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Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

zdnet.co.uk

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Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#11

Post by ascendant »

Kaizyn wrote: post #10
rbanffy wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They might as well donate all their Java patents to Google Are you kidding?! They could donate them to the FSF, ASF or any other non-profit entity dedicated to promote of free and open-source software. Donating them to Google would create a whole lot of temptations the folks in Mountain View really don't need.

But they have "Don't be evil" as a motto. How could they possibly be tempted by that?

Ok, we get it. Google is "evil". I'd pay $0.05 for every time someone wants to harp on this and DOESNT.

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#13

Post by naner »

mbreese wrote: post #9

It sounds to me like Oracle realized that they didn't quite grok community driven open-source projects and are finally starting to donate them to good homes (Jenkins to Eclipse and OOo to Apache). All it took was for the projects to go through the hell of major forks before Oracle realized what was going on. It's probably too late to engender any kind of good will out to this though. They put both of those communitie…

Honestly, it seems like they're just pragmatically dumping projects they don't want or can't make a profit off of.

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#14

Post by weavejester »

cschep wrote: post #12

LibreOffice is such a bad name, hopefully if they merge back to OpenOffice and drop the stupid .org from their name. Is it the name of the project or their website? nobody knows!

I believe they only used OpenOffice.org because OpenOffice was already trademarked.

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#15

Post by rbanffy »

codeup wrote: post #5

As expected Oracle didn't donate it to The Document Foundation. There will be more calls to merge the OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice projects now. That is really what needs to be done, both office suites are still almost identical. The Apache Software Foundation and The Document Foundation have to overcome their egos and do the right thing. Then we could credit TDF with 'liberating' OOO and ASF with closing the deal.…

> That is really what needs to be done, both office suites are still almost identical.

Except for licensing. LGPL prevents proprietary forks. IIRC Apache allows them. I wonder why Oracle would want to change the license (or not donate OOo directly to the Document Foundation)

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#16

Post by nettdata »

codeup wrote: post #6
irrelative wrote: post #4

Why the quotes around "donates"? This doesn't seem like a white elephant, or a trojan horse. It's commendable that they gave it up rather than let it rot.

"despite Oracle's talk of 'donation', a lengthy process precedes the ASF's acceptance of candidates"

As with all of their projects.

With a project of this size, scope, and adoption, I'd imagine the "acceptance" will be somewhat rubber stamped, and the process will focus on setting up the proper ASF development environment, review of existing code, etc.

I think a lot of people are looking for drama where none exists; ASF is just following the same procedures that EVERY project would be forced to go through.

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#17

Post by rbanffy »

cschep wrote: post #12

LibreOffice is such a bad name, hopefully if they merge back to OpenOffice and drop the stupid .org from their name. Is it the name of the project or their website? nobody knows!

> hopefully if they merge back to OpenOffice

Sure, and ditch the LGPL license and adopt the Apache one...

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#18

Post by mikey_p »

mbreese wrote: post #9

It sounds to me like Oracle realized that they didn't quite grok community driven open-source projects and are finally starting to donate them to good homes (Jenkins to Eclipse and OOo to Apache). All it took was for the projects to go through the hell of major forks before Oracle realized what was going on. It's probably too late to engender any kind of good will out to this though. They put both of those communitie…

Small nitpick, but Hudson was moved to Eclipse, not Jenkins. Jenkins is the community fork of Hudson.

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#19

Post by Tiomaidh »

weavejester wrote: post #14
cschep wrote: post #12

LibreOffice is such a bad name, hopefully if they merge back to OpenOffice and drop the stupid .org from their name. Is it the name of the project or their website? nobody knows!

I believe they only used OpenOffice.org because OpenOffice was already trademarked.

When they discovered that, it might've been a good time to think up a different name.

Re: Oracle 'donates' OpenOffice.org to Apache foundation

#20

Post by fingerprinter »

This is one of those things that I can read as both good news and bad news.

I'm really hopeful that the LibreOffice and OOo communities could now get together and work together and even collapse the code base to one codebase again, but I'm doubtful that will happen. It would be a huge shame to see split efforts continue as it would hurt both projects and, frankly, they are both still lacking FAR behind any of the proprietary competitors.

Not to mention Calligra is rapidly gaining ground on both. If Calligra gets the same level of MS office compatibility, it would leapfrog both OOo and LibreOffice in my mind.

This is going to be a test of the two communities and their ability to see the big picture as well as navigate a political situation. I really am wondering how they will both will fare.

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