It seemed like such a great idea; IBM – a name that’s surely familiar to everyone – releasing their own tweaked version of Open Office. With a name like that behind it there’s more chance of it being taken seriously (not that I personally have anything against Open Office, quite the contrary).
But they seem to have broken it. The first xls I threw at Symphony refused to print; it crashed the application every time I tried. I downloaded the latest release of Open Office (something I’ve been meaning to do for a while) and the same spreadsheet printed with no problems.
I’m all for IBM releasing something like this, but if it’s not ready they’re only going to do themselves more harm than good. I realise it’s still a beta, but in its present form I can’t trust it, and will continue to recommend Open Office to anyone who’s looking for a free, desktop office suite.
