StarOffice
office productivity suite software
StarOffice is a discontinued proprietary office productivity software suite. Its source code continues today in derived free and open-source office suites Collabora Online and LibreOffice. StarOffice supported the OpenOffice.org XML file format, as well as the OpenDocument standard, and could generate PDF and Flash formats. It included templates, a macro recorder, and a software development kit (SDK).
The software originated in 1985 as StarWriter by Star Division, which marketed the suite with some success, primarily in Europe. StarOffice was acquired by Sun Microsystems in 1999, which released the source code the following year as a free and open source office suite called OpenOffice.org, which subsequent versions of StarOffice were based on, with additional proprietary components. Sun Microsystems was acquired by Oracle Corporation in 2010, and the product was known briefly as Oracle Open Office before being discontinued in 2011, with Oracle turning OpenOffice.org into a "purely community-based project".
History
StarWriter 1.0 was written by Marco Börries in 1985 for the Zilog Z80. Börries formed Star Division in Lüneburg the following year. It was later ported to the Amstrad CPC (marketed by Schneider in Germany) under CP/M and later ported to the 8086-based Amstrad PC-1512, running under MS-DOS 3.2.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “StarOffice” is office productivity suite software. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through StarOffice, office and productivity, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “office productivity suite software” 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.
Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q375079. The first chronological checks are 1985, 1999, 2010 and 2011.
A general summary may omit uncertainty, sample limits or methodological disagreement that is explicit in the technical record. 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
Check terminology, classification and the date of the cited evidence. Scientific names and technical consensus can change while older records retain historical value.
- Current terminology
- Classification context
- Finding cited technical literature
Primary datasets, specimen catalogues, standards bodies and the most recent peer-reviewed literature.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “StarOffice”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow StarOffice primary sources, StarOffice archive and StarOffice 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 “StarOffice”?
- Has classification or technical consensus changed since the cited source?
- Is the terminology current, historical or disputed?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “StarOffice” 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.