The OpenOffice.org Community is pleased to announce that the public beta release of OpenOffice.org 3.0 is now available. This beta release is made available to allow a broad user base to test and evaluate the next major version of OpenOffice.org, but is not recommended for production use at this stage.

The most immediately visible change to OpenOffice.org 3.0 is the new "Start Centre", new fresh-looking icons, and a new zoom control in the status bar. A closer look shows that 3.0 has a myriad of new features. Notable Calc improvements include a new solver component; support for spreadsheet collaboration through workbook sharing; and an increase to 1024 columns per sheet. Writer has an improved notes feature and displays of multiple pages while editing. There are numerous Chart enhancements, and an improved crop feature in Draw and Impress.


Behind the scenes, OpenOffice.org 3.0 will support the upcoming OpenDocument Format (ODF) 1.2 standard, and is capable of opening files created with MS-Office 2007 or MS-Office 2008 for Mac OS X (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx, etc.). This is in addition to read and write support for the MS-Office binary file formats (.doc, .xls, .ppt, etc.).

OpenOffice.org 3.0 will be the first version to run on Mac OS X without X11, with the look and feel of any other Aqua application. It introduces partial VBA support to this platform. In addition, OpenOffice.org 3.0 integrates well with the Mac OS X accessibility APIs, and thus offers better accessibility support than many other Mac OS X applications.

View: Full article @ Openoffice.org
Download: OpenOffice 3.0



There are 15 additional comments
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(2 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #1 Posted by Midnight Mick on 11 May 2008 - 18:43
No screen shot, no download...
Quote this comment #1.1 Posted by random_ on 11 May 2008 - 18:54
http://marketing.openoffice.org/3.0/featurelistbeta.html
Quote this comment #1.2 Posted by ]SK[ on 11 May 2008 - 20:28
+1

Mac screen shots don't give me the horn, sorry.
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #2 Posted by night_stalker_z on 11 May 2008 - 18:47
Seems to start up quicker than previous versions and the page view is nice.
(5 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #3 Posted by tsupersonic on 12 May 2008 - 01:18
This has been out for a few days...Wow neowin is slow.

Anyways, without the quick start service thingy, it opens slow, although faster than previous versions.

For being free, it's great. However, I'll stick to the superior Microsoft Office for now.
Quote this comment #3.1 Posted by magik on 12 May 2008 - 03:22
Yea, I must say. Microsoft Office is leaps and bounds ahead of Open Office. There are just way too many shortcomings in OO and a plethora of advanced features that Office has that it's not really practical to use OO unless in a private environment and/or for exclusive home use or something small-scale like that. This is especially true when you consider Microsoft Office 2007, which quite honestly is the best Office yet IMO.
Quote this comment #3.2 Posted by +Raa on 12 May 2008 - 03:34
IMO O2k7 is the worst yet. The new ribbon? Stuff that. New file format? Stuff that too.

People are bitching over it, so I dont think it can be considered superior.

And as for the $400+ cost vs $0 free cost? Well, I think we have a winner.
Quote this comment #3.3 Posted by night_stalker_z on 12 May 2008 - 19:16
Everyone says OpenOffice is behind Microsoft Office in terms of features but they don't say what features. For the casual user who doesn't need Outlook, it pretty much does what everything Office does.
Quote this comment #3.4 Posted by Ambroos on 13 May 2008 - 05:18
(Raa said @ #3.2)
IMO O2k7 is the worst yet. The new ribbon? Stuff that. New file format? Stuff that too.

People are bitching over it, so I dont think it can be considered superior.

And as for the $400+ cost vs $0 free cost? Well, I think we have a winner.


Try using the ribbon for a week and you'll like it. Everyone who I gave a copy of 2007 loved it, because everything was so much easier. New file format won't be a problem since there are already updates for your old Office version, and more and more people start having 2007 themselves.

One reason why I personally don't like OpenOffice is because it doesn't use the ribbon. After the three or four years I've been using it now I couldn't possibly have anything without.
Quote this comment #3.5 Posted by Ender2070 on 14 May 2008 - 15:48
(magik said @ #3.1)
Yea, I must say. Microsoft Office is leaps and bounds ahead of Open Office. There are just way too many shortcomings in OO and a plethora of advanced features that Office has that it's not really practical to use OO unless in a private environment and/or for exclusive home use or something small-scale like that. This is especially true when you consider Microsoft Office 2007, which quite honestly is the best Office yet IMO.


your dumb, its the worst. previously with 2003 the customer got a disk with their oem version. now we're forced to install it and support it for the customer. i hate microsoft
(3 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #4 Posted by Xenomorph on 12 May 2008 - 03:30
How can this ever been considered a replacement for MS Office if they don't have an OUTLOOK clone???

I've worked with many companies that only plop down the money for Office just to get the latest Outlook.

Suggest OpenOffice to some corporations and you'd end up with people laughing in your face.
Quote this comment #4.1 Posted by +Raa on 12 May 2008 - 03:33
And yet you can suggest it to others and they'll be all over it.

Outlook is a moot point with Exchange web access.
Quote this comment #4.2 Posted by Mathiasdm on 12 May 2008 - 10:32
They intend to include Mozilla Lightning in OO 3.
Well, at least that's what I've heard.
Quote this comment #4.3 Posted by hagjohn on 13 May 2008 - 15:34
Calendar and Email Client (Mozilla Thunderbird and Lightning)

Mozilla Thunderbird and Mozilla Lightning are the perfect team for managing your emails, appointments and tasks.
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #5 Posted by hagjohn on 13 May 2008 - 15:31
Supports Aqua for Mac users without X11.
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