Hi,
Does anyone know about a open source software that would be the equivalent of the SmartArt module that is available in Office 2010.
It’s quite interesting for professional presentation ! And it is automatic to build presentation with text inputs !
Thanks for any suggestions !
Sample of what smartart can do :
No there isn’t; Linux programs tend to be free-standing. So, for example, you might use Dia for diagrams and import them into whatever document you are using.
While such modules may look superficially attractive, they are a pain if you want to use the contents in another context, e.g. a high quality publishing program, because they tended to be embedded in the Office document in ways which make using them in any other context difficult. It’s called vendor lock in.
If you are interested in really professional presentation, steer clear of Office. Yes, it has everything if you have a PhD and the time to hunt it down. But, if you don’t, you will ultimately be disappointed when you put your ‘professional’ Office document against something produced in a really professional program. I’ve spent the past week demonstrating that to someone who had laboured months to produce a book in Word and is astonished at the superior quality that LaTeX can produce in hours.
Thanks for your answer. I pretty much agree with you. The are plenty of software that will bring you much more than Office SmartArt, but it will also need a bit more time.
For those that are interested I have made some tries and the result is pretty much interesting ! No need to have a virtualised Windows rotfl!
* [JGraph](http://www.jgraph.com/) includes Process diagrams, workflow and BPM visualization, flowcharts, even traffic or water flow.
* [yEd](http://www.yworks.com/en/products_yed_about.html) – Java™ Graph Editor is written entirely in the Java programming language. It can be used to quickly and effectively generate drawings and to apply automatic layouts to a range of different diagrams and networks.
* Web apps like [Online Diagram Software and Flowchart Software - Gliffy](http://www.gliffy.com/)
Hope that it will help those that want to express complex ideas with a simple chart !