SOT - Free Open Source Office Suite For Both W7 & Linux

I'm gradually getting there with a standard W7 64-bit build for use on
two different laptops. When the W7 image is finished, at least one,
probably both, will dual-boot with Linux.

What do people think is the best open source alternative for Microsoft
Office?

Currently I'm still using Office 2000 Pro and prefer the simple,
old-fashioned, professional menu approach rather than a GUI cluttered
with girlie hackerslashery. Of the Office functions, I use mostly
Outlook for email, Excel for relatively simple spreadsheets, Word for
diminishing numbers of letters and other formal documents, and very
occasionally Power Point for presentations and making large labels for
parcels, I hardly ever use Access these days, and in fact had to
remind myself what it was actually called when writing this sentence.
Being able to import old data from Office 2000 and preferably Office
2010 (which I experimented with for a while) is thus vital. I also
want something that will work on Linux.

I'm presuming it's going to have to be Thunderbird or similar to
replace Outlook, but I'm wondering about the others. Some seem to
prefer Open Office, others Office Libre. Are there any significant
factors in choosing between them?
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"Java Jive" wrote

| What do people think is the best open source alternative for Microsoft
| Office?
|

I use Libre Office. It's good enough for my needs,
despite being unforgivably bloated. My understanding
is that Open Office support didn't continue and the
people there went to Libre Office. Politics. I
don't remember the details exactly. OO started as
Star Office. Sun open-sourced it. Then Oracle had
it. Then Apache got it. As I recall there was some kind
of fight over Apache's handling and the main people
forked it to Libre Office. As far as I know, LO is now
the only one still being worked on.

You can keep MSO 2000 for DOC and open DOCX
in LO. But LO won't entirely handle DOCX with complex
elements like tables. So you might be in a spot if
someone insists on sending you those. It's best if
you can get them to convert to DOC in their version
of MSO.

This topic came up awhile back and a few other
options were mentioned, but I haven't come across
anything that's free and still compares to LO. If it
also needs to work on Linux then I would guess that
LO is really your only option.

On Thu, 27 Jul 2017 18:21:20 +0100, Java Jive wrote:

What do people think is the best open source alternative for Microsoft
Office?

LibreOffice.

--
s|b

On 07/27/2017 01:21 PM, Java Jive wrote:
I'm gradually getting there with a standard W7 64-bit build for use on
two different laptops. When the W7 image is finished, at least one,
probably both, will dual-boot with Linux.

What do people think is the best open source alternative for Microsoft
Office?

Currently I'm still using Office 2000 Pro and prefer the simple,
old-fashioned, professional menu approach rather than a GUI cluttered
with girlie hackerslashery. Of the Office functions, I use mostly
Outlook for email, Excel for relatively simple spreadsheets, Word for
diminishing numbers of letters and other formal documents, and very
occasionally Power Point for presentations and making large labels for
parcels, I hardly ever use Access these days, and in fact had to
remind myself what it was actually called when writing this sentence.
Being able to import old data from Office 2000 and preferably Office
2010 (which I experimented with for a while) is thus vital. I also
want something that will work on Linux.

I'm presuming it's going to have to be Thunderbird or similar to
replace Outlook, but I'm wondering about the others. Some seem to
prefer Open Office, others Office Libre. Are there any significant
factors in choosing between them?


As others say too, Libre Office. And it's in Linux Package Manager so
it's real easy to install in Linux.

On 27/07/2017 18:21, Java Jive wrote:
I crap deleted


I wonder if the post was from a habitual drunk individual!!. The reason
I ask is because the word SOT was used in the subject matter and Oxford
English Dictionary states:

sot
n noun a habitual drunkard.
n verb (sots, sotting, sotted) archaic drink alcohol habitually.

DERIVATIVES
sottish adjective

ORIGIN
Old English sott 'foolish person', from medieval Latin sottus,
reinforced by Old French sot 'foolish'.

We seem to get all sorts here these days. The days of newsgroups are
clearly over with only nutters using them.

--
With over 500 million devices now running Windows 10, customer
satisfaction is higher than any previous version of windows.

Big Al wrote:
On 07/27/2017 01:21 PM, Java Jive wrote:
I'm gradually getting there with a standard W7 64-bit build for use on
two different laptops. When the W7 image is finished, at least one,
probably both, will dual-boot with Linux.

