The Safarization of Office	SIGPC Vol. 7, No. 3 Feb. 23, 2003

by Scott Tilley

With the recent release of the Safari Web browser, Apple, has entered an exciting and potentially dangerous phase. Safari is a “turbo browser for OS X” based on the KHTML rendering engine. What is particularly interesting about this development is that Safari, being based on KHTML, is an open source software application. Moreover, Apple has promised to integrate their changes and enhancements to the core back into the open source for use by the general public. Imagine what would happen if they did the same thing for Open Office.

It Could Be a Contender

There have been many competitors to the Microsoft Office suite over the years. Unfortunately, they’ve all shared the same fate of obsolescence. Lotus, Word Perfect, and even Apple’s own AppleWorks suite have all been mauled by Office. Quite simply, Office is the king of the office and there are no usurpers in view.

Well, perhaps there is one candidate after all. A long shot from Cupertino, riding a horse named Open Source. That company is Apple. And Safari is the example the other office applications may follow.

What if Apple took Open Office and turned it into a real Office contender? Microsoft itself is already moving towards open standards, such as making XML a native file format in the upcoming Office 11 release (schedule for Summer 2003). If Safari is any example to go by, the resulting OS X office suite could be quite something.

Office Application Comparison

This is a look at how a full-fledged office productivity suite from Apple might look compared to the current PC platform offerings from Microsoft.

Instead of staying beholden to third parties for key components of the computing experience, Apple could be in total control of this as-yet-unnamed application. Since Apple is one of the last vertically integrated computer companies, making both the hardware and the software for the Mac, such control would probably support their business philosophy.

In fact, Apple has already begun this process. In addition to Safari, Apple recently released Keynote, a presentation program that competes directly with PowerPoint. Unlike Safari, Keynote is not based on an open-source project. But it is one of the required pieces in a full-fledged office suite. Keynote’s ability to import and export PPT files make interoperability a snap, which may just spare it the fate of other Microsoft combatants.

Apple also has a great email program, aptly called “Mail”, which in many ways is superior to Outlook. I’ve come to rely on its automatic and impressive spam filtering every day. Like other Apple OS X software, Mail is based on standards, not proprietary file formats like Outlook.

So what’s left to build an office suite? A word processor, a spreadsheet, and a database. The database solution could be based on the freely-available and widely-used MySQL database. In a pinch, File Maker Pro could also be used (at least for the short term); it is after all the current market leader for databases on the Mac.

For the word processor and spreadsheet applications, Apple could go the same path as with Keynote, and build these programs from scratch. However, they could also go the open source route, building upon Open Office. Apple could take the current programs, which in my opinion are not yet ready for prime time, and safarize them by making them robust, feature-rich, and Aquafied.

Hunter or Hunted?

With these last two parts of the office puzzle completed, Apple would be done. Well, done in the sense that they would now have a complete office productivity suite under their own control. But also “done” in the sense that they may be making themselves the next Microsoft Office road kill. Only time will tell whether a safarized office would be the hunter or the hunted.