Installation took less than 10 minutes on my Red Hat Linux desktop, which is a 1-GHz AMD K7 with 512 megabytes of RAM. StarOffice's database support failed to load because of missing prerequisites on my system. SO seems to want Adabase, which I dont have installed.

The installation program wanted to convert my existing address book data, which is something I am not sure I would have wanted it to do even if I had one available in a supported format. SO can convert LDAP, Mozilla, Netscape, Microsoft Outlook, and Windows system address books. It didn't know what to do with my Sylpheed mail client data.

When the installation finishes, a message appears informing you SO6 has been added to your KDE menu. Since I don't run KDE on this machine, I was concerned that GNOME users might be left in the cold. Not to worry. I soon found the Star Office 6.0 beta in my Favorites menu.

I wrote last week that although SO is useful, it is too big and too slow. The beta shows Sun is making progress in addressing those problems. The ghastly SO shell that wanted to take over your entire desktop is gone. From the menu shown above you click on the app you want to use, and it starts. A much nicer design.

On my desktop system, StarOffice 5.2 takes more than 30 seconds to load the first time on my untuned, stock kernel. Loading the first app in the beta cuts that time in half. Note that simple performance tuning using hdparm would probably halve those times. Your loading mileage will vary based on the transfer speed of your disk drives.

The shell is gone, and that's good. Load times are much improved. That's good, too. But my gtop system monitor shows that memory consumption is still high, ranging from 55 megabytes with only the word processor loaded to 73 megabytes with the word processor, spreadsheet, drawing tool, presentation tool, and HTML editor running. Those numbers are higher than I noted in SO 5.2. Sun is making progress, but it looks like two steps forward, one step back.

The word processor, Writer 6.0, looks very professional. It claims to be able to import documents from a number of different versions of Microsoft Word and Excel, as well as a number of other formats. According to Sun, this release features XML file format support and greater compatibility with Microsoft file formats. Its range of tools and features far exceeds my normal requirements. But that range is probably on a par with what its primary audience, those moving away from Microsoft Office, are accustomed.

I use a spreadsheet more often than I do a full-fledged word processor. I use gnumeric to track a number of things, from expenses to invoices to exercise sessions. The beta SO6 spreadsheet (Calc 6.0) could not open the gnumeric spreadsheets. I could, however, save them in Windows 95 Excel file format from gnumeric, and then open them in Calc.

One column of dates in MM/DD/YY format became a column of five-digit numbers, but by selecting Format->Cells->MM/DD/YY those numbers were converted to the appropriate (and readable) dates again.

Please remember SO 6 is beta software. My attempts to save the spreadsheet in Calc format resulted in a general I/O error message. As always, be careful when trusting mission-critical data to beta software.

Another thing I happily learned is missing from the SO 6 beta is the e-mail client. Good riddance! Instead, Tools->Options->StarOffice->External Programs lets you enter the name of your preferred e-mail client, Web browser, and FTP client. I checked to see if it would send SO documents with Sylpheed as the designated mail client.

Clicking on File->Send in a SO document in Writer 6.0 did bring up Sylpheed, but everything else was left to me. I needed (from within Sylpheed) to click on compose, enter the address to send to, and attach the file. Perhaps if I knew the correct command format (if there is one) for starting Sylpheed with an attachment to be mailed, it would all work automagically.

Also included in SO6 are

• Impress, a presentation tool
• Draw, a graphics program
• Base, a database management tool
• An HTML editor

I plead insufficient time to tell you much about them, other than they all appear to be functional and ready for beating on by other beta testers.

StarOffice 6.0 promises to be a much-improved version of its popular antidote to Microsoft Office. It's faster and less bulky, offers more features and functions, and is easier to use. Those interested in finding a migration plan away from the Microsoft monopolies would be well advised to start looking at StarOffice 6.0, since it runs not only on Windows but on Solaris and Linux as well.