OpenOffice.org , 400MB on Linux. That's less than a third the size of Office 2007, but six to seven times larger than ThinkFree.

Though they lack detailed statistics, OpenOffice.org officials such as marketing lead John McCreesh confirm that Netbooks have been "a huge help in gaining market share for us. As the PC market becomes increasingly price sensitive, and margins decline generally, we believe it is inevitable that vendors will turn to OpenOffice.org," he wrote. "The small/simple computer market just happens to be the most price sensitive place at the moment." Even so, there is no effort under way today to create a Netbook-sized version of OpenOffice.org, said community steward Louis Saurez-Potts. "As with any open-source project, if there are people, and coordinated interest, we will build it," he said via e-mail.

Most attention has been focused on how to for Netbooks. But every megabyte counts for Netbooks, and 500MB office suites can prove problematic when a Netbook of data.

Indeed, many XP-based Netbooks today are shipping without an office suite at all, said Linder.

That's what ThinkFree is counting on.