I am considering downloading OpenOffice (free) rather than buy MS Office. Can anyone advise of pros/cons?

Question

Is Open Office truly compatible with MS-Office, are there any advantages (other than cost) or disadvantages in using this software?

Answer 1

The advantages are numerous:
*It's free
*It's license isn't as restrictive
*It can save files into formats used by MS office, and others.
*It can save files into any year of MS office (backwards compatible files).
*It's not Microsoft - MS is getting a worse and worse reputation over the years.
*You won't be locked into the newer versions of the Digital Rights Management (where other people have control over your files, not you).
*It's constantly improving - MS creates a new way of making .doc files with each version of Office. Within a few months of MS's release, OO can read and write the same files.

Cons
*It's might be a tad bigger, and a tad slower in side by side comparisons (mainly because there aren't as many things preloaded for OO before it starts up. MS products have this.)
*You have to download it - it's not sold in stores.
*You might need to learn a slightly new way of doing things - things are in slightly different places.

All in all, I'd recommend OpenOffice.
I also recommend Firefox (Internet Explorer replacement) and Thunderbird (Outlook replacement).

Answer 2

I've tried Open Office. I still use MS Office because I bought and paid for it.

The Open Office interface is a little different. I didn't think it was as user friendly, but this may be only because I'm not as familiar with it as I am with MS Office.

Most of the files that Open Office creates are fully compatible with MS Office files. The only problem I found was that the database program is not fully compatible with MS Access. It could open an Access database, but the menus and forms didn't convert. All I got was the tables. If you don't use database files, this shouldn't be an issue.

I feel Open Office is an acceptable alternative to MS Office.

Answer 3

I used OpenOffice and found it to be a bit buggy. Since bought StarOffice ( a paid for version of OpenOffice, with the bugs missing ) No problems with this. I paid £25 at Staples office world sale. You should be able to a get a used copy from Amazon for a few quid.

OpenOffice is constantly being changed, hence very bug ridden. Use StarOffice instead.

Open and StarOffice do not have all the functions of Microsoft e.g. no multiple clipboards. StarOffice is truly compatible.

Answer 4

I have OpenOffice and MSOffice 2003 and haven't found anything I can't do with OpenOffice that I could do with MS Office. OpenOffice will read all MS Office files and can even save your documents to PDF format.

One exception is the e-mail reader Outlook, but you can get Thunderbird (in my opinion a better e-mail app) at http://www.mozilla.com.

Answer 5

The only incompatibilities I'm aware of are that OO uses a different font algorithm, so documents don't always look exactly the same as they would in MS Office. If you need to send documents to MS Office users and need to know they'll look right, OO can be a problem. But if you're mainly concerned with reading documents from other people and reading your own documents, it's fine.

Answer 6

The full version off Microsoft Office Professional 2003 (Excel, Outlook, Word, Powerpoint, Publisher, Access) is about £437.99 from Amazon go to :-
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Office-Professional-Outlook-Powerpoint-Publisher/dp/B0000AZJVC/ref=pd_ts_c_th_10/203-1233361-0714358

An equivalent set of office tools is Star Office from Sun Systems you can have a full-featured office productivity suite that's compatible with Microsoft Office at just a slice of the cost.
Go to Sun Systems and read about it, at :-
http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/index.jsp
Or get the trial version first before you buy it from :-
http://www.sun.com/software/star/staroffice/get.jsp

Or you can buy it from Amazon,
StarOffice 8 (PC/Linux) (2005) (Linux, Unix, Windows 2000 / 95 / 98 / Me / NT)
Buy new: £53.99 from Amazon go to :-
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_ss_sw_h_/203-1233361-0714358?url=search-alias%3Dsoftware&field-keywords=StarOffice+8+&Go.x=11&Go.y=15&Go=Go

Or if you prefer free software OpenOffice is an exellent suite of office tools, get it from :-
http://www.openoffice.org/product/index.html

I would suggest you try the trial version of Star Office and test the compatibility requirements that you need, if it does what you need it to, then consider buying it.

Answer 7

I've never used it, since I have a copy of office 2000 that I've been loading on my computers (and everyone elses computers that need it).

I definitely wouldn't shell out the cash for office.

You can always just save your files in .txt format, and they will be useable by anyone.