# Any Microsoft Office alternatives? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 14, 2003, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602 "2003-09-14T19:21:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BigBadBassBone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/96bed5/32.png) [@BigBadBassBone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigBadBassBone)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/1 "2003-09-14T19:21:37Z")
First a little venting, I hate Microsoft! Recently my internet explorer was having some issues (the content advisor kept turing it’s self on, every time I opened a new window… very annoying). In trying to fix it I wound up killing Outlook, Word, and Excel as well. Apparently these programs are all conected… Now the question: I’ve found Netscape to be a brilliant alternative for Email and Web browsing, and I don’t want to go back to Microsoft again. Any suggestions for a good word-processor? A low-end spreadsheet/graphing program might be usefull too, but I don’t really need one - as I already have Maple6 and MatLab 6.1 - but my computer is old and running such heavy math programs at the same time as anything else can be risky business. ---
**Author:** ![Daizy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@Daizy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daizy)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/2 "2003-09-14T19:33:14Z")
Does [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=186318&highlight=office) help? ---
**Author:** ![BigBadBassBone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/96bed5/32.png) [@BigBadBassBone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigBadBassBone)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/3 "2003-09-14T19:43:04Z")
yes, thanks! I’m not sure how I didn’t see it when looking through the first time though… I checked out AbiWord, which somebody there mentioned. It works (which is more than I can say about MS right now), it feels like MSWord - so it shouldn’t take long to learn, it’s not MS - so I don’t feel dirty, and it’s FREE! ---
**Author:** ![Daizy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@Daizy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daizy)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/4 "2003-09-14T19:45:25Z")
Fabulous news! So glad you found something suitable. ---
**Author:** ![Yersinia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/6bbea6/32.png) [@Yersinia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yersinia)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/5 "2003-09-14T19:50:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by BigBadBassBone \* > \*\*First a little venting, > > I hate Microsoft! Recently my internet explorer was having some issues (the content advisor kept turing it’s self on, every time I opened a new window… very annoying). In trying to fix it I wound up killing Outlook, Word, and Excel as well. Apparently these programs are all conected… > > Now the question: > > I’ve found Netscape to be a brilliant alternative for Email and Web browsing, and I don’t want to go back to Microsoft again. > > Any suggestions for a good word-processor? A low-end spreadsheet/graphing program might be usefull too, but I don’t really need one - as I already have Maple6 and MatLab 6.1 - but my computer is old and running such heavy math programs at the same time as anything else can be risky business. \*\* Buy a Macintosh. 🙂 On my Macs, I use ClarisWorks for WP, Claris Emailer for email, either Netscape or iCAB for web browsing, IRCle for IRC and AOL IM for instant messaging. I don’t know your level of computer literacy, but if you’re a good geek like my boyfriend is, Linux and UNIX are other operating systems you could use in place of MicroBorg, er, Microsoft. ~Yersinia. “I don’t do Windoze…” ---
**Author:** ![TeaElle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8491ac/32.png) [@TeaElle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TeaElle)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/6 "2003-09-14T20:47:21Z")
Depending on what OS you’re using, try OpenOffice – [openoffice.org](http://openoffice.org) ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/7 "2003-09-14T20:55:57Z")
You can use OpenOffice in both Linux and Windows. [EasyOffice](http://www.e-press.com/) is another option as well. You can download a home version which is free. I found it to be pretty similar to Office and a decent alternative to Microsoft Office. ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/8 "2003-09-14T20:57:53Z")
Oops, I forgot to mention that you have to go to the downloads section and get the version called EasyOffice Freeware. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/9 "2003-09-14T22:00:09Z")
I use WordPerfect 8, from Corel. It does pretty much everything Word does, and for the most part, it does it better. Unfortunately, Excel is still the king of spreadsheets. ---
**Author:** ![DougC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7feea3/32.png) [@DougC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DougC)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2003, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/10 "2003-09-14T23:27:22Z")
- - - Just a possibly-important note: if you will be wanting a **database** , StarOffice has a crippled version of a proprietary database system, OpenOffice includes no database at all. EasyOffice I dunno nuthin about. …There are some free database systems that can run across Windows and Linux: PostGRE and MySQL are the two big ones, but neither is exactly as easy to use as Access or StarOffice’s offering. ~ ---
**Author:** ![BigBadBassBone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/96bed5/32.png) [@BigBadBassBone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigBadBassBone)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2003, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-microsoft-office-alternatives/201602/11 "2003-09-15T05:41:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Rysto \* > \*\* Unfortunately, Excel is still the king of spreadsheets. \*\* Yeah, I’m beginning to see that. I didn’t think I’d miss Excel, but OpenOffice can’t produce a “scientific” looking graph. It can’t take a data set and use them as uncertainty bars - and it’s regression sucks. MATLAB does an excellent regression fit to any function (and has more options than just least squares), but doesn’t produce a very pleasing graph (unless I want to write my own code in it… maybe I’ll have to). While Excel’s regression wasn’t that great, and least it could create a decent looking graph. Back to the old-fashioned way I guess…