There are several open source projects which are looked favorably upon as "success stories." Largest amongst these are Linus Torvald's Linux and Mozilla Foundation's Firefox. Amongst lesser-known (by the general populace) but up-and-coming applications include Sun Microsystem's OpenOffice.Org.

    I've been using OpenOffice.Org for around four or five years now, oftentimes as my primary word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation application. I remember 1.0 and 1.1 and the humongous steps forward that were taken in the 2.0 release. Its been a great ride and OpenOffice is quickly moving forward to become a major competitor to Microsoft Office and Corel's Office Suite. Still, market penetration hasn't been extremely rapid and I think this is largely centralized around several facts that I'd like to illustrate in hopes that they can be corrected and perhaps bring OpenOffice even more into the mainstream.

   First, and most importantly, OpenOffice should recognize that the average consumer doesn't care about ODF versus Microsoft's formats, they just care about successfully communicating with others. One of the first questions the many people I've ported to OpenOffice ask me is, "Can people who have Microsoft Office open it?" I tell them yes and then have to explain how to Save As... a document. I know we hate to admit it, but might it be better for our general users to allow them when they first install to select the default they want their application to save in? Perhaps even to default to Microsoft Office format and only ask in advanced installations?

   Secondly, we face a difficulty not so much in core features but in the extras. Microsoft has done well in this arena, providing thousands of graphics and templates to assist individuals in creating documents and presentations. Yes, I know there are thousands of free and open source graphics on the web that user's can get - but a user oftentimes doesn't recognize this. To them, clicking search in Microsoft Office and pulling up clipart means the clipart is locally on their computer, their is no recognition that Microsoft is searching both local resources and their online website. All they know (or care about) is having images right now that are quality and in quantity.

   I think this issue is relatively easy to resolve. Initially I had thought that Sun should establish a site similar to Microsoft's and integrate search just like Microsoft into the OpenOffice suite. But as I was writing a comment to this affect on the Gull FOSS blog I realized this wasn't the best methodology. Rather, OpenOffice should create a open standard that would allow sites to offer their content integrated into OpenOffice. Perhaps an XML standard that would allow a URL to be added to OpenOffice, similar to RSS that would include tag and image/template url information. OpenOffice could select the best of these resources to automatically include with the install - and then users could add/remove sites from the list as they desired. I am sure there are numerous open source clipart/resource sites that would jump at this opportunity.

   Thirdly, the website for OpenOffice.Org needs to be redesigned. The site has taken significant steps forward from its original forms back in the 1.0 days, but it still is too complex for the general user. A consultation with the Mozilla Foundation may be in order. Mozilla has mastered offering content is a streamlined, yet detailed manner. One area that is especially important is the separation of the development section of the website from the public presentation side. This has been heightened to some extent, but still needs further work.

   Fourthly, OpenOffice needs to continue to work on the Add-Ons architecture. One of the great advancements Mozilla Firefox had over Microsoft's Internet Explorer 6 was its ability to include add-ons - and those of a centralized repository. OOo Extras was okay back when it was just us geeks, but if we expect mom and pop to utilize OOo we have to give them a streamlined and automatic centralized interface like Mozilla.

   If Sun is able to advance OOo in these four areas we can expect much more mainstream penetration. I install OOo on people's computers whenever possible, helping them move to this environment, but I could do ten times moreso and with less switch-back by the users themselves if these additional features were added. What do you think? Is my list comprehensive enough? Are these features in the work? Am I off-base on one or more of the features?