WPS Office

Kingsoft Office

Developer(s)	Kingsoft
Initial release	1988
Stable release	2012 (v.8.1.0) / October 12, 2012 (2012-10-12)
Written in	CodeGear Delphi, C/C++
Platform	Microsoft Windows, Linux, Android
Available in	English, Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese
Type	Office suite
License	Proprietary
Website	Kingsoft

Kingsoft Office, commonly known as KSO or KSOffice, developed by Zhuhai-based Chinese software developer Kingsoft, is an office suite for Microsoft Windows and Android OS. KSOffice include Kingsoft Writer, Kingsoft Presentation and Kingsoft Spreadsheet.

The basic version Kingsoft Office Suite Free is free to use. A fully featured Pro version is also available. The current version is KSOffice 2012.

The product has had a long history of development in China, where it is still sold as WPS Office. "KSOffice" is the company's attempt to spread, primarily in the Western and Japanese markets. Since Kingsoft Office 2005, the user interface bears resemblance to the Microsoft Office products, and the suite reads and writes the files generated by Office in addition to its native documents.

History

Early dominance and fall

The Chinese version is marketed as WPS Office named after the early Kingsoft word processor WPS (Word Processing System). WPS is also used as a promotional initialism for "Writer, Presentation, and Spreadsheets" which are the components of Kingsoft Office. WPS started as a word processor under DOS in 1988. WPS maintained an enormous user base throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s.

When Microsoft Office 95 and Windows 95 were introduced into the Chinese market, the influence and sales of WPS went into steep decline. Faced with stiff foreign competition and high level of domestic piracy, Kingsoft was nearly bankrupt by the end of 1995. Kingsoft chief software architect Pak Kwan Kau (求伯君), in an attempt to revive the company, injected 4 million Yuan (approx. US$500,000 in 2003) into the company by selling off his private assets, and began the development of WPS 97 for Microsoft Windows. When WPS 97 was released in 1997, it struggled to compete with Microsoft Office 97. There were number of reasons for that:

• Office 97 was in widespread use and users were reluctant to switch
• Office 97 offered more features than WPS 97
• WPS was still just a word processor with no spreadsheet or presentation application

In May 2001, Kingsoft launched WPS Office, which included a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software, again strugglng to compete with the more popular and powerful Microsoft Office 2000.

Revival

In 2002, WPS Office 2002 surfaced as the next version of WPS Office and added to its bundle an email client. In a move hailed by many, WPS Office 2002 maintained interface compatibility with established office products and as a result dramatically reduced the amount of retraining required to migrate from Microsoft Office.

When China joined the WTO, the Chinese government looked to rid piracy within the government offices.In 2003, the Chinese government made Kingsoft office software the standard for various government branches. The decision in favor of Kingsoft, who had held a market share of 90 percent in the office software market in the early 1990s, demonstrates the government's preference for local companies, in spite of large investment by foreign companies.

The 2004 incarnation of the office suite, WPS Office Storm, was released in late 2004 to limited fanfare. In its increased effort to converge with Microsoft Office, WPS Office Storm claims to offer perfect compatibility with the Microsoft Office document formats.

In a bid to differentiate itself from other office suites, Kingsoft collaborated with Intel and IBM to integrate their text-to-text and text-to-speech technology into WPS Office Storm. Its new technical capabilities became the focal point in an advertising campaign.

There are two versions of WPS for Linux: WPS Office Storm and WPS 2005.

In late 2005, WPS Office Personal Edition was released as a free download, in hope of introducing the product to more users. This edition is only offered in Simplified Chinese, and can only be used by home users. Kingsoft is constantly updating this personal edition which indicates the company may intend to support and improve the free version as a long term commitment.

In 2007, another edition was released, Kingsoft Office 2007, which is available in Chinese, English, and Japanese interface. The personal edition is available for 30-day trial (with the license key available for free by request), the next version will be available in 100-day trial and free version.

In 2009, Kingsoft Office 2009 was released which has increased compatibility with Microsoft Office including support for the 2007 version file formats. Kingsoft Office 2010 was released in 2010.

In 2011, Kingsoft Office granted funding from the Chinese government and received further orders from central ministries in China.

Kingsoft Office Suite Free 2012 was released in 2011. Kingsoft Office Professional 2012 and Kingsoft Office Standard 2012 were announced for sale in February 2012, in addition to Kingsoft Office for Android.

File format

.wps is the file extension used for Kingsoft Writer Documents. The format is similar to a Microsoft Word document (.DOC or .DOCX file) and supports formatted text, images, and advanced page formatting. Kingsoft Writer documents can be converted to Microsoft Word *.doc files in the software.

Gallery

• Kingsoft Writer.
  Kingsoft Writer.
• Kingsoft Spreadsheets.
  Kingsoft Spreadsheets.
• Kingsoft Presentation.
  Kingsoft Presentation.

See also

• List of office suites
• Comparison of office suites
• Web operating system
• Web desktop
• Office Open XML software
• OpenDocument software

External links

• Official website