; can you let me know if they are not, >> please, so I can present a factual status of the project when asked? > > Try rewriting the statements Absolutely, although I do want to avoid any apologetics, positive or negative, as I've found people are quick to condemn expression of opinions in this area, especially by me! > >> The Apache OpenOffice project will be releasing a new binary under the new >> name "Apache OpenOffice" at some point soon, which will probably be numbered >> v3.4. > > The Apache OpenOffice project will be releasing a new binary called Apache > OpenOffice v3.4 soon. All GPL code has been replaced or eliminated. Please > ask ooo-dev for a list of improvements like a native SVG implementation. I'd probably make the second part of that a separate bullet, thus: * The Apache OpenOffice project will be releasing a new binary called Apache OpenOffice v3.4 soon. * Major features of this release will include removal and in some cases replacement of GPL code, plus a native SVG implementation. A full list of improvements is at $URL I'd probably like a second highlight to accompany the SVG feature; which would you suggest? > >> The release is being developed by a subset of the original developers >> augmented by others. > > The AOO project team includes a large number of the original developers, > Symphony developers, community developers and new developers. The original population was much much larger so "large" seems hyperbolic here. How about: * The AOO project team includes a number of the original developers plus developers from IBM Symphony and community developers old and new. > >> There have been no updates to OpenOffice.org binaries released for users >> since Oracle stopped development. > > The project has focused on moving the project to the Apache License and off > of Oracle Infrastructure. Continuing to release OOo binaries was not an > option. > >> There will be no new versions of a binary program called OpenOffice.org >> released. > > We are now calling it Apache OpenOffice. It is still OpenOffice.org. That wasn't my point in either case or in the point below; the point was that my clients wanted to know where to get updates to the code they were running and needed telling that there weren't any. Do you have a better objective way to say that? > >> No downloads of OpenOffice.org containing bug fixes or security updates have >> been made available for end users since Oracle stopped development. > > We are prevented at the ASF from releasing GPL code. This was discussed in > June/July 2011. Subsequently, TeamOO never fully engaged with ooo-dev about > bug fix versions. The TOO individuals were on the Initial Committer list and > are members of the AOO PPMC. > >> The Apache OpenOffice project now controls the original OpenOffice.org >> domain (via the ASF) and plans to use it for future promotion of the Apache >> OpenOffice project. > > We are using the domain, it is now Apache's trademark. ALL of the legacy OOo > site has been migrated, saved and available for further development. The NLC > communities are welcome to return and work on NL versions of Apache > OpenOffice and the openoffice.org website. > >> The Apache OpenOffice project is still in incubation and has not yet >> requested graduation to a TLP. > > A release is a prerequisite to graduation. Once a release has been made > graduation is next on the agenda. Our mentors can correct me if I am wrong, > but we have likely met all of the other requirements. Those are all useful gloss if there are "why" questions but I think I'd leave the original statements as "what" answers. Thanks again - this will also be useful when the time comes to write about the release. S.
