openOffice

[seb]

anyone use openOffice? I'm tempted to grab a copy... I currently use officeXP... whats it like? Compatbility ok? and most importantly, how stable is it?

seb

[exekewtable]

its pretty stable.
takes a long time to load unless you use the preloader.
At fifty meg you are better off just downloading it and forming your own opinion.

dave

[Lujan]

I have used Open Office for quite a while, on windows, linux and FreeBSD, and I have found it to be quite good. It does take a while to load, being based on java, but the preloader does wonders for that :)

My only system I dont run it on is my p233mmx laptop with 64mb ram for obvious reasons, I use abiword on that for reading word documents. But do most of my writing in either vi or LaTeX

[Zan]

I say that it's good for a freeware package - it's pretty complete, with things for spreadsheets, publishing and various other stuff, but I have to say, being raised on a diet of MS Office, it just doesn't have the same feel.

There are a number of nuances with it that I found incredibly annonying. It was a little too dissimilar to the 'easy to pick up' MS Word or Excel for my likes, but again - that's just what I am used to.

It is only 50mb, not an unthinkable download even for dialup (3, maybe 4 hours?) so I recommend that you download it and try it out for yourself.