Starting from the system menu

Getting Started with OpenOffice.org 2.x

Chapter 2: Starting OpenOffice.org

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• Starting from the system menu
• Starting from an existing document
• Using the Quickstarter under Windows
• Using the Quickstarter under Linux
• Starting from the command line

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Using the system menu

Using the system menu is the most common way to launch OpenOffice.org. The system menu is the standard menu from which most applications are started. On Windows, it is called the Start menu. On GNOME, it is called the Applications menu. On KDE it is identified by the KDE logo. On Mac OS X, it is the Applications menu.

When OpenOffice.org was installed, a menu entry was added to your system menu. The exact name and location of this menu entry depends on the graphical user interface. This chapter looks at Windows, GNOME and KDE on Linux, and Mac OS X. The concepts should easily be applicable to another operating system.

Windows

On Windows, the OpenOffice.org menu is located in Programs > OpenOffice.org 2.x, where “2.x" corresponds to the version number of OpenOffice.org. The figure below shows a typical setup on Windows XP. Select OpenOffice.org Writer to start Writer with a blank document.

File:Windows-startmenu.png

Starting Writer from the Windows XP Start menu.

Linux/GNOME

GNOME installations differ from one distribution to the next. Most modern distributions come with OpenOffice.org already installed. You will find OpenOffice.org under Applications > Office.

File:Linux-gnome-startmenu.png

Starting Writer from the GNOME Applications menu.

Fedora/Red Hat Enterprise Linux comes with OpenOffice.org installed. On the GNOME desktop, OOo can be found under Main Menu > Office. If you have installed a newer version of OOo, you will find it under Main Menu > Office > More Office Applications.

If OOo was downloaded from the http://www.openoffice.org website, OOo is under Applications > Other.

Linux/KDE

On KDE, OpenOffice.org is installed in its own menu, called “Office".

File:Linux-kde-startmenu.png

Starting OOo from KDE start menu.

Some Linux distributions install OpenOffice.org in the Office submenu. Mandrake is such a distribution. In this case, to launch Math (for example), choose Office > Word processors > OpenOffice.org Math.

File:Mandrake-startmenu.png

Starting OOo from Mandrake's KDE menu.

Mac OS X

Go to the folder where you installed OpenOffice.org. You should see its icon in the Applications folder. To start OpenOffice.org, double-click its icon. This opens a text document in Writer.

File:Location OOo MacOSX.png

Starting OpenOffice.org from the Mac Applications folder.

To open the other components (Draw, Calc, Impress, Base), go to the File menu of the Writer window and select the component you want.

File:OtherApps MacOSX.png

Opening different OOo components on the Mac.