Anyone using OpenOffice?

[FearM9]

Like many people out there...I use MS Works on my home laptop and Office here at work.

I'm having a friend wipeout my old laptop's harddrive this weekend and unfortunately do not have the old MS Works discs that it originally came with. We might try to put in the Works discs that came with my new laptop onto my old laptop, but if that doesn't work...barring having to buy MS Works or Office, I'm looking at installing OpenOffice on the old laptop. Anyone use this before? How does it compare to MS Office?

Let's say a person creates a word processing document in MS Word...will it work on OpenOffice and then vice-versa? Same goes for spreadsheets as well?

Thanks!

[That Phat Hat]

Not to threadjack but a quick question: can OpenOffice encrypt Word documents? One of my clients requires password-authenticated Word files, but I'm thinking of switching to OO.

[Kryptonite]

Speaking of Works, i'm surprised that it's still around. What advantages does that have over Office?

Open Office is a free download, so you won't risk anything by trying it.

[Claus KJ]

I used to use MS office but for at least a year now I've been using OO as my office suite and I've had very little trouble switching. The only thing I've had a bit of trouble with is saving documents with pictures imbedded in the text as doc files that word can open without something looking funny. Other than that I've just had to spend a bit of time to learn how things work in OO as opposed to MS Office but overall things are pretty much the same, if you can use one of them you can use the other.

Mind I've only used the word processing and the spread sheet programs in OO, so I have no idea if things are radically different in the database or presentation programs. However as Kryptonite said it's free so my suggestion is give it a try and see how you like it. Speaking as a student the choice seems like a no-brainer but things might be different for people who actually have some kind of money.

[Grouchy]

I use Open Office and haven't encountered a problem loading or saving most .doc documents.

One thing I did notice is that the Open Office saved .doc is much larger than the MS Office saved version.

I can open .xls spreadsheets but haven't saved one yet.

[JeffS]

I use OO, and I think it's excellent. It's certainly more than adequate as a free replacement for MS Office, saving the user upwards of $300, $400, $500 (depending on sales, volume discounts, etc, for purchasing MS Office).

I'd say that only about 5% of MS Office users would have a hard time migrating to OO, due some advanced features 95% of user know nothing about, or the usage of large, complicated VBA macros.

But at least 90-95% of MS Office users could seamlessly migrate to OO.

Plus, OO is completely cross platform - you can run it on Windows, Mac, Linux, Solaris, BSD, etc.

Actually, it's quite amazing to me that people are still willing to pay MS for Office, when there is such a good free alternative. It's both fear and inertia, I guess.

[roninmedia]

Not to threadjack but a quick question: can OpenOffice encrypt Word documents? One of my clients requires password-authenticated Word files, but I'm thinking of switching to OO.

Office does allow for password protected files. It's very easy.

Turning on protection
Choose File - Save As and mark the Save with password check box. Save the document.

Turning off protection
Open the document, entering the correct password. Choose File - Save As and clear the Save with password check box.


I personally don't use the OO excel clone because I like running the formulas and stats in excel. Can't be bothered learning something else. Everyone else should be fine.

[Grouchy]

Actually, it's quite amazing to me that people are still willing to pay MS for Office, when there is such a good free alternative. It's both fear and inertia, I guess.

A couple of reasons, actually. MS Office outperforms Open Office, especially with large spreadsheet calculations. MS still has huge head start in this category; they have had good working code for years. No grammar checker. Paragraph numbering is (or to me seems to be) a pain in the ass; always wants to apply a list style. I would also assume many companies have investments in macros, VBA programs, templates and other custom programming ties to MS Office products - and it would actually cost more to convert than to drop it.

But for ma and pa and people looking to save a buck, yeah can't beat it.

[Chicago1871]

My experience with OO has been good. The two weak points I've found in regular use is the slightly different setup with the spreadsheet functions, and the powerpoint application is not as polished. I'm believe these are small nitpicking details from someone who is just used to MS Office, and I'm sure I'll work my way past them and OO will continue to improve.

[patrickdavila]

OpenOffice is great. I highly recommend it to Windows user looking to dip their toes in open source software (along with Firefox, VLC, Thunderbird, GIMP, etc..). For the vast majority of users it works perfectly. This is great time to switch as the latest version Microsoft Office has a vastly different interface than previous versions. Why would you want to spend more money and have to relearn the interface?

[Belgian guy]

I use it at work because we tend to get a lot of mails with .sxw files as attachments. But both at work and at home, I use office for my own files.

[servotron]

I'm going to give OO a try on all my new computers. Really it's just Word that I end up using the most.

