Revision as of 10:37, 6 November 2007

This is Chapter 1 of Getting Started with OpenOffice.org 2.x (Third edition), produced by the OOoAuthors group. A PDF of this chapter is available from the OOoAuthors Guides page at OpenOffice.org.

Introduction

OpenOffice.org is a freely available, full-featured office suite. This chapter describes:

• The components of OpenOffice.org
• Some of the enhancements and new features in version 2
• How OpenOffice.org compares with other office suites
• How to get help
• How OpenOffice.org is licensed
• Answers to some common questions

Note: Because someone else owns the trademark OpenOffice, the correct name for both the open-source project and its software is OpenOffice.org.

OpenOffice.org (OOo) is both a software product and a community of volunteers that produces and supports the software.

Everyone is free to redistribute OOo, thanks to its open source license (see How is OpenOffice.org licensed?).

If you are new to OOo, its open source development, and the community that produces and supports it, you should read this chapter.

OOo 2.0 was a major upgrade of an already feature-rich office suite. If you have used previous versions of OOo, please look over the section New features in version 2.