Technology The Document Foundation Slams Euro-Office Before Public Launch

[lokamoka820]

Content source

https://linuxiac.com/document-foundation-slams-euro-office-before-public-launch/

The Document Foundation has released a strongly worded open letter criticizing Euro-Office, the forthcoming European open-source office suite backed by major technology organizations, one day before its public launch.

Euro-Office is a new office suite based on a fork of ONLYOFFICE, supported by organizations such as Nextcloud, IONOS, Eurostack, XWiki, OpenProject, Soverin, Abilian, and BTactic. It is positioned as a European, open-source alternative to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, supplying tools for documents, spreadsheets, and presentations.

However, The Document Foundation, which develops LibreOffice, states that Euro-Office’s presentation is misleading. In its open letter, TDF disputes claims that Euro-Office is the first European open-source office suite, citing OpenOffice.org, launched in 2001 from StarOffice’s European codebase, and LibreOffice, introduced in 2010.

The letter is notably direct. TDF asserts that Euro-Office is not the start of European open-source office software, but rather the latest in a long history. It also criticizes Euro-Office’s document format strategy, stating that defaulting to Microsoft’s OOXML format does not support true digital sovereignty as claimed.

 

[Halp2001]

The launch of Euro-Office definitely highlights Europe's interest in strengthening digital sovereignty through open alternatives. At the same time, it’s clear the project is facing some historical and strategic questions that still need to be ironed out. Beyond the different perspectives, the great thing is that this debate brings the importance of having diverse and transparent options in our software ecosystem right to the forefront.