Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
On 30/06/2011 Ian Lynch wrote: If I save an odf file from OOo it will open exactly the same in LibO. If that isn't true than I would be interested to know where things break. Talking about 100% compatibility is probably exaggerated, since there are portions of the ODF standard (e.g. table styles, if I recall correctly) that are not implemented yet in either suite, and that could be implemented with different accuracy/priority in future. There are also cases of data loss originating from features that are currently implemented in LibreOffice only, see http://openoffice.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=118037 But of course these are corner cases and, if not 100% compatibility, OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice do indeed offer 99% compatibility. Regards, Andrea.
Discretionary ODF Provisions and Implementation Notes (was RE: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.)
I think it is foolish to assign a metric to compatibility between OOO and LibreOffice, and particularly between either and ODF. If the 1% matters to me, it can be a show-stopper for my interoperability needs. The larger the take-up of *Office.org, the greater the number of folks impacted by such things, including deviations attributable to platform, configuration, and version of the software as well as the origin of documents that already exist. The variety of contingent factors is rather extensive. Adding to the degree of contingency is the extent of discretionary provisions in whatever ODF specification a program's support is based upon. There are places where provisions are loose if not altogether underspecified, where provisions are explicitly implementation-dependent in various ways, and where the conformance conditions are extremely flexible. The sharing of a reasonably-common *Office.org code base promises alignment of discretionary elements and even of extensions having nothing to do with requirements for ODF. There is a barrier of entry, so-to-speak, if the ways discretionary matters are handled are not made explicit so other producers of ODF-supporting software can choose to align or at least to deviate knowingly. I am not talking about the code being available for inspection, I am talking about explicit statements that can be understood without having to examine an implementation. That is what provides for independently-derived interoperably-usable implementations based on an open standard. The work invested in arriving at such arrangements can also lead to valuable feedback to the perfection of the evolving specifications for ODF. One way to accomplish this is to provide implementation notes that explicitly account for the conditions of support for ODF provisions and any deviations that also exist. I have only seen this attempted by one producer. Although that particular provision could be done much better, I find it remarkable that this is the only case where it appears to be done at all. The idea is to be accountable for discretionary matters in a way that adopters of software can make informed choices about which products are suitable in a particular interoperability situation, including support for already-existing documents for which continual conversion is not an option. This is also a way for a development team to be mindful of what their discretionary choices are and how evolution of their code base needs to account for what those choices have been. There is an opportunity for Apache OpenOffice.org to raise the bar in this respect. And how can one provide a reference implementation without such an account of all the discretionary and contingent factors? I have heard it said that no desired quality of software is achievable in the absence of a concrete measure for it. Implementation notes are a way of assuring whatever the desired quality of ODF support is to be, along with the discretionary provisions that are part of that achievement. - Dennis -Original Message- From: Andrea Pescetti [mailto:pesce...@openoffice.org] Sent: Saturday, July 02, 2011 07:38 To: ooo-dev@incubator.apache.org Subject: Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice. On 30/06/2011 Ian Lynch wrote: If I save an odf file from OOo it will open exactly the same in LibO. If that isn't true than I would be interested to know where things break. Talking about 100% compatibility is probably exaggerated, since there are portions of the ODF standard (e.g. table styles, if I recall correctly) that are not implemented yet in either suite, and that could be implemented with different accuracy/priority in future. There are also cases of data loss originating from features that are currently implemented in LibreOffice only, see http://openoffice.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=118037 But of course these are corner cases and, if not 100% compatibility, OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice do indeed offer 99% compatibility. Regards, Andrea.
