New
#10
I love microsoft office. Especially because I was able to get Microsoft office 2010 professional+ for just 10 USD. Thanks to the enterprise agreement our company has with Microsoft.
Customers Say Microsoft Office Offers Superior Value to OpenOffice
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New #11
This thread and the article it's based on are ridiculous. If openoffice cost the same as microsoft office, or even anything at all besides the time it takes to download and install, and both created the same kind of files, then there would be a rational basis for value comparison based on features, cost and productivity. What the article fails to mention is that MSO is deliberately designed to create files that are incompatible with anything other than MSO applications by default.. and that microsoft would sue anyone into bankruptcy if they created another office application that could create or edit MSO files. Also, if you use MSO and need to work with PDF documents.. you have to get a third party suite like Acrobat, which also costs a fortune.. So how is it a better value? $400 for office professional, plus another $500 for acrobat vs. one free application that can do most of what both of them combined can do.. with nearly everything that is lacking also available as freeware? Get real folks.. the BS is getting kind of deep
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New #12
Well there are free PDF readers like Foxit. And of course you got different editions of MS Office suite to choose from if that is the case.
People will continue to use MS Office because its where many of them have accustomed themselves into. Even myself would take some time to get used to Open Office which for me is buggy.
Just remember, Micro$oft wants to maximize their profits. If freeware is better for you, who is forcing you to use M$ Office???? All people have their preferences.
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New #13
I'm sure madtown is discussing the ability to Create PDF files from within Microsoft Office...not read them. OpenOffice has had the ability to "Save AS" a PDF file for years. While MS has tried to add this in the past (to 2007), Adobe had a stinking fit and MS removed the functionality from the base product. While you can add it back, you have to find it on your own from MS website and install it....most customers aren't aware of this and don't do it.
I'd say the majority of home users who feel that MS office offers more value
1). get office for like $10 because of a work home use program
2). use office from their technet subscription
3). pirate office.
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New #14
Thanks for making my point for me.. the only thing M$ cares about is maximizing their profits ...by any means possible. They can't stand up to even the possibility of competition, which is probably why so many propaganda articles are written and the reason so much effort is made to corner as much of the market as they can. People prefer MSOffice because it's the only thing most of them know about. A trial version has been preloaded on nearly every mass produced PC on the planet as part of an agreement they've had with manufacturers who sell windows PCs and laptops.. for the past ten years. Neither MSO or openoffice a better value than the other.. there isn't any logical basis to make a comparison
@pparks.. you're correct.. and the reason Adobe sued Microsoft about the PDF issue was microsoft would have probably have decided to make Adobe products incompatible with Windows.. effectively killing that part of the company.. same thing with xml.. there's a good reason windows doesn't come with a good xml reader/editor
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New #15
@madtownidiot, Microsoft is a business, to be in business you have to be thinking and care about maximizing profits. Otherwise you are no longer in business. This is not something only Microsoft does, ever business is like this, EVERYWHERE. Money makes the world go round and everyone wants a piece of the pie.
What? How would supporting PDF capability in Office make Adobe software incompatible? What are you smoking?@pparks.. you're correct.. and the reason Adobe sued Microsoft about the PDF issue was microsoft would have probably have decided to make Adobe products incompatible with Windows..
Again, what? First off, IE reads XML just fine and dandy better then any other browser. Also Windows Vista/7 both come with MSXML to handle XML and XML-supporting (Scheme, XSLT) documents which is a very good implementation of XML.same thing with xml.. there's a good reason windows doesn't come with a good xml reader/editor
Seriously, what are you smoking?
Futhermore, OpenOffice can open Word 2007/2010 documents and Office can open OpenOffice documents. That alone completely contradicts you. The format that Office 2007/2010 uses is also an open standard! Anyone can use it.
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New #16
Because the first thing you'll learn about in the business world is that value isn't always about money. It's what you get for your money, and from my own standpoint as IT Management, the fact that the ribbon is more intuative, and my users already know how to use Office, I can save on training costs and time...and cut down on help desk calls. Add in the fact we're a non-profit, and I get Office for next to nothing...the initial cost argument goes right out the window.
For the record, on forums, it is tough to take posts seriously when they contain M$, MicroShaft, or Windblow$. I'm not pointing my finger at you, just making a general statement. Now, what business, aside from non-profits, isn't out to maximize their profits any legal way they can? I was laid off from a company who cut their IT staff from 15,000 to 1,500 globally to maximize profits.
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New #17
I am a decades long user of Excel and love it. Have used it in an office environment both big and small. I can see where switching to OpenOffice could have had a pretty large cost associated with it, and those with a pay grade higher than mine never attempted the switch. That said, I use OpenOffice at home (after using Gnumeric, not sure how I ever got talked into using that mess), and it works great for my personal applications. On a recent computer purchase, I deleted my free trial of MS Office immediately and installed OpenOffice.
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New #18
Honestly, if I didn't have a bunch of licenses, I wouldn't run Office at home, at least not the installed version. I'd be using the Office Live version that's online and free.
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New #19
I'm actually using the Live version to share some spreadsheets with family. The only downside I have is that if I want to edit it online, it insists on converting my xls file to a xlsx file, which doesn't always carry over all the formatting changes when I then open it with OpenOffice. But I assume if you use nothing but MS products, there would be no issue. Also there is no direct print function available with the xlsx spreadsheet, you have to print via the browser, which I could NEVER get to work the way I wanted. Not sure why no direct xlsx print, because they do let you print docx documents directly. So I did the quick convert to PDF on the xls in OpenOffice, shared both which makes it easy for them to download and print.
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