IBM Lotus Symphony
office suite for Windows, Macintosh and Linux
IBM Lotus Symphony is a discontinued suite of applications for creating, editing, and sharing text, spreadsheet, presentations, and other documents and browsing the World Wide Web. It was first distributed as commercial proprietary software, then as freeware, before IBM contributed the suite to the Apache Software Foundation in 2014 for inclusion in the free and open-source Apache OpenOffice software suite.
First released in 2007, the suite has a name similar to the 1980s DOS Lotus Symphony suite, but the two software suites are otherwise unrelated. The previous Lotus application suite, Lotus SmartSuite, is also unrelated.
IBM discontinued development of Lotus Symphony in January 2012 with the final release of version 3.0.1, moving future development effort to Apache OpenOffice, and donating the source code to the Apache Software Foundation.
Features
IBM Lotus Symphony consists of:
IBM Lotus Symphony Documents, a word processor program
IBM Lotus Symphony Spreadsheets, a spreadsheet program
IBM Lotus Symphony Presentations, a presentation program
A Web browser based on Firefox 3
Each application is split into tabs.
Symphony supports the OpenDocument formats as well as the binary Microsoft Office formats. It can also export Portable Document Format (PDF) files and import Office Open XML files. Previous support for Lotus SmartSuite formats was disabled in Symphony 3.
Symphony is based on Eclipse Rich Client Platform from IBM Lotus Expeditor (the shell) and OpenOffice.org 3 (the core office-suite code).
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “IBM Lotus Symphony” is office suite for Windows, Macintosh and Linux. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Lotus, Symphony and office, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “office suite for Windows, Macintosh and Linux” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q259201. VIAF identifies the subject as 306410427. None of the 2 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2014, 2007 and 2012.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “IBM Lotus Symphony”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow IBM Lotus Symphony primary sources, IBM Lotus Symphony archive and Lotus research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “IBM Lotus Symphony”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “IBM Lotus Symphony” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.