I have been using Ubuntu Linux as my primary desktop OS at home for the last year. I've had to find Linux alternatives to the software I've been using on Windows. Luckily for me many of the programs I use on Windows are also available on Linux such as Firefox, Thunderbird, FileZilla, Flash, Java, NetBeans, Sun App Server/Glassfish, Postgres, etc...

In previous blog posts I talked about installing the mscorefonts package in Linux to make OpenOffice render and edit MS Word documents perfectly. I also talked about how Star Office, the commercial version of OpenOffice (around $70), comes with many more proprietary Windows fonts and possibly other fonts. It also comes wit a better dictionary, and clip-art. Today I found out that Google is now offering Star Office for free as part of their Google Pack. That's great news! I think Star Office is free for students and schools, and also comes free on Solaris.

What OpenOffice/Star Office is missing is an MS Project clone. Today I found OpenProj:

OpenProj is a free, open source desktop alternative to Microsoft Project. The OpenProj solution is ideal for desktop project management and is available on Linux, Unix, Mac or Windows. OpenProj is a complete desktop replacement of Microsoft Project and even opens existing native Project files. OpenProj shares the most advanced scheduling engine in the industry with Project-ON-Demand. The OpenProj solution has Gantt Charts, Network Diagrams (PERT Charts), WBS and RBS charts, Earned Value costing and more.

I downloaded OpenProj and gave it a quick try. The first thing that I noticed (because of the file extensions) is that it is a Java application! That means I can use it on Solaris too. OpenProj seemed very feature packed and fast. What a great addition to the world of open source. I know that there are other free MS Project alternatives out there, but I don't think many/any of them attempt to be fully compatible with the MS Project file format. That is important to me because I half expect to be sharing files with people who use the MS family of products.