Rutba Office 2.20: only the apps you choose, profiles, and mail kept in step with the server

Rutba Office 2.19 and 2.20 were built side by side and went out together on 27 October as 2.20. It changes how the suite is installed, gives each person on a computer a space of their own, and makes Mail a client that keeps the server in step rather than a copy that drifts from it.

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What’s new in Rutba Office 2.20.

Only the apps you choose

Since 2.6 you could turn apps off; since 2.20 they are not installed in the first place. The installer asks which apps to install, writes only those, and registers only their kinds of file. An update keeps the apps you have and adds any app that is new in that version.

• Add or remove apps on the launcher adds an app from this version’s release, or from a folder of app files, and removes one at the next start.
• Each app is a signed pack. Its code sits in a pack of its own, signed for this release. A pack that is damaged, changed or from another version is refused, and an app that is not installed says so in plain words wherever you might look for it.
• Smaller. In 2.21 the installer went from 176 MB to 149 MB with the apps compressed harder. The portable version still carries every app.

Profiles

Two people sharing a computer, or one person keeping work and home apart, can now have profiles side by side, each in its own folder with its own mail, calendars and recent files. A menu on the launcher switches between them, and its badge says whose profile is open.

• A password if you like. It seals the profile’s saved passwords, recent files, calendars, contacts, Talk messages and mail. If the computer stops halfway through setting or changing it, the change is finished at the next start, with every message still readable.
• A keystore for each profile. Every password a profile saves, for mail, calendars, Talk or Data Files’ engines, is kept in a keystore that opens only in that profile, on this computer and this Windows account. Copied anywhere else it does not open, and Office asks for each password again as it needs it.

Mail at the server

• Changes reach the server. Marks, moves, deletes, junk and the copy in Sent are made in your mailbox on the server, so your phone sees them. A change made offline is sent when the server is back.
• New mail by itself, as Mail opens, every few minutes, and the moment the server says something has arrived.
• Folders are made, renamed and deleted at the server, and messages dragged onto a folder move there.
• One-click unsubscribe sends its one request from Mail, without opening a web page.
• Import again adds only what the mailbox made from that file did not already hold.

Gmail and Outlook.com accounts still sign in with an app password; signing in with Google or Microsoft waits for their registrations. Calendar and Contacts gained invitations that send on save, single occurrences of a repeating event edited on their own, a second time zone, and CSV imports you see before they come in.

Files as other programs wrote them

Documents, workbooks and presentations made in the Strict form of Open XML now open, stay Strict when saved, and can be saved as Strict from each app’s menu. The suite was also checked against 419 public documents from government statistics offices and open-source test suites, and a large set of real business files. Every one that is not damaged or locked with a password opens, and comes back unchanged when saved and opened again.

• Workbooks. A chart sheet opens, and a sheet whose formulas read whole columns of thousands of rows calculates in seconds, not minutes. Charts made in Excel are drawn as Excel drew them.
• Documents. A long manual opens in seconds rather than over a minute.
• Macro-enabled files and templates (.docm, .xlsm, .pptm and the rest) are saved under their own names with their macros kept.
• PDF. A file protected with a password asks for it, opens, and keeps its protection when saved.

Data Files’ own format was published as an open specification at the same time, with a checker and sample files. Its share of the release is in the Data Files post, and the release later the same day, 2.21, is all about pictures.