Press Release: KOffice Version 1.5

The spread of the OASIS OpenDocument File format (ODF) is widely regarded as one of the most important developments in the whole IT industry right now. It will give users world-wide the opportunity to control the future of their own data and also ensure that all documents can always be read at any time in the future.

KOffice 1.5 offers native ODF support for the important productivity applications KWord (.odt), KSpread (.ods), and KPresenter (.odp). In addition to that, the supporting applications KChart (.odc) and KFormula (.odf) also support ODF, although not yet fully.

Great care has been taken to ensure interoperability with other office software that supports OpenDocument, most notably OpenOffice.org. We acknowledge, however, that the ODF support and interoperability is not yet perfect. We hope to be able to quickly identify and fix the incompatibilities that do exist in the upcoming 1.5.1 and 1.5.2 bugfix releases.

Killer Applications

KOffice is already the most comprehensive office suite in existence. In addition to the basic productivity applications mentioned above, it also includes a creativity application suite featuring Krita, a paint application with lots of image manipulation features, Karbon, a vector graphics application, and Kivio, a Visio® style flowcharting application. Other components are Kexi, an integrated environment for creating database applications, and KPlato, a program for project management.

Even as parts of a suite, some of these applications are outstanding in their field:

• Krita is a full-featured pixel-based image application with layer support, full colorspace independence and a versatile plug-in based architecture. Krita has advanced tremendously since the first released version and now sports: L*a*b and CMYK colorspaces, scripting, adjustment layers, layer groups and a first preview release of a natural media simulation colorspace for watercolors.

• Kexi 1.0 is the much awaited data management application that is the KOffice counterpart to MS Access or FileMaker. Kexi integrates the data and GUI into one file that can be easily sent over the internet as an email attachment.

  Using Kexi, a new database project can be set up in less than one minute as a single efficient file, without the need for administering servers. When needed, MySQL or PostgreSQL servers can be used for storage, or existing projects can be imported from MySQL or PostgreSQL servers or MS Access files. The final version focuses on data exchangeability and server support.

  Kexi is the first KOffice component to be ported to Windows and is also commercially supported by OpenOffice Polska.

Fast Paced Development

The KOffice team has been able to keep development speed very high. The reason for this is the code base which is very sound and easy to work with. It also builds on a solid foundation made up of the Qt library and the KDE base libraries.

Despite its having more components than any other office suite, things are improving very quickly. Version 1.5 features OpenDocument as the default file format, introduction of a unified scripting framework, improved accessibility for handicapped users, the first major release of Kexi and a technology preview of KPlato, a new project management application. You can read more about it in the full announcement.

KOffice has doubled the size of its developer base from around 15 at the time of KOffice 1.4 to around 30 at the time of KOffice 1.5. We are at present experiencing a healthy growth in our developer community, which bodes well for the future.

Regarding future development, KOffice 2.0 will be released around the turn of the year 2006/2007. It will build on the same platform as KDE 4.0, which means immediate portability to Windows and MacOS X. KOffice 2.0 will also include improved font handling, change management and improved integration.

Given the development speed of KOffice, we expect most of the components to reach a best-of-breed status in the world of Open Source office programs in 1 to 2 years.

Additional and More Detailed Information

Announcement

• The full Announcement contains much more detailed information about news in KOffice 1.5.

Changelog

• The Changelog contains all the gory details that anybody would ever want.

Download

• The Download page contains information about downloading KOffice 1.5 in source and binary formats.

About KOffice and KDE

KOffice is an integrated office suite for KDE which utilizes free and open standards for its document formats, component communication and component embedding.

This release includes:

• a frame-based, full-featured word processor (KWord);
• a spreadsheet application (KSpread);
• a presentation application (KPresenter);
• a flowchart application (Kivio);
• an integrated database application (Kexi);
• a pixel based image editing and painting application (Krita);
• a vector-drawing application (Karbon14).
• a technology preview of a new project management application (KPlato).

Additionally, KOffice includes robust embeddable objects:

• business quality reporting software (Kugar)
• full-featured charting engine (KChart)
• mathematical formula handling (KFormula)

as well as a built-in thesaurus (KThesaurus) and support for many different file formats.

KOffice 1.5 is a subproject within KDE, a powerful and easy-to-use Internet-enabled desktop for Linux and other UNIXes. Together, KDE and KOffice constitute the only Free Software project to provide a complete desktop and productivity environment for Linux/UNIX.

KOffice and all its components (including KDE) are available for free under Open Source licenses from the KDE http and ftp mirrors.