Oracle has imposed a fee of US$90 per user on a plug-in for Microsoft Office that was available at no cost under Sun Microsystems' ownership.

A European IT consulting firm is warning large enterprises and government entities not to deploy OpenOffice.org until Oracle Corp. shows proof that it will invest as heavily in the development of open-source productivity suite as project champion Sun Microsystems Inc. did.

The Microsoft Office productivity suite has risen to become the dominant application of its type for business IT management. But there are open source office productivity suites available that may provide a suitable alternative to Office, depending on your requirements.

With the world economy in shambles many businesses are already battening down the hatches expecting rough seas ahead. IT budgets will shrink along with all other budgets, and maybe even more than other budgets. After all, companies still need to advertise and pay their workforce, but they may be able to do without new servers or software for a while. And that is where open source software vendors can help keep the ship sailing.