Quick Tip: Making OpenOffice 2 start faster

OpenOffice 2 has been out for a while now, and today I downloaded it, updating for the first time since version 1.1.2. I’m all in for open software, but what I really didn’t like about OpenOffice (and MS Office for that matter) was the long start-up. Here’s what I did to make it start faster:

Tools -> Options
Under the OpenOffice.org tab (the first one) click Java.
Check off "Use a Java runtime environment"

Open Office only use Java for special features. Since I only care about writing, I wouldn’t normally use them. There are other things you can customize here, but for my old laptop it was the Java runtime engine that was the great white whale.
Click OK.

Make a shortcut on your desktop (or whatever) to the soffice.exe file in your OpenOffice/program folder and add parameters -writer and -nologo after the program path:

"C:Program FilesOpenOffice.org 2.0programsoffice.exe"  -writer -nologo

This shortcut will open the Open Office Writer with a new document, without showing the splash logo first, and without starting the QuickStart utility.

There are other parameters you can pass in command line or a shortcut like the one above. To see them all, see the Help files on parameters or simply open command line and run:

C:Program FilesOpenOffice.org 2.0program>soffice.exe -?

A popup window will list all the available parameters. That’s it!
I used to be able to have a cigarette while OpenOffice Writer started, but now it just pops up like it ought to. That’s great, ’cause inspiration waits for no man.

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