| AbiWord | |
|---|---|
 | |
 AbiWord running onDebian 11 | |
| Developer | AbiSource |
| Initial release | April 19, 2002; 23 years ago (2002-04-19) |
| Stable release | 3.0.7[1]  / 31 July 2025 |
| Preview release | none (Linux), 2.9.4 (Windows) [±] |
| Repository | |
| Written in | C++ |
| Operating system | Cross-platform |
| Available in | Multilingual[2] |
| Type | Word processor |
| License | GPL-2.0-or-later |
| Website | www.abisource.com |
AbiWord (/ˈæbiwɜːrd/) is afree and open-sourceword processor. It is written inC++ and since version 3 it is based onGTK+ 3. The name "AbiWord" is derived from the root of the Spanish word "abierto", meaning "open".[3]
AbiWord was originally started by SourceGear Corporation as the first part of a proposed AbiSuite but was adopted by open source developers after SourceGear changed its business focus and ceased development. It now runs onLinux,ReactOS, Solaris,AmigaOS 4.0 (through itsCygwinX11 engine),MeeGo (on theNokia N9 smartphone),Maemo (on theNokia N810),QNX and otheroperating systems. Development of a version forMicrosoft Windows has temporarily ended due to lack of maintainers (the latest released versions are 2.8.6 and 2.9.4 beta).[4]
ThemacOS port has remained on version 2.4 since 2005,[5] although the current version does run non-natively on macOS throughXQuartz.
AbiWord is part of the AbiSource project which develops a number ofoffice-related technologies.[6]
AbiWord supports both basic word processing features such as lists, indents and character formats, and more sophisticated features including tables, styles, page headers and footers,footnotes, templates, multiple views, page columns,spell checking, andgrammar checking.[7] The Presentation view of AbiWord, which permits easy display of presentations created in AbiWord on "screen-sized" pages, is another feature not often found in word processors.
AbiWord generally works similarly to classic versions (pre-Office 2007) ofMicrosoft Word, as direct ease of migration was a high priority early goal. While many interface similarities remain, cloning the Word interface is no longer a top priority. The interface is intended to follow user interface guidelines for each respective platform.
AbiWord allows users to share and collaborate on documents in a similar manner toGoogle Docs, using a system known as GOCollab.[8] Users can collaborate using a varitety of different protocols includingTCP andXMPP,[9] and formerly over AbiCollab.net, a web based service that facilitated collaboration between users.[10]
AbiWord comes with several import and export filters providing partial support for such formats asHTML,Microsoft Word (.doc),Office Open XML (.docx),[11][12]OpenDocument Text (.odt),[13]Rich Text Format (.rtf), andtext documents (.txt).LaTeX is supported for export only. Plug-in filters are available to deal with many other formats, notablyWordPerfect documents. The nativefile format, .abw, usesXML, so as to mitigatevendor lock-in concerns with respect to interoperability anddigital archiving.
The AbiWord project includes a US English-only grammar checking plugin usingLink Grammar. AbiWord had grammar checking before any other open source word processor, although a grammar checker was later added toOpenOffice.org.[7] Link Grammar is both a theory of syntax and an open source parser which is now developed by the AbiWord project.
Version 0.1.0 made public,source only – August 21st, 1998, demoed at Open Source Developer Day.[14][15][16]
Version 0.7.0 – May 19th, 1999 – first binary release.[15][17][18]
Version 1.0 – April 19th, 2002.[19][20]
The recently released AbiWord-2.4...is the first Free Word Processor to offer an integrated Grammar Checker
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