Openoffice vs Microsoft Excel..?

Question

Hi,
I often need to plot quick graphs..Currently I use Excel for it..
but I don't feel quite good about it..
My copy of Excel that I use currently is pirated..

I installed Open Office , but either the interface is different or may be all the fns are not even available.
Would sbdy pl give insights into how does openoffice compare with microsoft office? and what about the file compatibility..?

What office package does Linux use?

What about Mac?

Thanks

Answer 1

Hi,

Microsoft Office is a Macintosh application that was ported to Windows many years ago so that Windows users could use it, too. Microsoft sells Office for Windows and Mac. A new Mac version (Office 2008) will be released January 15.

OpenOffice is a competing product made by Sun Microsystems. They tried to sell it against Microsoft Office, but people just weren't all that excited about it, so Sun decided to give their money-losing dog away so as to hurt Microsoft's sales and made it open source to get free developer support from the open source community. OpenOffice can open and save in Microsoft's file format.

OpenOffice is available both Mac and Windows (not sure about LINUX). Graphs you make in OpenOffice will often look different in Microsoft Office, and vice-versa even if you save them in Microsoft Office format. If sharing your files with Microsoft Office users is important, I'd recommend you purchase the Microsoft brand. You can purchase just Excel as a stand-alone if you don't want the entire Office suite.

On the other hand if you just need to make the graphs and print them and use them only on your own computer then OpenOffice will be just fine for you. If you share the graphs with other OpenOffice users they will be fine, too.

There is a major difference in the user interfaces of Microsoft Office for Windows, Microsoft Office for Mac, and OpenOffice. The best user interface (GUI) in my opinion is Office 2004 on the Mac. The worst is office 2007 on Windows. OpenOffice looks a lot like Microsoft Office version 5, which some people hated but I kinda liked it so I think it's OK.

If you ever decide you want to get into advanced features that involve automation, programming, or using databases with your graphs, then Excel is the only way to go. OpenOffice's visual basic is mostly broken, and OpenOffice does not have a Structured Query Language (SQL) GUI (Graphical User Interface) at all, but Excel does. There are thousands of Excel add-ins, but I doubt many will work in OpenOffice due to the broken VBA.

-Jim Gordon
Microsoft Mac MVP

MVPs are independent and do not work for Microsoft
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/

Answer 2

I can't answer for Mac as I don't use one. I'm a Windows man myself.

Linux users use OpenOffice, I know that much!

As for the differences between them, OpenOffice touts itself as fully compatible....and it is to an extent, but there are differemces, as you probably seen.

Your basic "=sum" formula's work ok, but your more advanced features don't work the same way.

OpenOffice is great when you get used to it, but it's the getting used to it over MS Office!

Answer 3

open office and excel are about the same, they do the same stuff, but there gui are different.... mac uses ms office but linux uses open office... so it just comes down to which one you want to use....

Open office is growing and more and more people are using it instead of MS office.... Its free and they dont have to worry about tryen to get a pirated copy of it....