A confusing set of statements by Sun Microsystems Inc. following a CNET story that claimed Apple and Sun were cooperating on a version of StarOffice for Mac OS X, has resulted in a clarification by Sun and admission that the original report was correct.
On Monday, Sun contacted MacCentral and several other news organizations and denied that such a partnership existed. The company confirmed that a port of OpenOffice — an open source version of StarOffice — is in the works, but said they were not working with Apple on StarOffice.
“There is a port of OpenOffice in development that is coming along quite well, but there is no development of a StarOffice port at this time,” Nancy Lee, group product marketing manager, office productivity at Sun, told MacCentral on Monday. “Currently, there is no joint effort between Sun and Apple to develop StarOffice, but Apple has been very supportive of the OpenOffice.org effort,” Lee said.
Tony Siress, Sun’s senior director of desktop marketing solutions, who first made the statements to CNET about an Apple/Sun partnership, also denied Sun and Apple were working on a version of StarOffice. In an e-mail sent to an open-source mailing list, Siress wrote that “Sun does not have a partnership with Apple Computer to develop StarOffice for Mac OS X and is not planning a Java StarOffice that would run on Mac OS X.”
However, in a story last night Sun official Russell Castronovo admitted that the original CNET story “is an accurate representation of what was said during the course of the interview.” Castronovo went on to say, “we do not have a version of StarOffice we’re planning to deliver right now” for Mac OS X. But he would not say what Sun might do in the future. “We’re actively trying to assist in that development and we would like to have a relationship with Apple to do that.”
While Sun officials confirm there is no work on StarOffice “right now,” there is no clear indication of whether Apple is working on a port of the application suite on their own or even if an Apple/Sun alliance is currently being discussed.
Apple representatives were not immediately available for comment on this story.
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