Re: Certification programs (was: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice)
On 30 June 2011 18:04, Shane Curcuru a...@shanecurcuru.org wrote: Isn't this related to certification programs? Speaking of which, does anyone have a brief explanation and some links to any existing official OOo certification or training or similar programs? Just to be clear on terms because certification can apply to two key different things. Certification of the product ie this product is 100% compliant with ISO 26300 :2006 and certification of people either as users of products or developers/technical support professionals. Certification implies that there is a set of systems and/or policies and procedures that have been applied and that the certificate is the manifest that this has occurred and the outcomes are as described by the certificate. While the concept is generic, the specifics are very different and require different expertise and knowledge. AFAIK the only certifications associated with OOo are the odf file format as it is effectively certified by OASIS and OSI certification (I think but not absolutely sure) because it is licensed with a recognised FOSS license. There could be others I'm not aware of. These certifications are about the product, not the people that use it or develop it. There are end-user competence based certificates that can apply to users of OOo such as ECDL/ICDL and ITQ. Degrees in computer science and similar provide generic certification of the skills and knowledge of developers administrators etc of OOo. However, competing proprietary products often have vendor certification for people that is specific to the product eg MOS (Microsoft Office Professional). I don't know of any comparable system for FOSS. Clearly the vendors of proprietary software see end-user certification as part of their marketing strategy to strengthen their ecosystems. As a revenue driver they are probably more at the margins compared to license fees and other sales for these big companies but of course what is marginal to MS, Cisco etc is likely to be very significant to a FOSS project. This is a major area for end users (and trainers, consultants, and the like) that we need to figure out how to effectively transition to the ASF. As a non-profit public charity, the mission of the ASF is to produce software for the public good, given away freely. The way that the ASF does this is loosely known as the Apache Way, which is mostly about meritocratic communities making consensus based decisions on project directions, leading to high quality software that everyone can use. Along with our software, our projects also offer basic community-led support and help, through our mailing lists and bugtrackers. However the ASF does not directly offer support contracts, trainings, certification, or other services about our products. This is because of our volunteer nature, and the fact that we do not charge for any of the software (or services) that we provide. I'm sure we can provide sufficiently documented licensing procedures for trainers who want to provide certifications in Apache OO, although it may take a little while to get it right, and to ensure the Apache folk here understand what's important to the broader and pre-existing OOo community. We have a load of CC licensed policies and procedures accredited by the UK National Regulators that can be used if they are helpful. These include things such as equality of opportunity, the disabilities act etc. I can put together a generic set of requirements that could apply to any training or outcome based qualifications system but of course I could be seen to have a conflict of interest in carrying out that work so I don't want to put the time in if its likely to be discounted on those grounds ;-) Of course anything I do at Apache is under the ICLA so anyone can modify it. -- Ian Ofqual Accredited IT Qualifications (The Schools ITQ) www.theINGOTs.org +44 (0)1827 305940 The Learning Machine Limited, Reg Office, 36 Ashby Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 8AQ. Reg No: 05560797, Registered in England and Wales.
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
On 30 June 2011 17:18, Dennis E. Hamilton dennis.hamil...@acm.org wrote: From this, is it more precise to say that OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice.org provide 100% fidelity in interchange of documents with each other when employing their common native format, ODF? I'm happy with that, I wasn't thinking in a particular detailed way with the original post, it was really just saying hey this end user asked which product to choose. His main concerns I'm guessing would be are they similar to use (almost identical), can I exchange files the same from and between these products and others. (hopefully identically) and will any license differences affect me (probably not) And the presumption for that is the common code base which is their common inheritance assures that, at least for now? Yes - but I'm not a dev so I can't be 100% certain :-) Is it safe to conclude that this statement does not extend to anything about completeness and quality of support for ODF beyond the fact that, all else being equal, whatever the one produces and carries via the ODF format, the other successfully consumes? And this is without qualification? Yes again. Remember the average end user is not going to understand anything about odf, its extensibility or differences in implementation. I just think at this level too much information will only serve to confuse. If this statement were made in front of an audience of users or officials or executives, would it be better to say that OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice.org are compatible (in their support for and reliance on ODF)? Is this a promise that they are and will be kept that way? That is more difficult. I was simply thinking in terms of replying to an individual asking a question on a mailing list :-) What is it you want the take-away to be that has you use the expression odf files with 100% fidelity. What is meant to be reassuring about that? I worded it badly, fell between two stools. Not technically precise enough for someone like yourself and probably unnecessary technical terms for the user I was intending it to be for. -- Ian Ofqual Accredited IT Qualifications (The Schools ITQ) www.theINGOTs.org +44 (0)1827 305940 The Learning Machine Limited, Reg Office, 36 Ashby Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 8AQ. Reg No: 05560797, Registered in England and Wales.
