The OpenOffice.org 3.1 free office software released today contains a raft of new features voted for by users, including much improved on-screen graphics and improvements to all its components. The software is available as a free download via the OpenOffice.org website.
Edinburgh, UK (PRWEB) May 7, 2009 — The OpenOffice.org Community today announced the general availability of OpenOffice.org 3.1, a significant upgrade to the world’s leading open-source office productivity suite. Since OpenOffice.org 3.0 was launched last October, over 60 million downloads have been recorded from the OpenOffice.org website alone. Released in more than 90 languages and available as a free download on all major computing platforms, OpenOffice.org 3.1 looks set to break these records.
The OpenOffice.org Community is listening to its users. Users of previous versions of OpenOffice.org were asked to vote for their ‘most desired’ new features, and this wish list helped shape the new release. The new release also includes a feedback mechanism where users can opt-in to supply feedback automatically to the developers about how they use OpenOffice.org.
The biggest single change (half a million lines of code!) and the most visible is the major revamp of OpenOffice.org on-screen graphics. Techies call it anti-aliasing – users just appreciate how much crisper graphics are on screen. The improved look extends to other subtle changes, such as: how images display when they are being dragged, how selections of text are highlighted, and even adding the ability to overline text.
New core features include:
Writer (word processing)
- Improvements to comments: reply feature now supports ‘conversations’
- Further grammar checker integration
- Outline levels within paragraphs for complex documents
Calc (spreadsheet)
- Hot hints for formulae, with new and improved formulae available
- Improved sorting
- More performance bottlenecks removed
- The zoom slider added to the status bar
- Rename sheets with a double-click
Chart (graphics engine)
- Flexible positioning of axes for scientific and educational users
- Flexible handling of “missing” data points
Impress (presentation)
- Font size buttons
Base (database)
- SQL syntax highlighting
- Easier deployment of macro applications
Internationalization and Localization
- Improved support for bidirectional scripts
- New locale support
Behind the scenes, OpenOffice.org also now has a more capable file locking mechanism, enabling users to share files safely in a multi-user, multi-platform environment.
“OpenOffice.org 3.1 demonstrates that we are listening to our users, and thanks to the long term commitment from our sponsors, we can invest the time and effort to make significant changes to the software,” said John McCreesh, OpenOffice.org Marketing Project Lead. “OpenOffice.org has all the features users want, it’s easy to use and free. We urge everyone to download and try it today.”