Future versions of OpenOffice.org will come bundled with Mozilla’s Thunderbird email client and Lightning calendar application.The open source office suite is also planning to revamp its system for building and installing extensions by the end of the month by introducing an extensions system like that of Mozilla’s Firefox browser. The process of developing, selecting and managing extensions will be standardized and simplified, according to Charles H. Schulz, the lead of OpenOffice.org’s Native Language Confederation.Developers disclosed the new developments at last week’s OpenOffice.org Conference in Lyon, France.Extensions of various kinds are critical to enterprise users of productivity software, who often add elaborate customized services to the software’s basic functions. Companies’ heavy investment in macros for Microsoft Office is considered one of the major barriers to adoption of OpenOffice, despite the existence of tools for migrating such macros. OpenOffice will get “Firefox-like” extension capabilities by version 2.0.4, due this month, Schulz said. The suite’s existing extensions platform will get a new and “definitive” extensions format, .oxt, which can work with languages from StarBasic to Java.The suite will get new extensions wizards and configuration tools for the benefit of end users, Schulz added. Reaction from developers on the Internet was mixed, with some pointing out that a more open extensions framework could be a potent new attack vector. Mozilla has had to tweak Firefox’s extensions system in the past to deal with security concerns.Both OpenOffice and StarOffice will be available in Thunderbird and Lightning bundles, Schulz said, but there’s no timeline set for releasing the bundles. “Connectors to Sun Calendar Server and Microsoft Exchange will also be developed,” he said.Some developers joked that OpenOffice is already bloated enough without being included in a bundle with two more applications. “It’s just the natural order of things, as expressed by Zawinski’s Law of Software Development: ’Every program attempts to expand until it can read mail’,” wrote one developer in a Slashdot forum.Schulz said plans for version 3.0 are still up in the air, partly because of a change to the release process earlier this year, which made releases more regular and incremental. “The only objective of the 3.0 will be to make it much more modular and running on top of frameworks such as Eclipse, Netbeans and Mozilla’s XUL,” he said.-Matthew Broersma, Techworld.com (London)Check out our CIO News Alerts and Tech Informer pages for more updated news coverage. Related content opinion Website spoofing: risks, threats, and mitigation strategies for CIOs In this article, we take a look at how CIOs can tackle website spoofing attacks and the best ways to prevent them. By Yash Mehta Dec 01, 2023 5 mins CIO Cyberattacks Security brandpost Sponsored by Catchpoint Systems Inc. Gain full visibility across the Internet Stack with IPM (Internet Performance Monitoring) Today’s IT systems have more points of failure than ever before. Internet Performance Monitoring provides visibility over external networks and services to mitigate outages. By Neal Weinberg Dec 01, 2023 3 mins IT Operations brandpost Sponsored by Zscaler How customers can save money during periods of economic uncertainty Now is the time to overcome the challenges of perimeter-based architectures and reduce costs with zero trust. By Zscaler Dec 01, 2023 4 mins Security feature LexisNexis rises to the generative AI challenge With generative AI, the legal information services giant faces its most formidable disruptor yet. That’s why CTO Jeff Reihl is embracing and enhancing the technology swiftly to keep in front of the competition. By Paula Rooney Dec 01, 2023 6 mins Generative AI Digital Transformation Cloud Computing Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe