[THIN] Re: OT: OpenOffice 2/3

I started my basic testing with OpenOffice 3 RC1 and the first hurdle I immediately ran into is saving in a certain file format.  I was hoping I could save as .DOC and .XLS in Word/Excel 2003 format, but that's not the case.  It saves as .XML.  While the cross-compatibility seems great, that's not friendly for e-mail attachments.

I can save as .DOC/.XLS in Word/Excel 97/2000/XP format.  That seems to be rather regressed and could mean that a user tries to do something that doesn't save properly into that translated format, and really doens't have a good way to know if there's a translation problem.

 

So it seems that the method would be to save in native OpenOffice format, and then save another copy in 97/2000/XP format and either hope it looks OK, or test it on a machine that has Office 2003/2007 installed.   I don't think I've overlooked anything, so I guess this is the biggest trade-off in my situation.

 

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From: thin-bounce@freelists.org [mailto:thin-bounce@freelists.org] On Behalf Of Jan
Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 4:24 PM
To: thin@freelists.org
Subject: [THIN] Re: OT: OpenOffice 2/3

If doing a CV, you should use the PDF feature of OpenOffice. Then you know that all of your formatting will be retained exactly as you wanted it.

OpenOffice 3 has not given me any formatting issues whatsoever thus far. You might want to give it another look.

On Wed, Sep 17, 2008 at 3:58 PM, Nick Smith <nick@officeanyplace.com> wrote:

FWIW I suggested Googleapps to a charity and they had a similar issue - all OK other than formatting - they were trying to write CVs for disadvantaged kids, and they just weren't good enough printed to send to employers.

-----Original Message-----
From: thin-bounce@freelists.org [mailto:thin-bounce@freelists.org] On Behalf Of Marc-André Lapierre
Sent: 17 September 2008 18:05
To: thin@freelists.org
Subject: [THIN] Re: OT: OpenOffice 2/3

I have a couple of customers using it. The worst part of Open office is with Writer. You lose almost 90% of the time the formatting of your text if you open and edit it with MS Office. So, most of the time, the document you create with Open Office is not gonna look good on someone's else screen using MS office.

Also, Large Excel spreadsheet with macros does not work well with Open Office.

-----Message d'origine-----
De : thin-bounce@freelists.org [mailto:thin-bounce@freelists.org] De la part de Evan Mann
Envoyé : 17 septembre 2008 09:15
À : thin@freelists.org
Objet : [THIN] OT: OpenOffice 2/3

Has anyone spent any up close and personal time with OpenOffice 2 or 3
(now at RC1).  I need to seriously look at the product as an alternative
for basic business users.  It has the potential to save up to $10,000 in
licensing costs.

My basic business user runs e-mail and web based applications, and a lot
of PDF viewing.  Some of them may not even open up any office app aside
from Outlook more then once or twice in a week.  If they open
Word/Excel/PowerPoint, it's usually to view and print, or generate an
extremely low end document in terms of complexity.

I have Outlook 2003 licensing through my SBS 2003 R2 Premium licensing,
and all the desktop licensing is purchased OEM with that equipment, so
the core needs of the basic business user are covered.  I need to
evaluate, and get real-world feedback on cross-compatibility of Office
2003 docs with OpenOffice 2, and Office 2007 docs with OpenOffice 3.
Focus is on Word and Excel with this compatibility

Power users will still have MS Office suite. I may setup a dedicated
workstation or VM for the basic business users to have access to MS
Office suite, should a compatibility issue arises.  However, I don't
want that to be a daily occurance, that needs to be a once a month type
thing.


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