Today, the new version of OpenOffice has been released with tons of new features and improvements. On top of the improvements is the faster startup time. It is reported that Write and Calc now starts up 46% faster on a “cold start” compared to OpenOffice 3.2.
OpenOffice 3.2 has also made further strides in compliance with ODF 1.2, including closer conformance to OASIS ODFF/OpenFormula specifications. As OpenOffice.org 3.2 currently requires a superset of the ODF 1.2 specification, the software now warns users when ODF 1.2 Extended features have been used. The document integrity check now proves whether an ODF document conforms to the ODF specification (this mainly affects ODF 1.2 documents). If an inconsistency is found, the document is treated as a broken one, and OpenOffice.org offers to repair the document.
OpenOffice 3.2 also provides improved support for other common office document types.
- Password protected Microsoft Office XML files (supported document types: MS Word 2007 documents (*.docx, *.docm); MS Word 2007 templates (*.dotx, *.dotm); MS Excel 2007 documents (*.xlsx, *.xlsm); MS Excel 2007 binary documents (*.xlsb); MS Excel 2007 templates (*.xltx, *.xltm); MS Powerpoint 2007 documents (*.pptx, *.pptm); MS Powerpoint 2007 templates (*.potx, *.potm)).
- OLE objects, form controls and pivot tables can now be read from MS Excel 2007 documents (*.xlsx, *.xlsb).
- Encryption support within the Microsoft Word 97/2000/XP filter allows password protected Microsoft Word documents to be saved (using the Microsoft Office standard RC4 algorithm).
- Filters for AportisDoc and PocketWord now support type detection based on DocType. As a result, files in these formats can be loaded without explicitly selecting the document type in the file picker.
- When writing string data to SYLK files, embedded double quotes are no longer escaped by doubling; semicolons are now escaped by doubling. This improves compatibility with files created by other applications.
OpenOffice 3.2 also supports PostScript based OpenType fonts for formatting, printing, PDF-export and display.
You can download the new OpenOffice through ftp.
You can check out the complete list of new features here.