David Baxter PhD
Late Founder
Break from MS Office with free alternatives
By Scott Spanbauer, Windows Secrets
June 18, 2009
If you're thinking of skipping the next expensive Microsoft Office upgrade, you can begin preparing today for the move to a free Office-like suite or Web service.
A gradual and easy transition allows you to avoid any possible file incompatibilities, because you can still keep an old copy of Office available as a safety net.
I like almost everything about Microsoft Office except its price. Even so, like many people, I use only a fraction of the suite's features. I rely mostly on the basic formatting, spellcheck, grammar, and review features of Word, with an occasional Excel spreadsheet or PowerPoint slide thrown in for good measure. The rest of Office is bloatware to me.
I don't automate my documents with VBA macros; my Excel tables are rudimentary; and my PowerPoint presentations are just the facts, ma'am. Do I really need to pay to load a copy of Office on every computer I use?
I stuck with the Microsoft behemoth all the way through Office 2003. To date, I've never felt a need for Office 2007. In recent years, meanwhile, upstart productivity applications have seduced me away from Microsoft's ubiquitous suite.
I started using the free, open-source OpenOffice.org suite on a daily basis several years ago to see whether it could really replace Office. Though OpenOffice's menu commands, dialog boxes, and settings often vary only slightly from those of the corresponding Microsoft Office applications, I found the switch to OpenOffice's Writer and Calc applications easy.
And because OpenOffice is free, I can install the program on every one of the PCs I use, whether it runs Windows, Linux, or OS X. You can get your copy ? or copies ? at the OpenOffice.org download page.
I outlined the major differences between MS Office and OpenOffice in my Oct. 30, 2008, review of OpenOffice.org 3. There are a couple of reasons why I haven't given up Office 2003 entirely. For one thing, I maintain several important databases in Access. Unfortunately, OpenOffice's Base database program is not a replacement for Access. Base can't read and save Access files the way Writer does with Word files, Calc does with Excel files, and Impress does with PowerPoint files.
Another reason I keep a copy of Office around is because OpenOffice lacks a PIM analogous to Outlook. This is a hole you can fill with one of the many alternatives I reviewed in my July 31, 2008, and Aug. 14, 2008, Best Software columns. Another alternative is to use OpenOffice with Yahoo's free Zimbra Desktop service in place of Outlook.
Compatibility with Office file types remains a problem for OpenOffice and other Office alternatives. Before you make the switch, open your most important Office documents in the Office replacement of your choice to ensure that the files look and function as expected.
OpenOffice opens and saves files in .doc, .xls, and .ppt formats (among others), usually without a problem. In my experience, however, those documents may not always look and behave exactly as they do in Microsoft Office.
You can protect yourself from unwanted surprises by opening and printing a generous sampling of key files you've exchanged with co-workers and clients. More importantly, keep an old copy of Office installed on at least one of your computers, just in case.
Stick with standard Office file formats
You can minimize file-compatibility issues by standardizing on the most common file formats. By default, OpenOffice.org saves files in Open Document Format (ODF). Microsoft's by-the-book support for ODF, unfortunately, breaks some spreadsheet files, according to a recent ZDNet blog post.
OpenOffice reads and writes Office 2007's default .docx and .xlsx XML file formats. But the older .doc and .xls formats are still the ones most often used. I suggest that you make the classic Office formats your defaults in OpenOffice. To set .doc as the document default, for example, open any OpenOffice program and do the following:
By Scott Spanbauer, Windows Secrets
June 18, 2009
If you're thinking of skipping the next expensive Microsoft Office upgrade, you can begin preparing today for the move to a free Office-like suite or Web service.
A gradual and easy transition allows you to avoid any possible file incompatibilities, because you can still keep an old copy of Office available as a safety net.
I like almost everything about Microsoft Office except its price. Even so, like many people, I use only a fraction of the suite's features. I rely mostly on the basic formatting, spellcheck, grammar, and review features of Word, with an occasional Excel spreadsheet or PowerPoint slide thrown in for good measure. The rest of Office is bloatware to me.
I don't automate my documents with VBA macros; my Excel tables are rudimentary; and my PowerPoint presentations are just the facts, ma'am. Do I really need to pay to load a copy of Office on every computer I use?
I stuck with the Microsoft behemoth all the way through Office 2003. To date, I've never felt a need for Office 2007. In recent years, meanwhile, upstart productivity applications have seduced me away from Microsoft's ubiquitous suite.
I started using the free, open-source OpenOffice.org suite on a daily basis several years ago to see whether it could really replace Office. Though OpenOffice's menu commands, dialog boxes, and settings often vary only slightly from those of the corresponding Microsoft Office applications, I found the switch to OpenOffice's Writer and Calc applications easy.
And because OpenOffice is free, I can install the program on every one of the PCs I use, whether it runs Windows, Linux, or OS X. You can get your copy ? or copies ? at the OpenOffice.org download page.
I outlined the major differences between MS Office and OpenOffice in my Oct. 30, 2008, review of OpenOffice.org 3. There are a couple of reasons why I haven't given up Office 2003 entirely. For one thing, I maintain several important databases in Access. Unfortunately, OpenOffice's Base database program is not a replacement for Access. Base can't read and save Access files the way Writer does with Word files, Calc does with Excel files, and Impress does with PowerPoint files.
Another reason I keep a copy of Office around is because OpenOffice lacks a PIM analogous to Outlook. This is a hole you can fill with one of the many alternatives I reviewed in my July 31, 2008, and Aug. 14, 2008, Best Software columns. Another alternative is to use OpenOffice with Yahoo's free Zimbra Desktop service in place of Outlook.
Compatibility with Office file types remains a problem for OpenOffice and other Office alternatives. Before you make the switch, open your most important Office documents in the Office replacement of your choice to ensure that the files look and function as expected.
OpenOffice opens and saves files in .doc, .xls, and .ppt formats (among others), usually without a problem. In my experience, however, those documents may not always look and behave exactly as they do in Microsoft Office.
You can protect yourself from unwanted surprises by opening and printing a generous sampling of key files you've exchanged with co-workers and clients. More importantly, keep an old copy of Office installed on at least one of your computers, just in case.
Stick with standard Office file formats
You can minimize file-compatibility issues by standardizing on the most common file formats. By default, OpenOffice.org saves files in Open Document Format (ODF). Microsoft's by-the-book support for ODF, unfortunately, breaks some spreadsheet files, according to a recent ZDNet blog post.
OpenOffice reads and writes Office 2007's default .docx and .xlsx XML file formats. But the older .doc and .xls formats are still the ones most often used. I suggest that you make the classic Office formats your defaults in OpenOffice. To set .doc as the document default, for example, open any OpenOffice program and do the following:
- Step 1. Choose Tools, Options;
- Step 2. Select General under Load/Save;
- Step 3. Click Text Document under Document type in the Default file format and ODF settings section;
- Step 4. Choose Microsoft Word 97/2000/XP in the Always save as drop-down menu and click OK.
- Step 1. Choose Spreadsheet under Document type in the Default file format and ODF settings section;
- Step 2. Choose Microsoft Excel 97/2000/XP in the Always save as drop-down list and click OK.
