keynote importing/exporting to opendocument format ODP or ppt

The real question here is not what software package we should use

At least that question has an answer.

but why the keynote application can not save a presentation in the standard opendocument format.

Unfortunately no one can answer it for you, and no one can tell you when or whether keynote will ever save that way. To tell Apple you want it, use this link:

http://www.apple.com/feedback/keynote.html

I'm surprised that Keynote even supports export to .odp. But then, my own personal Keynote is quite old, and dates from 2003.

Can I ask what version of Keynote you are using? And, also, what version of OpenOffice.org?

As well, given the increasing popularity of both Keynote (Apple Macs, at least) and OOo (>50 million users, probably over 100M), I'd propose to either or both Apple and OOo to work on a better export/import filter, thus allowing greater compatibility and interoperability.

-louis (community manager, OpenOffice.org)

I think anything you're trying to do that includes Keynote will be horribly mangled when opened with anything other than Keynote. PowerPoint is a "common formatand OpenOffice merely builds on that with the goal of being as compatible as possible. Keynote presentations aren't really meant to be easily transportable to other formats because Apple's goal is not to create another PowerPoint clone. I would imagine there are features Keynote has that can't be replicated in PowerPoint and by extension, OpenOffice.

While it's a noble idea to include presentations created by Keynote users, you would have to give them VERY strict guidelines (so that the features they're using are kept as simple as possible). Even then, the results still likely won't be very good. Luckily, you can suggest that Keynote users download the free OpenOffice and create their presentations with that.

The real question here is not what software package we should use but why the keynote application can not save a presentation in the standard opendocument format.

i can accept that the nice keynote transitions would be lost but i would rather have document portability and be certain i can open my documents in the future. Just try to open an old harvard graphics presentation on your current platform and you will note that a standard document format is as important as using good backup media.

I'm surprised that Keynote even supports export to .odp.

It doesn't as far as I can see. The export options are quicktime, ppt, pdf, images, and html.

Apple seems to be in 2 minds in regards to the open document formats.

None of the iWork programs support it, only TextEdit does.

Peter

But there's always the option to simply use the FREE OpenOffice software when compatibility is of the utmost importance.