Is Open Office any good?

[gogoblender 3,068]

Hey guys

 

I'm looking for free software..anything that puts out docs like word...but free

 

I'd heard about open office...is it okay? Am I wasting my time with the download...is there something better out there.... Free?

 

 

gogo

[podgie_bear 184]

I can't speak for the latest version, but I used it for years until my new computer came with MS Office installed for free. I never had a problem with Open Office and Sun Systems have always been good about supporting their products.

[Stormwing 40]

Can't really say much about it. I've had some version of Office almost all the times, but I'm quite sure OO is the best free software there is.

And seeing it is quite compatible with MS's formats, it works well enough.

[locolagarto 15]

I use Open Office at home and on some PC's at work and it is as close to a clone to MS Office as your gonna find for free. I am sure we could make a long list of pros and cons, but for what its worth it works great for most things.

[masteff 64]

Your next best is probably Google docs but no idea how their stuff is since I haven't needed to try it. You could always download them both (open office and google) and compare (I suspect OO will be the winner but never hurts to see what's out there).

[noodles 0]

I use Open Office. Best thing about it is that the Open Office community is massive. So many templates that you can use and their is always support on hand plus you can save your files into other files like .ocx .doc .pdf etc

[Dragon Brother 619]

Well...I used it early last year but didnt quite like its feel and limitations in regards to equations and stuff when it came to writing up labreports/assignments for uni so I ended up buying the cheap student MS office version...$50 aussie (I think it was ~us$30) for their professional version

[gogoblender 3,068]

wow, great info guys! Well...I went to open office .org... it looked cool...and I got that thrilly feeling whenever I see open source software... yah! ... and then lol, mastefff.. I went off over to google docs...

 

Wow!

 

Templates and everything ...I just click it on, fill it all up and email away!

 

wheeeeeeeeeeeeeee

 

 

gogo

 

p.s. I downloaded the open office anyway..it's really cool and has loads of features... always great to have a word processor here on the comp I was thinking.

[masteff 64]

Okay, you made me curious The first problem I thought of (and a quick Google confirmed) is that right now offline access to documents is basically nil (apparently their prior thing called Gears was really flakey). So if you want to be able to work on stuff offline, that's your #1 reason to OO.

[gogoblender 3,068]

It went off very well actually, I was super happy with the accessibility and the setup, and it got out the invoice I had to send out very quickly.

 

I'm not sure why you're unable to access it masteff, I was able to use my logins and I was able to access a number of templates and chose a snazzy one.

 

 

gogo

[chattius 2,522]

My experience with typing maths was: you should stay to one office or carefully use same fonts on both offices. Typing on MSO at one computer and then changing to a linux netbook with OO at train travels: lot of strange line brakes, failed formatation, ... As soon as you have to use a font which is trademarked, OO will use a replacement font which may be a bit different.

 

But I grew up with TeX anyway, even 40 years old, it is still fastest way to type formulas, music notes, ...

[locolagarto 15]

It went off very well actually, I was super happy with the accessibility and the setup, and it got out the invoice I had to send out very quickly.

 

I'm not sure why you're unable to access it masteff, I was able to use my logins and I was able to access a number of templates and chose a snazzy one.

 

 

gogo

 

I think he meant access off network. like on a laptop with no WiFi available. Google is probably net dependent, where as Open Office is not.

[masteff 64]

I'm not sure why you're unable to access it masteff, I was able to use my logins and I was able to access a number of templates and chose a snazzy one.

Sorry, to explain what I meant... what you accessed was the online documents. They used to have a thing called Google Gear and you could save stuff on your PC or USB drive and work on docs while not connected to the internet (such as a laptop or someone w/ dialup) and then later upload them back to your document area on google website. So right now, if I understand the various user forums, you have to be able to go online to Google Docs to access your files.

 

For example, I'm a member of charitable organization and work on stuff at home/office and then use a flashdrive take to org's building and use it on the PC there. But that PC doesn't have internet so I couldn't use Google docs there. (We looked at Open Office when I rebuilt that PC but a database we use requires MS Access so we had to stick to MS.)

 

But like my personal stuff, that I only do at home or work, Google docs would be a nice replacement. Might have to check out the spreadsheet myself as I wasn't keen on the latest Office.

 

Edit: Loco got in while I was typing... yeah, what he said.

Edited August 31, 2010 by masteff

[gogoblender 3,068]

Ahh, I get now. Well, It's taking some time to get used to online office environment...but, I kinda think stuff may be going this way? No extra software and all for me to download, and I just keep all my files online with google.

 

I can see though how this would not work out so well if not connected to net.

 

Eek!

 

 

gogo

[Silearth 6]

I used Open Office for months and loved it at first. I started to get annoyed when my wife got it as well and she kept trying to send files to a friend with M$ office. Always managed to send in the wrong format even though I set it to save as a word file by default.

 

Then I started to notice how hard it was to find some functions.

 

I took the plunge and downloaded a trial of MS office 2010 Home & Student. When my trial runs out I am buying the 3 user version.