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Corel Offers a Linux WordPerfect

Corel will offer WordPerfect 8 for the alternative OS as a free download.

By Tom Spring, PCWorld   

The move is meant to challenge Microsoft Windows while bolstering Corel's role as a leader in delivering software for the fledgling Linux operating system.

Linux, an open-source-code operating system that enjoys a cult-like status among its followers, is making inroads into the computer mainstream.

Michael Cowpland, Corel's president and chief executive officer, announced the giveaway at the Atlanta Linux Expo on Saturday. The freebie is seen as a ploy to entice users to buy Corel's full Linux office suite, expected next year.

"Linux is the first real competition to Microsoft and the first true replacement to Windows," Cowpland said from his offices in Ottawa, Canada, on Monday. "The keys to the kingdom should not be held by one company."

Corel said it will ship a $50 shrink-wrapped version of WordPerfect 8 to CompUSA and other major computer stores two weeks after it makes the program available for free downloads from its Web site. It will also sell a $500 Server Edition, which runs the application off a network server.

Cowpland said he hoped to capitalize on the growing popularity of Linux. Already 10,000 users have preregistered online for the software, which is intended for "personal use only," he said.

Corel's full Linux office suite will bundle a popular set of bread-and-butter business applications. The suite ties in Corel's existing spreadsheet, presentation, database, and graphics applications with WordPerfect 8. Corel said its package is more complete than existing Linux application products made by S.u.S.E., Applixware, and Star Office.

Analysts believe Corel is simply circling its wagons around the new Microsoft-alternative market that is growing slowly. "Microsoft isn't losing a wink of sleep," said Ted Schadler, director of software strategies at Forrester Research, a high-tech research consulting firm in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

IBM and Oracle have committed to making their database software available on Linux. Netscape and other companies have already published mainstream software for the platform.

Other companies are skeptical of Linux. Hewlett-Packard has publicly characterized it as little more than "an interesting sideshow." Dan Kusnetzky, analyst at International Data Corporation, commented that the operating system is hobbled by its "anything-but-user-friendly interface."