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
On 30 June 2011 07:10, Dennis E. Hamilton dennis.hamil...@acm.org wrote: Umm, 100% fidelity to/of what? I would love to understand the qualifications that attach to that statement, and how whatever that is can be demonstrated/verified. [T]hey both operate on odf files with 100% fidelity. If I save an odf file from OOo it will open exactly the same in LibO. If that isn't true than I would be interested to know where things break. (Fonts I think are a different issue) If it isn't 100% true it is pretty likely to be more true than filtering to either other applications that use odf or .doc etc. From an end user point of view all they will be concerned about is that files produced in OOo don't break in any way if imported into LibO or vice versa. Of course product divergence might make this less likely but at the moment I don't think there is a significant problem but I'm willing to be corrected. So do we scare the end user or give them more confidence? In terms of verification or otherwise, give me a file created in OOo that will not open correctly in LibO other than because the fonts are different on the two systems creating the files. If you prefer to say that OOo/LibO use the same file format so you are safe exchanging files between OOo and LibO, Ok, better to get rid of all mentions of technical stuff for end users in any case. What we need is to give reasonable confidence to the end user rather than obscure (to them) technical reasons why that might on some almost impossibly rare occasion not be the case. -- Ian Ofqual Accredited IT Qualifications (The Schools ITQ) www.theINGOTs.org +44 (0)1827 305940 The Learning Machine Limited, Reg Office, 36 Ashby Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 8AQ. Reg No: 05560797, Registered in England and Wales.
RE: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
From this, is it more precise to say that OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice.org provide 100% fidelity in interchange of documents with each other when employing their common native format, ODF? And the presumption for that is the common code base which is their common inheritance assures that, at least for now? Is it safe to conclude that this statement does not extend to anything about completeness and quality of support for ODF beyond the fact that, all else being equal, whatever the one produces and carries via the ODF format, the other successfully consumes? And this is without qualification? If this statement were made in front of an audience of users or officials or executives, would it be better to say that OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice.org are compatible (in their support for and reliance on ODF)? Is this a promise that they are and will be kept that way? What is it you want the take-away to be that has you use the expression odf files with 100% fidelity. What is meant to be reassuring about that? - Dennis -Original Message- From: Ian Lynch [mailto:ianrly...@gmail.com] Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2011 01:56 To: dennis.hamil...@acm.org Cc: ooo-dev@incubator.apache.org; giffu...@tutopia.com Subject: Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice. On 30 June 2011 07:10, Dennis E. Hamilton dennis.hamil...@acm.org wrote: Umm, 100% fidelity to/of what? I would love to understand the qualifications that attach to that statement, and how whatever that is can be demonstrated/verified. [T]hey both operate on odf files with 100% fidelity. If I save an odf file from OOo it will open exactly the same in LibO. If that isn't true than I would be interested to know where things break. (Fonts I think are a different issue) If it isn't 100% true it is pretty likely to be more true than filtering to either other applications that use odf or .doc etc. From an end user point of view all they will be concerned about is that files produced in OOo don't break in any way if imported into LibO or vice versa. Of course product divergence might make this less likely but at the moment I don't think there is a significant problem but I'm willing to be corrected. So do we scare the end user or give them more confidence? In terms of verification or otherwise, give me a file created in OOo that will not open correctly in LibO other than because the fonts are different on the two systems creating the files. If you prefer to say that OOo/LibO use the same file format so you are safe exchanging files between OOo and LibO, Ok, better to get rid of all mentions of technical stuff for end users in any case. What we need is to give reasonable confidence to the end user rather than obscure (to them) technical reasons why that might on some almost impossibly rare occasion not be the case. -- Ian Ofqual Accredited IT Qualifications (The Schools ITQ) www.theINGOTs.org +44 (0)1827 305940 The Learning Machine Limited, Reg Office, 36 Ashby Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 8AQ. Reg No: 05560797, Registered in England and Wales.
