LinuxWorld: A first look at StarOffice 6.0 beta

"The shell is gone, and that's good. Load times are much improved. That's good, too. But my gtop system monitor shows that memory consumption is still high, ranging from 55 megabytes with only the word processor loaded to 73 megabytes with the word processor, spreadsheet, drawing tool, presentation tool, and HTML editor running. Those numbers are higher than I noted in SO 5.2. Sun is making progress, but it looks like two steps forward, one step back.

The word processor, Writer 6.0, looks very professional. It claims to be able to import documents from a number of different versions of Microsoft Word and Excel, as well as a number of other formats. According to Sun, this release features XML file format support and greater compatibility with Microsoft file formats. Its range of tools and features far exceeds my normal requirements. But that range is probably on a par with what its primary audience, those moving away from Microsoft Office, are accustomed.

I use a spreadsheet more often than I do a full-fledged word processor. I use gnumeric to track a number of things, from expenses to invoices to exercise sessions. The beta SO6 spreadsheet (Calc 6.0) could not open the gnumeric spreadsheets. I could, however, save them in Windows 95 Excel file format from gnumeric, and then open them in Calc."

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