Swopping Office for OpenOffice

[Balstrome]

I want to get rid of MS office, totally and use OpenOffice. What types of problems will I have, and suggestions on how to solve these. I have been using Office since 97, so I have a large amount of files in the ms formats.

Would a straight uninstall of MS Office, a reboot and then an install of OpenOffice be ok and save or will some sort of conversion be needed first ?

 

[The_Unbeliever]

What is the latest version of Office you have?

OpenOffice should be able to read all Office formats with ease.

You can install OO without uninstalling M$ office, and try it out to see if there's any funnies. Once you're satisfied all is well, then you can uninstall M$ office.

 

[Balstrome]

I think it's the latest version, grabbed it off the local ftp.

Maybe I try the double install and see, always scared of doing double installs, they usually bite me in the butt

 

[Tacet]

I've had the double install before without any issues - used to use OO for technical docs with lots of math in (I liked the LaTeX like math editing).

 

[w1z4rd]

I stopped using OpenOffice unless I am offline. Otherwise Google Docs works fine for me.

 

[LazyLion]

The biggest problem we had was getting the bank and other clients to be able to open our files that we sent them.

Nedbank refused point blank to install the openoffice converter that would have allowed them to open ODF files.

So we had to start saving all of our docs in excel format which kinda negates the whole purpose then of moving to OpenOffice.

The other headache I had was making sure all the computers had the latest version of Java and that the users were updating their OpenOffice versions.

Most of the time they just sit there and stare at the upgrade notice.

 

[LazyLion]

I stopped using OpenOffice unless I am offline. Otherwise Google Docs works fine for me.

unfortunately the free version of Google docs is limited to a two megabyte file size.

 

[znubair]

The biggest problem we had was getting the bank and other clients to be able to open our files that we sent them.

Nedbank refused point blank to install the openoffice converter that would have allowed them to open ODF files.

So we had to start saving all of our docs in excel format which kinda negates the whole purpose then of moving to OpenOffice.

The other headache I had was making sure all the computers had the latest version of Java and that the users were updating their OpenOffice versions.

Most of the time they just sit there and stare at the upgrade notice.

You dont have to save the files in ODF, you can save it in any MS Office format

 

[czc]

You dont have to save the files in ODF, you can save it in any MS Office format

He was saying that defeats the purpose of having an open format.

 

[The_Unbeliever]

stupid banks *mutter*

 

[czc]

Do you guys think that Open Office can be feasibly used in a small business?

 

[Nod]

Do you guys think that Open Office can be feasibly used in a small business?

It will depend on what type of documents you create (macros, etc), and what format your business partner uses.

In general it shouldn't be a problem, and using PDF as standard when sending documents to other people, makes more sense.

 

[Drake2007]

Do you guys think that Open Office can be feasibly used in a small business?

Depends on the business, if it's just word processing and some simple spreadsheets then yes but as soon as it comes to any makros or VBA, say from suppliers, then things fall over terribly.

 

[plazma]

I don't think that being able to save documents in open document format is the reason d'etre for Open Office. You're kinda missing the point there.

The point of Open Office is that it is FREE. It costs NOTHING. And it can save its documents in a format that can be opened by all the people who use MS products. I won't even try to explain the other advantages of not paying money to a massive, multinational corporation etc.. etc.. etc..

Once you buy MS Office, you are forever bonded into en endless cycle of costly upgrades to keep up with 'product development' - Open Office upgrades are forever free of charge.

 

[ponder]

Most of the time they just sit there and stare at the upgrade notice.

I've noticed people do that with all things from windows updates to antivirus updates

I have someones laptop on my desk here with about 120 virii, trojans & worms, I give up.

 

[Balstrome]

I've noticed people do that with all things from windows updates to antivirus updates

I have someones laptop on my desk here with about 120 virii, trojans & worms, I give up.

Something I think leaving dumb terminals behind was a really stupid idea.

 

[killadoob]

It is good but i find load of my suppliers pricelists freeze on it, highly annoying and i uninstalled it.

Nice for something free but annoying when some files do not work i mean if i am going to need office i may as well just use it.

 

[wayfarer]

If you use mail merge with spreadsheet or database docs you may run into some issues. also the spreadsheet formulas are not as diverse and versatile as MS Office 2010.

 

[Asha'man X]

Since you are running it under Windows, a small benefit is that you have access right away to a larger set of fonts than you would if you were running it on Linux. My colleague runs that setup at work, and he often has to boot up a VM with Microsoft Office to do serious work. I sent him a very simple Word document with a border, a banner image at the top of the 1st page and the text in a numbered list. Writer totally butchered the file when opening it, and after he sent me the doc back, I had to copy and paste his stuff into my copy of the doc and reformat it. Maybe it was because the file was in 2007 .docx format, but either way, I was not impressed with the end result.

 

[Synaesthesia]

The additional fonts are freely available on MS's website - but they aren't included in Linux by default obviously.