Certification programs (was: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice)
Isn't this related to certification programs? Speaking of which, does anyone have a brief explanation and some links to any existing official OOo certification or training or similar programs? This is a major area for end users (and trainers, consultants, and the like) that we need to figure out how to effectively transition to the ASF. As a non-profit public charity, the mission of the ASF is to produce software for the public good, given away freely. The way that the ASF does this is loosely known as the Apache Way, which is mostly about meritocratic communities making consensus based decisions on project directions, leading to high quality software that everyone can use. Along with our software, our projects also offer basic community-led support and help, through our mailing lists and bugtrackers. However the ASF does not directly offer support contracts, trainings, certification, or other services about our products. This is because of our volunteer nature, and the fact that we do not charge for any of the software (or services) that we provide. I'm sure we can provide sufficiently documented licensing procedures for trainers who want to provide certifications in Apache OO, although it may take a little while to get it right, and to ensure the Apache folk here understand what's important to the broader and pre-existing OOo community. - Shane On 6/30/2011 4:56 AM, Ian Lynch wrote: On 30 June 2011 07:10, Dennis E. Hamiltondennis.hamil...@acm.org wrote: Umm, 100% fidelity to/of what? I would love to understand the qualifications that attach to that statement, and how whatever that is can be demonstrated/verified. [T]hey both operate on odf files with 100% fidelity. If I save an odf file from OOo it will open exactly the same in LibO. If that isn't true than I would be interested to know where things break. (Fonts I think are a different issue) If it isn't 100% true it is pretty likely to be more true than filtering to either other applications that use odf or .doc etc. From an end user point of view all they will be concerned about is that files produced in OOo don't break in any way if imported into LibO or vice versa. Of course product divergence might make this less likely but at the moment I don't think there is a significant problem but I'm willing to be corrected. So do we scare the end user or give them more confidence? In terms of verification or otherwise, give me a file created in OOo that will not open correctly in LibO other than because the fonts are different on the two systems creating the files. If you prefer to say that OOo/LibO use the same file format so you are safe exchanging files between OOo and LibO, Ok, better to get rid of all mentions of technical stuff for end users in any case. What we need is to give reasonable confidence to the end user rather than obscure (to them) technical reasons why that might on some almost impossibly rare occasion not be the case.
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
FWIW; One interesting difference that I see happening in the future wrt LibreOffice is that Apache OpenOffice will be a big consumer of Java stuff. Apache PDFBox looks like a good candidate for inclusion. cheers, Pedro.
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
Maybe better to emphasise the similarities, the most important being that they both operate on odf files with 100% fidelity. From a user point of view that is very important and not mentioned in this thread which was started by what seems to be a user not a dev. -- Ian Ofqual Accredited IT Qualifications (The Schools ITQ) www.theINGOTs.org +44 (0)1827 305940 The Learning Machine Limited, Reg Office, 36 Ashby Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 8AQ. Reg No: 05560797, Registered in England and Wales.
Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
I've seen both. Is LibreOffice a fork of the OOO code? I don't know which one to choose. Ted signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
--- On Tue, 6/28/11, Ted Rolle, Jr. ster...@gmail.com wrote: I've seen both. Good, that's what software freedom is about :-). Is LibreOffice a fork of the OOO code? Yes. I don't know which one to choose. This list is not really for comparisons among the many OOo forks. I am personally happy with thew original OOo but you are free to try them out and choose whatever fits best for you. best regards, Pedro.
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
On Tue, Jun 28, 2011 at 13:37, Norbert Thiebaud nthieb...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Jun 28, 2011 at 12:05 PM, Christian Grobmeier grobme...@gmail.com wrote: OOO uses (or will use in future) the ASL 2.0 license, OOO is LGPLv3, the AOO fork will be ASL2 To my knowledge the OOo trademark will be transferred to the ASF (or is already?). Therefore I would not say this project is a fork of OOo, it is OOo. No? Eric Raymond, in his seminal essay The Cathedral and the Bazaar,[1] stated in 1997 that The most important characteristic of a fork is that it spawns competing projects that cannot later exchange code, splitting the potential developer community. So, since OOo and LO have compatible license that allow code exchange and AOO won't, then it seems that that qualify as a 'fork' of OOo. This is not the correct list to argue semantics. People have various opinions, and ESR is *not* the only reference for what fork means. Also, please note it is the Apache License, v2.0. There is no S in the acronym. -g
Re: Differences between OOO and LibreOffice.
Also, please note it is the Apache License, v2.0. There is no S in the acronym. haha my mistake - i always do it wrong :-)
