On October 13th, the eagerly-anticipated version 3.0 of the free OpenOffice.org Productivity Suite was released. Finally, 3 days later, the website is back up - they needed to take down all but the download links from their front page due to the incredible demand.

For those of you who haven't used or heard of OpenOffice.org already, it is a productivity suite that is often compared favorably against Microsoft's Office suite. It offers compatibility with the Office file formats, which is important to many users, especially business users, who deal with others sending or expecting documents in these formats. Perhaps more importantly, it uses XML-based open standards for its native file format, OpenDocument, which are unencumbered by complex or confusing licensing schemes, patents that lead to legal liability concerns, or closed standards which could leave old files inaccessible by newer software or competing applications.

We develop applications and libraries for a number of clients. While it is not unreasonable for a client to desire exclusive rights to software they pay to have developed, there are many common modules and libraries that are generic in their use. Furthermore, the idea of “owning” generic algorithms or methods seems ridiculous, as these methods are often public, common sense, or needed for such a wide range of applications that the concept of exclusive rights to them could only make sense to a deranged IP attorney.

For many coders just getting started, or even seasoned coders who feel Visual Studio is a bit out of their price range, there's a fantastic, free, open-source application that does most of what VS does, and has some great extras. We use it here almost exclusively, and are very pleased with it.