OpenOffice.org


毛慶禎 輔仁大學圖書資訊學系副教授
http://www.lins.fju.edu.tw/mao/works/OOo.htm
2004/10 for PCOffice

昇陽已經與微軟達成協議, 不對StarOffice提出侵犯專利權的主張, OpenOffice.org可沒那麼好命, 聽說, 微軟隨時可能採取行動, 對使用者提出侵權的告訴。

今年四月初, 這兩家公司以16億美元達成和解, 在未來的十年內, 不再互控侵權, 也不互控其客戶侵權。不過, 根據9月中呈繳給美國證券交易委員會的資料, 和解的效力不及於OpenOffice.org及其用戶, 而且昇陽還有義務提供法律協助, 讓微軟起訴包 括昇陽公司在內OpenOffice.org的用戶。

法律應該要遵守, 不過法律也是人訂的, 為人服務, 隨時可以修改, 甚至可以透過法院的審判程序, 宣告特定法律無效。

微軟已經不再授權客戶使用Office 2000及Office 97, 昇級到Office 2003, 或者乾脆採用自由軟體的OpenOffice.org 1.1.1, 是考慮的兩個主要方向。

深度使用Excel的客戶, 已經觸及微軟Office的極限, 希望有更多的功能, OpenOffice.org 1.1.1確實令他們失望。除此之外, 經過客製之後, OpenOffice.org 1.1.1都能符合使用者的期望。

Writer幾乎沒有檔案格式相容的問題, Writer把檔案存成PDF格式, 尤受歡迎, Microsoft Word也有這個功能, 不過需另購套件。

OpenOffice.org 1.1.1 特色

具有自由軟體的屬性, 沒有授權費。

內部整合良好, 例如: 可以在Writer裡建立新的試算表文件。

多種輸出格式, 除了PDF格式外, 還可以存成Flash格式。

處理微軟專屬檔案格式時, 不免出現少許不一致之處, 需要人工調整。

技術支援來自多個網站及新聞群組, 沒有單一的廠商具備該等能力。

介面自成一格, 與微軟的介面並不完全一致, 需要若干時間來適應。

Office 2003 特色



  • Interface differences OpenOffice.org is similar to Microsoft Office in its design, but users will need some time to grow accustomed to differences between the two.

    • Office 2003

    Pros

  • Familiarity Most knowledge workers use some version of Microsoft Office already, and an upgrade to a new version of Office presents the flattest learning curve.
  • File-format compatibility Microsoft Office file formats are de facto standards, and no rival suite handles these proprietary formats as well as Office does.
  • Advanced features Office 2003 has more features and capabilities than competing suites. Although many users do not require or use much of this functionality, advanced users, particularly of spreadsheets, often find it vital.

    Cons

  • High licensing costs Microsoft Office licenses are priced at a few hundred dollars each—a cost that can be difficult to justify when your users require only basic productivity suite functionality.
  • Advanced features require latest versions Some of the most compelling features added to the last two versions of Office—such as extensible smart tags, document protection and Smart Document creation—are not backward-compatible with earlier versions of the suite.




    • Next page: Excel vs. Calc

    Excel vs. Calc

    eVAL testers were split between those who use spreadsheets very little or for fairly simple tasks and those who are accustomed to using Excel 97/2000 as an analysis tool.

    The latter group includes some of FN Manufacturing's finance and engineering personnel. They leverage Excel's statistics capabilities, among others, and appreciated the improvements made to the Pivot Table feature in Excel 2003. OpenOffice.org's Calc offers a similar feature, called DataPilot, but testers had trouble locating it because of the differences in the way Calc and Excel are organized.

    Our advanced testers also were interested in Excel's Watch Window feature, something Microsoft added to the application in Office XP. A Watch Window is a separate, small window that remains "on top" and enables users to monitor a selected set of cells. Calc does not have a similar feature, but this wouldn't likely be a deal breaker for FN Manufacturing users because the versions of Excel they currently use don't offer this functionality.

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    Among the more casual spreadsheet testers, the differences between the spreadsheet applications were less jarring. Romuald Dufour, an IT manager at Fabrique Nationale, said of Excel 2003: "There was not much difference between Office 2000, OpenOffice.org and Office 2003 for my use."

    Melinda Vause, who works in finance at FN Manufacturing, said Calc felt "similar to Excel, and it would be easy to learn the slight differences."

    Most of the Excel spreadsheets we used during testing were not heavily formatted, but we did experience compatibility issues between Excel and Calc. For the most part, these problems related to charts.

    OpenOffice.org tester Vause noted that "graph names were converted to row numbers in some cases, and some formatting was dropped."

    The severity of these issues differed from document to document, and the significance differed from tester to tester.

    FN Manufacturing bookkeeper Suzan Widener reported that the Excel-formatted spreadsheet she used during the eVal was compatible with Calc. However, Joan Curfman, who tested Office 2003 during the eVal but who had been part of an earlier OpenOffice.org test group, estimated it would take weeks to convert FN Manufacturing spreadsheets from Office 97 and 2000 to OpenOffice.org.

    Next page: PowerPoint vs. Impress

    PowerPoint vs. Impress

    eVAL testers said they use the PowerPoint presentation app less than any other Office application. However, a move to either PowerPoint 2003 or OpenOffice.org's Impress would require significant training because PowerPoint 2003 is the Office application that's changed the most since its 97/2000 incarnations and Impress is the OpenOffice.org application that differs most from Office in its design. Shaffer said of Impress: "Its icons and commands are not very similar to PowerPoint."

    		Case file

  • Company FN Manufacturing

  • Location Columbia, S.C.

  • Issue FN Manufacturing wants to upgrade its users from Microsoft's Office 97 and 2000; although the company likes the features of Microsoft's Office 2003, the suite's licensing costs and potential training costs are barriers to entry; the company is also considering an open-source alternative

  • Solution Test OpenOffice.org's namesake suite and Microsoft's Office 2003 to determine the learning curve (and cost) for each and assess whether the open-source office suite has the ability to replace Microsoft's Office within the organization

  • Tools The OpenOffice.org project's OpenOffice.org 1.1.1; Microsoft's Office 2003; IBM's ThinkPad T41

  • What's next Form a group that will assess the results from eWEEK's office application suite eValuation; budget and plan for a new office suite within the 2005 IT budget

    Source: eWEEK reporting

    • FN Manufacturing produces its fair share of complex presentations, and it was with one such presentation that we experienced several compatibility problems between PowerPoint and Impress.

    The FN Manufacturing presentation we were testing made heavy use of embedded Word and Excel objects, a result of the heavy collaboration among the groups that produced the document (a common scenario in many organizations). The upshot was that the small formatting snafus testers encountered in Writer and Calc tended to collect in the test presentation. FN Manufacturing would definitely have to rework this presentation—and likely others it has already produced—if it moved to OpenOffice.org.

    What's more, Impress and PowerPoint handled transition animations differently, and certain Impress capabilities, such as three-dimensional text in presentations, did not carry across to PowerPoint.

    However, Philippe Nemery, an IT manager at FN's parent company in Belgium, said he's used Impress for some time now and has come to prefer the way that the application is organized.

    Senior Analyst Jason Brooks can be reached at jason_brooks@ziffdavis.com.

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    參考資料