IBM will actively support the revamped OpenOffice.org project following its move to the Apache Software Foundation.

So, Corel has launched its latest version of WordPerfect Office. What have they done to make it better than Office 2007, better than the free Open Office, and better than web apps like Google Docs? Turns out there’s some key new features which are very attractive - but are they enough to make you switch – or even take notice?

IBM's Office alternative Lotus Symphony has reached version 1.0. Not only is it available for both Available for Windows and Linux, but it is absolutely free.

Microsoft is planning on releasing SP2 in 2009, with support to save documents in ODF format as standard, in the name of ‘interoperability’, while adding PDF and XPS save/export compatibility without requiring any add-on software. The EU’s Commission has ‘taken note’ and welcomed the decision, while promising to investigate it further. What does this mean?

One of the main barriers to the wider adoption of the OpenOffice.org (OOo) suite by Mac users is its dependence on X11, as few of them are comfortable working in that environment. If that requirement vanished and OOo took on the familiar Aqua look and feel, would you give the open source office suite a try?

In a few days the fate of Microsoft's Office Open XML will be known - whether it will be accepted as a second ISO standard for documents. Two years ago, the Open Document Format was ratified as a standard.

In the wake of the ISO rejecting Microsoft's OOXML document format as an international standard, Microsoft has launched its Document Interoperability Initiative pledging to work with industry to ensure its document formats remain interchangeable with industry standards.

Online office applications provider, Zoho, has added support for DOCX, the Microsoft Open Office XML format for Microsoft Office Word 2007 and says it intends to support all Office 2007 XML-based file formats. The move will make the software-as-a-service more attractive to the enterprise market.

The European Commission has initiated two new antitrust investigations against Microsoft for alleged abuse of a dominant market position one of which follows a complaint by Opera over non-standard features of Microsoft's Explorer browser. The other concerns interoperability.

Dutch not-for-profit venture capitalist NLnet Foundation has called on Microsoft to release its older file formats into the public domain to enable businesses, open source-developers and the standards community to better access their own documents in the future, and to help them get Microsoft's products to work with the new open standard ODF.