Download KOffice 1.6 beta 1

KOffice is an open source office suite for the KDE desktop environment on Linux and Unix systems. It consists of a number of different applications such as a word processor (KWord), a spreadsheet program (KSpread), a presentation program (KPresenter), a drawing program (Krita) and a database program (Kexi). The developers have released the first beta version of KOffice 1.6 with the following announcement:

Highlights:

The main energy of the KOffice development team is currently focused on the revolutionary 2.0 version that will be based on KDE 4 and Qt 4. The 1.6 release is intended mainly as a feature release for the two fastest developed components: Krita and Kexi. However, other components are being developed too. Here are the highlights of this preview of KOffice 1.6:

• OpenDocument support in KFormula
  The formula editor of KOffice now supports OpenDocument and uses it as its default file format.
• Scripting support in KSpread
  KSpread, the spreadsheet program, now supports scripting in python and Ruby just like Krita and Kexi.

Principal Improvements:

Kexi (Database application):
• Further enhancements in the database connectivity library.
• Further improvements in Table Designer (schema changing without removing table contents, “Image” data type)
• Data aware combo boxes (drop down lists)
• Data-aware “Image Box” widget in Forms and Table View

Krita (Pixel-based graphics editor):

• New filters has been added (random noise, random pick, lens correction, filters from krita-plugins…)
• New tool for drawing bezier curves, magnetic selection, perspective transformation and healing has been added

Kugar (Reporting tool):

• Kugar’s templates are now visible in the startup dialog.

KPlato (Project management tool):

• Added PERT calculation for estimated value based on optimistic, expected and pessimistic value.
• The distribution used is dependent on the setting of Risk.

KFormula (Mathematical formula editor):

• OpenDocument and MathML are now native format. And OpenDocument is now the default file format, and most of the standard is now supported

A more complete list of changes is available at the KOffice web site.