What is Open Office?
Are you still paying for and using Microsoft Office products that costs you an arm and a leg? Well stop right where you are. Open Office disintermediates Microsoft from the desktop publishing business with a Suite of really cool office tools.
What’s Inside Open Office?
Everything that’s inside Microsoft Office and actually more- how about instant PDFs?
Here’s what else you get…
- Base – database!
- Writer – word, on crack.
- Calc – incredible excel
- Impress – awesome presentations
- Draw – sketch, draw, flowcharts, and more!
Do You Use it?
We’ve been using Open Office for the better part of a year and participate in the project fully. When the need arose for a PDF document creation solution without the pricetag, Open Office presented that solution and a whole host of other solutions.
Is it Buggy or Lacking?
If you’re absolutely a MS Office fan you will find many variations of the same functions, but what has been most impressive to me is the forums and open discussions around the net about those issues and resolutions. For the most part, the casual user will find the product to be absolutely solid, and easy to use. The hard core desktop publisher may find issues, but a solution is a click away.
Can You Open Word Documents in Open Office?
Yes! And more importantly, Word can open Open Office Documents!
What About Templates?!
There are tons of templates, but the cool thing about Open Office is that you can actually create your own templates in a snap. Whether you want to write an e-book, whitepaper your blog, create fancy newsletters, or mailers- it’s a breeze and it’s free. Everything a successful agent needs.
Where do I Get it?
Check out Open Office
Todd Carpenter
August 24, 2008 at 12:25 pm
I use Google docs most of the time, but every computer I own has Open Office loaded on it. Best part is, it works on OSX, Windows and Linux machines. I have one of each. Great program.
Matt Stigliano
August 24, 2008 at 12:54 pm
Glad to see someone else who’s hip to the awesomeness that is OpenOffice. Open source is the way to go (especially when Office products in general tend be bloated code monsters) with this, especially if you’re on a budget.
My only complaint about OpenOffice is on the Apple side of things. Its not quite as smooth on it as it is on Windows, but its still better than Office in my opinion.
Me like open source.