[noaihmtch]

A couple of reasons, actually. MS Office outperforms Open Office, especially with large spreadsheet calculations. MS still has huge head start in this category; they have had good working code for years. No grammar checker. Paragraph numbering is (or to me seems to be) a pain in the ass; always wants to apply a list style. I would also assume many companies have investments in macros, VBA programs, templates and other custom programming ties to MS Office products - and it would actually cost more to convert than to drop it.


finally someone with right mind... i tried to open an excel file that i made for work in oo. the file had functions all over the book and over a several megabytes in size. geez it took hell a lot of time and pain in the ass waiting. the piece of crap was doing "recalculation" for more than a minute before it finally opened it. i saved it in oo format but it still did the same thing. in a meantime in excel ,it opens up right away. what a ********ing piece of shits this openoffice crap. whoever made this garbage should be ashamed of himself and never shows up in public.

everyone if you alreay have ms office, just stay with it. don't waste the limited precious time you have in life by switching to oo. you should know time is more important than money. i am willing to spend $500 for microsoft because their products always save my time. don't you want to earn $1000 in a day instead of a year?

[Kryptonite]

OpenOffice is great. I highly recommend it to Windows user looking to dip their toes in open source software (along with Firefox, VLC, Thunderbird, GIMP, etc..). For the vast majority of users it works perfectly. This is great time to switch as the latest version Microsoft Office has a vastly different interface than previous versions. Why would you want to spend more money and have to relearn the interface?

Exactly. What do you lose by downloading something free? If you don't like it, there's nothing lost.

[Kryptonite]

I'm going to give OO a try on all my new computers. Really it's just Word that I end up using the most.

Yeah, and why pay for a suite when you only need one program? Let us know how you like it. If you could get Word seperately for a reduced rate, that might be worth the purchase, but OO is certainly a viable alternative.

You can also download updates for free, unlike MS. :)

[Grouchy]

what a ********ing piece of shits this openoffice crap. whoever made this garbage should be ashamed of himself and never shows up in public.
Gosh, didn't you read the rest of my post(s)? Open Office is far from a piece of ****. Here are some facts about Open Office.

My "Blog of the Dead" story blog is well over 55,000 words now and a good 90 percent of it was done using OO Writer; about half of that on an AMD Duron, 256mb laptop. No problems. The support spreadsheet containing tabs for the timeline, statistical formulas (with timeline interaction), name generation and tracking, mapping, etc. about 456K in Excel; also handled easily on the same craptop using Open Office.

Open Office is extremely helpful to me because I use multiple computers. I have a power/development station, main workstation, laptop and Linux workstation. I would be stupid to license MS Office on all four computers at a cost of ? ($800-$1500?). The only reason why I have MS Office at home is because work extended one of their volume licenses to me.

For the user at the top of this thread with a laptop there is no reason why they couldn't try it. If it works, great, you saved a chunk of money. If it sucks, then hey pony up the couple hundo for MS Office.

everyone if you alreay have ms office, just stay with it. don't waste the limited precious time you have in life by switching to oo. you should know time is more important than money. i am willing to spend $500 for microsoft because their products always save my time. don't you want to earn $1000 in a day instead of a year?

Definitely, if you have already invested money then don't unless you are going to save a boatload of cash in the long run. Time is money. But two things here. The original poster was wiping a laptop system and did not have money invested; was looking to Open Office to save money.

But, $1000 in a day instead of a year? C'mon. Did Excel generate that far-fetched number for you? Maybe you need to tweak a formula or something.

[Daniel from Montréal]

Ignore new-name hamatachi, he's a comically retarded and ferocious pro-MSer.

[servotron]

Yeah, and why pay for a suite when you only need one program? Let us know how you like it. If you could get Word seperately for a reduced rate, that might be worth the purchase, but OO is certainly a viable alternative.

You can also download updates for free, unlike MS. :)

I downloaded and installed OO on my wife's business computer last night. First off, seems great. They will never do more than the most basic Word processing stuff.... and it works great for that, and opens semi-difficultly-formatted Word docs with ease.

SCORE.

[Andy Bennett]

I use Open Office and haven't encountered a problem loading or saving most .doc documents.

One thing I did notice is that the Open Office saved .doc is much larger than the MS Office saved version.

But the OO document native files, (.odt), are about a quarter of the size of the MS ones.

I can open .xls spreadsheets but haven't saved one yet.
Similar story to the above I believe although I haven't had as much use out of them.

[Andy Bennett]

But, $1000 in a day instead of a year? C'mon. Did Excel generate that far-fetched number for you? Maybe you need to tweak a formula or something.
He can't... a microsoft product has just had a bug, virus or worm and deleted his hard disk :D