I mentioned recently that the StarOffice 8 installer failed when I ran it under SUSE Linux 10. As I had upgraded from SUSE 9.3 Pro (rather than do a fresh install of SUSE), I wondered if that was the problem. There were one or two little things that weren't quite right, so it wasn't just about StarOffice. So I bit the bullet and spent some time yesterday backing up my system so I could start from scratch with SUSE 10.
Having done my fresh install of SUSE 10, when the time came to install StarOffice 8, the installer GUI came up perfectly, no sign of the error I noted previously. However, I realised half-way through that I had forgotten to install Java 1.5.0_03 (it was using 1.4.2_06). I stopped the installer, so I could install 1.5.0_03 first. When I restarted the StarOffice installer, guess what happened - it failed with the same error as originally. So, at least I had found the culprit. I uninstalled Java 1.5.0_03, and ran the installer using 1.4.2_06. Once that was done, I re-installed Java 1.5.0_03. StarOffice 8 uses Java for its database component, which is now based on HSQLDB, a Java relational database. So, I created a quick test database, and it ran normally, no problems from my having reinstalled Java 1.5.0_03 (which I must update ASAP to a later 1.5.0_xx, since 1.5.0_03 actually has some problems that break a number of applications that I use).
So I eventually stumbled onto a solution, but not a satifying one. I really don't understand why StarOffice 8 can't work with Java 1.5.0, particularly given that they both come from Sun. Anyway, I am at least happy to have StarOffice up and running now. It's a great product (once you get it installed ...).
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