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Talk to me about avoiding Microsoft Office

Started by ASFTSN, April 18, 2018, 10:36:24 PM

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ASFTSN

Hello

I've bought a new PC, and it doesn't come with Microsoft Office...  What are your experiences with using the "free alternatives" out there (that I can legitimately get without torrenting etc.)

Criteria are:

- Needs to run on Windows 10
- Needs to be able to Save/Read Microsoft Office formats
- Word Processing/Spreadsheets are a must.  PowerPoint type things....ehhh not so much.
- Can't do anything weird like swap in bizarre fonts from exisiting MSOffice documents when my back is turned.

Any ideas?  And if these do exist and are so good, why do people ever use MSOffice?

Cheers!

Povidone

Its been awhile since I've used it but openoffice generally did the business for me when i needed it. Alternatively you can produce Office documents on google drive.

It's microsofts clever little way of getting people to buyextra shit I think, office is so ubiquitous everybody just expects it to be there as it was at school/work/university etc


BeardFaceMan

Another vote for https://www.openoffice.org/, does everything you mention in your post.

Blumf

Use LibreOffice ahead of OpenOffice. Libre forked from Open a while back and most the devs went with it (tl;dr nobody trusted Oracle)

ASFTSN

Thanks Lads and Lasses, looks like LibreOffice is the way to go.  Is it a new thing that Windows 10 PCs don't necessarily come with Office as standard?

canadagoose

LibreOffice is really good. Version 6.0 seems to have fixed the dictionary issue which caused it to be a bit slow on older systems, and in general, it seems to open all Office documents accurately.

Edit: Looks like you've decided on it already :) It's not a new thing that PCs with Windows don't come with Office - they never really have as standard.

Cuellar

Is there a 'text to columns' feature in LibreOffice's Excel equivalent? Can't seem to find it.

It's not a deal-breaker but I would like to know.


Captain Z

Quote from: ASFTSN on April 19, 2018, 01:11:12 PM
Thanks Lads and Lasses, looks like LibreOffice is the way to go.  Is it a new thing that Windows 10 PCs don't necessarily come with Office as standard?

I've never had a Windows PC that came with Office.

Sebastian Cobb

While libre probably emulates word better and has more features google docs/sheets is fine for most things and doesn't make me angry like office does.

Dex Sawash

Quote from: Captain Z on April 19, 2018, 09:55:12 PM
I've never had a Windows PC that came with Office.

Mine usually have Office desktop icons that just open up a sort of extortion scheme.

Cuellar


DrGreggles

You could always download a cracked version of Office, like everyone else does.

Dusty Gozongas

I'm pretty sure AutoKMS is still a good friend for this sort of thing if you really really want Office specifically or Windows in general. Depends on how hard you want to look and how risk averse you are.

Pseudopath

Quote from: Dusty Gozongas on April 20, 2018, 09:24:55 PM
I'm pretty sure AutoKMS is still a good friend for this sort of thing if you really really want Office specifically or Windows in general. Depends on how hard you want to look and how risk averse you are.

Yeah, AutoKMS still works (as far as I'm aware). If you want to stay legit and you know any university students or people who work for companies using Office 365, you could always ask to borrow one of their five allocated licenses. The only downside is that your software will become deactivated once they graduate or leave the firm.