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<title>Corel Conference LG #40</title>
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"Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>"
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<H1><font color="maroon">Corel WordPerfect Suite 2000 and CorelDraw 9 Release Press Conference</font></H1>
<H4>By <a href="mailto:dstaff@echelon.ca">Dean Staff</a></H4>
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On April 7, 1999, Corel Corporation held a press conference in
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, to announce the official release of CorelDraw 9
Graphics Suite, which includes Corel Photo-Paint 9 and Corel WordPerfect
2000 Suite.
<p>
While the announcement was geared more towards those who use the Microsoft Windows
platform, it was also announced that the Linux version of Corel WordPerfect
Suite 2000 should be available in the last quarter of 1999, probably
around November, and that the Linux version of CorelDraw 9 Graphics
Suite will be available in the first quarter of 2000.
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<center><img src="./gx/staff/3421f1.gif"></center>
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<h4>Corel WordPerfect 8 for Linux Booth</h4>
<p>
There are new features in both packages. One of them is
real-time previewing in the WordPerfect Suite, also called Live Effects
in CorelDraw, allowing you to ``preview'' a potential change to
your document or drawing in ``real-time'' without committing
to the change permanently. Also, CorelDraw 9 Suite will include IXLA
digital camera support, allowing one to download and edit images from
approximately 120 different camera models. Both packages allow you to
publish a document in PDF format, a very important new feature for the
legal community that locks a document so it cannot be edited, allowing
lawyers to submit briefs electronically, safe in the knowledge they cannot
be altered but are easily retrievable.
<p>
While other Linux packages are available, it is nice to see
``commercial'' software packages with outstanding
industry acceptance available to the Linux community, further
proving that Linux IS a viable alternative.
<p>
To show the success of Corel's Linux efforts, they provided the
following information. Since the Personal Edition of WordPerfect 8 for
Linux was released for download, over 900,000 download attempts have been
recorded. Based on an on-line survey, 60% of the people downloading
stated they were previous Microsoft Word users.
<p>
To add a little note of humour, during the CorelDraw demonstration,
done on a Windows 95/98 machine, the software froze. This author
had to bite his tongue hard so as not to yell out, ``That would
not happen on a Linux machine!'' To the credit of the young lady
performing the demonstration, she very quickly recovered and turned the
``crash'' into a demonstration of how fast CorelDraw 9 loads,
for which she received a round of applause.
<p>
Dr. Michael Cowpland also announced Corel has been negotiating with
the Debian Linux Development team to use the Debian Linux distribution
as the backbone of Corel Linux for the Desktop. He also announced
they would be using KDE as the default desktop environment. This came
as a bit of a surprise, considering Corel's past work with Red Hat.
Dr. Cowpland explained that Red Hat is concentrating on network servers
and Caldera (another logical choice for an alliance) is focusing on
Novell networks, while Corel's focus is on the desktop PC. Instead of
reinventing the wheel, Corel decided to align themselves with an existing
distribution, and Debian was the one they picked.
<p>
Some of the features Corel is promising in their Corel Linux for the
Desktop are an easy setup GUI, plug-and-play support, auto-hardware
detection, auto update from the web, Windows network integration including
mapping and sharing, and a home networking GUI interface.
<p>
It will be interesting to see how many of these features are present when
Corel releases their Linux for the Desktop, due in the fall of 1999 to
coincide with the release of WordPerfect Suite 2000 for Linux, but they
have stated a beta release will be ready for LinuxWorld in August.
<p>
Corel has realized that to get the masses to switch to Linux, they
cannot expect users to purchase all new applications for the Linux
operating system: they must provide a way for users to run their existing
applications. To that end, Corel is also working with the Wine Project,
partly to facilitate the porting of the two suites to Linux and also
provide the ability to run one's existing Windows-based applications
under Linux. For this, they should be applauded.
<p>
These are truly exciting times for the Linux community, and I for
one am excited to see where Linux will be this time next year. One
of Dr. Cowpland's closing remarks was that this is the 10th
anniversary of CorelDraw, and while we have had great years of
CorelDraw (under Windows), he is looking forward to the next 10 years
of Linux.
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<center><H5>Copyright &copy; 1999, Dean Staff <BR>
Published in Issue 40 of <i>Linux Gazette</i>, Mid-April 1999</H5></center>
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