What do people think is the best open source alternative for Microsoft
Office?

Currently I'm still using Office 2000 Pro and prefer the simple,
old-fashioned, professional menu approach rather than a GUI cluttered
with girlie hackerslashery. Of the Office functions, I use mostly
Outlook for email, Excel for relatively simple spreadsheets, Word for
diminishing numbers of letters and other formal documents, and very
occasionally Power Point for presentations and making large labels for
parcels, I hardly ever use Access these days, and in fact had to
remind myself what it was actually called when writing this sentence.
Being able to import old data from Office 2000 and preferably Office
2010 (which I experimented with for a while) is thus vital. I also
want something that will work on Linux.

I'm presuming it's going to have to be Thunderbird or similar to
replace Outlook, but I'm wondering about the others. Some seem to
prefer Open Office, others Office Libre. Are there any significant
factors in choosing between them?


As others say too, Libre Office. And it's in Linux Package Manager so
it's real easy to install in Linux.

One difference is, they've chosen OpenGL in both Linux and Windows.

The ATI OpenGL Windows driver, can no longer detect the amount of
remaining video card RAM properly (this is due to the different
flavors of WDDM and "who owns the memory"). Which is why graphs
in LibreOffice Calc, take five minutes to appear on the screen.
It's actually an OpenGL problem.

Of course, they wouldn't recode that "just for Windows"
versions, to use DirectX. Because... FOSS.

It's real easy to install on Windows too. As for
usage, it's a YMMV thing.

*******

In a search, it's pretty hard to find the commercial ones.

I expect companies like this are having trouble staying afloat.

http://www.softmaker.com/en/softmaker-office

Paul

In message , Mayayana
writes:
[]
You can keep MSO 2000 for DOC and open DOCX
in LO. But LO won't entirely handle DOCX with complex
elements like tables. So you might be in a spot if
someone insists on sending you those. It's best if
you can get them to convert to DOC in their version
of MSO.
[]
MS released free - I don't know what you'd call them, addons? utilities?
- for (some) earlier versions of Word (and I think Excel) that allow
them to open (though not save) .docx etc. documents; I haven't looked
lately to see if they're still available, but if not lots of people must
have them (they were IIRR a single installer file). Obviously, they'd
not give you facilities that weren't _in_ the earlier version of MSO,
but at least you can open the files and get _most_ of the information.
(Also, I think, the free standalone viewers [i. e. for people who don't
have Office at all] can handle the .docx etc. files.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

782.55 - The Number of The Beast (including VAT)

"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote

| MS released free - I don't know what you'd call them, addons? utilities?
| - for (some) earlier versions of Word (and I think Excel) that allow
| them to open (though not save) .docx etc. documents;

I looked into that at one point. I don't remember
if it even worked. I seem to remember some special
requirement. In any case, I think that most people
who actually need to work with DOCX will need to be
able to edit/create and not just read.

In message , Mayayana
writes:
"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote

| MS released free - I don't know what you'd call them, addons? utilities?
| - for (some) earlier versions of Word (and I think Excel) that allow
| them to open (though not save) .docx etc. documents;

I looked into that at one point. I don't remember
if it even worked. I seem to remember some special
requirement. In any case, I think that most people
who actually need to work with DOCX will need to be
able to edit/create and not just read.

I can't remember if I've played with the standalone viewers since the
advent of the new formats; they certainly worked for me before that. As
for the ability to import .docx etc. into my existing Word, I haven't
had a file that I haven't been able to import yet. (Granted, my elderly
news/email prog. first says something like "this is really a .zip file
[which indeed it is] - do you want to rename it?", but as long as I just
export it from the email as a .docx, my older Word with the patch can
import it.)

As for people needing to edit/create in the new formats: why? I'd say
only if the document includes features that only _work_ in the new
version; the people they interact with's new version can still, so far,
read the old .doc format. And given that the vast majority of users only
use a fraction of the features of a word processor (probably
spreadsheets too), the chance of them actually using one of the new
features is quite low, I'd say.

Of course, I guess there are circles in which not saving in .docx is
seen as "old-fashioned" and thus a credibility problem; fortunately, I
don't work in any such circles.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Just seen a Dyslexic Yorkshireman wearing a cat flap!