Developers left Oracle-controlled OpenOffice. Every major Linux distro switched. OpenOffice donated to Apache, now near-dead.
OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice is a full office productivity suite including word processing (Writer), spreadsheets (Calc), presentations (Impress), and databases (Base). It supports the OpenDocument Format (ODF) standard and provides compatibility with Microsoft Office formats. As one of the most complex open source applications, with millions of lines of C++ code, the ability to fork and maintain it required substantial organizational infrastructure.
The LibreOffice fork is the textbook example of what happens when a corporation acquires an open source project and proceeds to treat its community like an inconvenience. When Oracle swallowed Sun Microsystems in 2010, the OpenOffice.org community braced for impact. They were right to worry.
On September 28, 2010, a group of long-time OpenOffice.org contributors — including Thorsten Behrens, Italo Vignoli, and others — announced The Document Foundation (TDF) and launched LibreOffice. They even invited Oracle to join and donate the OpenOffice.org brand. Oracle's response? They demanded that every Community Council member involved with TDF resign immediately, leaving the Council staffed entirely by Oracle employees. Subtle.
The exodus was swift and devastating. Within months, virtually every major Linux distribution switched from OpenOffice to LibreOffice. Oracle, apparently realizing they were holding a bag of nothing, laid off the remaining OpenOffice developers in April 2011 and donated the carcass to the Apache Software Foundation in June 2011. Apache OpenOffice lingered on life support for years, occasionally releasing updates that were mostly just security patches.
LibreOffice, meanwhile, thrived spectacularly. With a proper community governance model, regular releases, and contributions from companies like Red Hat, Collabora, and SUSE, it became the de facto open source office suite. The project attracted hundreds of developers and established itself as a genuine alternative to Microsoft Office.
The OpenOffice.org saga became the canonical example cited whenever someone asks 'what could go wrong if a corporation mishandles an open source community?' The answer: everything. Everything could go wrong.
Oracle completes acquisition of Sun Microsystems
The Document Foundation announced; LibreOffice fork launched
Oracle demands all TDF-affiliated Council members resign
LibreOffice 3.3 released as first stable version
Oracle lays off remaining OpenOffice.org developers
Oracle donates OpenOffice.org to Apache Software Foundation
The Document Foundation formally incorporated in Germany
Apache OpenOffice nearly declared 'retired' due to lack of volunteers
LibreOffice became the standard open source office suite worldwide, shipping as the default in every major Linux distribution. It effectively killed OpenOffice.org, which limps along under Apache with minimal development activity and increasingly infrequent releases.
More broadly, the fork demonstrated that a well-organized community can successfully wrest control of a major software project from a hostile corporate steward. It became the template for future governance-driven forks and proved that brand recognition means nothing if the developers have already left the building.