Where is the OpenGL 3D extension for Impress? - OpenOffice.org Ninja

Where is the OpenGL 3D extension for Impress?

Posted by Andrew Z at Thursday, April 24, 2008 | Permalink

OpenOffice.org 2.4 is here, and people are asking where is the touted OpenGL 3D extension for Impress? Inquiring minds want to know. It is perhaps the most exciting feature from the 2.4 release.

Initially I understood an .oxt extension would be released with OpenOffice.org 2.4.

3D OpenGL transitions eye candy for OpenOffice.org Impress 2.4

After the OpenOffice.org 2.4 release, I tried to build the extension myself from the source. I did, but it wouldn't install in OpenOffice.org. I asked, and OpenOffice.org Extension Grand Ninja Stephan Bergmann explained it can't be done because of binary linking problems. Then, I asked Impress Grand Ninja Thorsten Behren who told me it is in fact possible to build it using a special build environment (which I did not use).

In conclusion, where is it? It's not available. When is it coming? Unknown.

Nevertheless, there are several ways right now to use the OpenGL transitions, though none are compatible with the vanilla OpenOffice.org.

  • Install OxygenOffice 2.4 (currently in beta)
  • Ubuntu and Debian users: install the package openoffice.org-ogltrans
  • OpenSUSE users: install package OpenOffice_org version 2.4 or newer with the file OGLTrans.uno.so
  • Mandriva users: install the package openoffice.org-core version 2.4 or newer with the file OGLTrans.uno.so
  • Install my old, experimental build which has the feature built in (not an extension) via HTTP or via BitTorrent
  • Search for OGLTrans.uno.so on rpmfind.net or pbone.net and install the appropriate packages for your Linux distribution
  • Windows users: right now this feature is Linux only

Thank you

Thank you to Shane M. Mathews, Thorsten Behrens, and Radek Doulik for engineering the 3D OpenGL transitions for Impress. Thank you to them and Stephan Bergmann for answering my questions, and thank you to Google for funding the feature under the Summer of Code 2007.

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11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Any idea when this feature will be built into OOo Impress by default? I notice it's currently not enabled in the 3.0 developer snapshots, leaving me to assume it won't be included in the 3.0 final release.

Thanks,
Sak.

Andrew Z said...

Sak: Don't hold your breath. AFAIK, this article is still up to date. I know of no definite plans to distribute the OpenGL 3D transitions with the vanilla OpenOffice.org—not ever—not for any operating system. However, this week I saw some work on porting these transitions to Apple Mac OS X Aqua.

Jayme Ayres said...

Can I install this rpm package in Fedora 9?

Andrew Z said...

Jayme: Yes, you can install OxygenOffice in Fedora 9. I did it this week.

Jayme Ayres said...

Hi andrew!
How I do this, I' ve a OO installed on my fedora 9, but I would like to install this OpenGL 3d extenson... Have any tutorial for this? If sure... how I get?
Thanx

Jayme Ayres

Andrew Z said...

Jayme: 1. Uninstall OpenOffice.org. 2. Download OxygenOffice. 3. Follow its instructions for installing it. (OxygenOffice is a spin of OpenOffice.org, and they are about 99% the same. Either app works fine on F9.)

Till Achinger said...

I hope this is not a too stupid question but is there any possibility of using the extension with the Ooo 3.0 (Linux)? I successfully installed the package but the transitions do not show off in Impress. Thank you.

Vinu Vikram said...

I have installed openoffice.org-ogltrans with open-office 2.4 in Ubuntu hardy. Unfortunately the 3D transition is not working. When I select the transition, the slide just blink once. What is going wrong?

Andrew Z said...

Till: You can use the OpenGL extension in OpenOffice.org 3 the same as 2.4. (See link for details.)

vvinuv: Do desktop effects (Compiz) work on your system?

Till Achinger said...

@Andrew Z I figured out the problem is not Oo3 but Ubuntu 8.10. Hopefully they fix it soon.

Yonatan said...

I enjoined this great package in Hardy (Ubuntu 8.04), in Intrepid (Ubutnu 8.10) impress was crasjing when using one of the 3d transitions.

I just installed Jaunty (Ubuntu 9.04), which comes with OpenOffice 3, and I hoped that the crashes will be solved - but this package is missing.
Can someone tell me how to install it ?

-- Yonatan