Bob Sutor: IBM to donate Symphony code to Apache for consideration

July 14 2011

IBM VP Bob Sutor just posted this to his blog, following discussion on some of the Apache mailing lists over the last 24 hours:

Six weeks ago I noted here that Oracle had to decided to offer the codebase for OpenOffice.org, the open source word processing, presentation, and spreadsheet software suite to the Apache Software Foundation. Two weeks after that, Apache voted to accept the proposed project for incubation. Now, one month later, IBM is announcing that it will offer the Symphony source code to the Apache OpenOffice incubator for consideration.
We've been working on Lotus Symphony now for a few years and, since after all it is derived from OpenOffice, now saying that we want to give back as much of our innovation into the open source project as possible, while contributing to future innovation -- both for Symphony and the open source project. As Sutor explains:
Work on Symphony will continue with the Apache OpenOffice code an essential part of its core. Just as IBM’s WebSphere Application Server ... uses Apache open source code but has code also written by IBM, so too will Symphony continue to evolve within IBM using code from Apache. Employees of IBM will contribute to OpenOffice as part of the community. IBM will benefit from the work done by others in the community, but so too will we all.

As the core OpenOffice code gets better and better, downstream projects and products like Symphony will benefit because they can focus on the features that distinguish them and add particular value for their users. This other software might have alternative user interfaces, support different devices, or be optimized for particular consumer or enterprise applications.
I think this is a very strong message for the future of our Symphony strategy. Our work with Apache is clearly designed to ensure that Symphony is no longer simply our own fork of OpenOffice, but tapped into the main vein of the future of desktop productivity and innovation.

Link: Bob Sutor: IBM to donate Symphony code to Apache for consideration >
Link: Network World: IBM bequeaths Symphony code to Apache >

Ed Brill | Highland Park, IL USA Category:  Symphony Lotus+Symphony  Add/View Comments [13]

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  1. 1  mdmadph http://mdm-adph.blogspot.com | 7/14/2011 1:43:21 PM

    Here's hoping for the best! I've actually had more success with people adopting Symphony than I ever did with OpenOffice -- funny, because OO was more of an MS Office clone, and you think it'd be adopted quicker.

  1. 2  Gary Murtagh  | 7/15/2011 4:30:54 AM

    So the Lotus Symphony brand will remain (albeit in an open source model).

    So IBM development model/focus will change quite drastically from a closed/proprietary fork of open source project to a main stream open source project.

    Hopefully the UI and the tabs functionality of Symphony are adopted by Apache as they are 2 big improvements on current OpenOffice/LibreOffice.

  1. 3  John Foldager http://izone.dk | 7/18/2011 2:38:58 AM

    Contributing the Lotus Symphony codebase to Apache would benefit all of us Notes and Symphony developers. We'll get access to see how the internal functionality is build and be able to solve bugs and make contributions too. Just hope IBM will contribute as much of the codebase :o)

  1. 4  C Stockel  | 7/28/2011 7:27:52 AM

    I hope this does not mean IBM is not going to continue to develop and refine Lotus Symphony. I have my entire project teams using Symphony and I continue to look forward to its continued development by IBM. Lotus Symphony's integration with Quickr team rooms and Lotus Live is a HUGE plus and I cannot wait to see how it works with Lotus Symphony Live.

  1. 5  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 7/28/2011 2:09:32 PM

    Of course we will continue to develop Symphony, now taking advantage of work with the entire Apache community.

  1. 6  Bernie Leung  | 9/6/2011 5:43:10 PM

    Since this is still not an Apache accepted project, is the Symphony source code available anywhere?

  1. 7  Ajay  | 2/9/2012 8:06:33 AM

    Lotus Symphony's unique sidebar UI and single window tabbed interface has excellent usability. Hats off to the UI team that formulated the excellent UI,

    It is frankly much more usable than the mess Office 2007 & 2010 are, specially for lightweight documents, which is 99% of almost all documents created.

  1. 8  Ajay  | 2/9/2012 8:13:24 AM

    Continuing above comment, Openoffice interface looks like a landfill. Symphony UI is the first word processor interface that does intimidate me and the only one where I'm able to get documents to look like how I want them to.

    Sincerely hoping IBM continues to retain and develop on this interface in future versions of Symphony (or whatever it'll be called)

  1. 9  Ajay  | 2/9/2012 8:14:58 AM

    Oops, "that does intimidate me" should've been "that does NOT intimidate me"