MS Office Alternatives

[Drunk Vegan]

Here's a quick list I compiled for my company to use to make files usable on PCs without Windows/MS Office:

Viewing Microsoft Office (Powerpoint, Word, Access, and Excel) files without Microsoft Office:

http://www.openoffice.org (freeware)

Viewing Outlook .msg files without Microsoft Outlook: (Shareware)

http://www.outlookextract.japler.com/downloads.htm

- Use the Email Explorer option in this program to view .msg files and save their attachments.

- This program can also save .msg files as PDFs or HTML files for viewing on non-PC computers.

Viewing .snp files without MS Office / Access:

MS Access Snapshot Viewer: (freeware)

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...DisplayLang=en

Converting .snp files to view on non-PC computers: (freeware)

http://www.stintercorp.com/ic.php

Creating PDF files from any document:

http://www.cutepdf.com/download/CuteWriter.exe (freeware)

- This program allows you to use the File – Print option in any program to instead save the file as a PDF, which can be viewed by anyone using the free program Adobe Reader.

How to identify what kind of file you’re working with/is saved on the computer:

http://forums.torrentspy.com/showthread.php?t=24921

What the file extensions mean:

File types that are universally compatible can be used on any computer.

Picture files (universal):

.jpg/.jpeg, .bmp, .gif, .tif, (image files)

.pdf (Can include either a picture of a document or text and pictures. Can be either locked to prevent editing or unlocked, allowing recipients to alter the contents)

Picture files (require extra software to view)

.png, (High-resolution, high quality picture file)

.snp (Microsoft Snapshot Viewer)

Text files (universal):

.txt (Basic text readable on any computer),

.rtf (Text with all formatting included such as italics, bold, paragraph format, etc)

.html (Web page format for text. To have a complete web page viewable without being on the Internet you would have to save this file and all files used on that web page display (usually just picture files) by using the File – Save – Web Page (Complete) option in Internet Explorer.

Text files (non-universal)

.doc (Can be formatted in any of a dozen different ways, including Microsoft Word)

.msg (Outlook message file, with or without attachments)

[AZeyC]

Sweet post, this should be stickied!

[-Z-MAN]

Great post. I realised that recently I downloaded Sun's Star Office instead of Open Office by mistake lol.

[iball®]

And what about email encryption? PGP alone just doesn't cut it for corporate use mainly due to the need for actual key recovery. And then there's future biometric implementations and/or keycard tokens, i.e. smartcards.
Online web collaboration and intranet portals? Most PHP/MySQL portal combos are a little too weak both security-wise and load-wise to handle a proper deployment. Not too mention being "complicated" to maintain/patch/secure for the admins as well as being complicated for the users (translation: big load on any helpdesk).
Gee that's cute of you to suggest those things to your company, but it's obvious you're not up on present/future corporate technologies so I doubt they'll take you too seriously. If they do, then they can't be a "real" company and will be dead soon.
All this blab about Microsoft software being too expensive for SME's is usually coming from folks who have no idea how to sit down with Microsoft and actually negotiate a fair price and licensing agreement.
It's a LOT more than just the office applications on the desktop.
Don't get into these things lightly or you'll wind up on the unemployment line so fast your head will spin.

[linkboy]

Originally Posted by -Z-MAN

Great post. I realised that recently I downloaded Sun's Star Office instead of Open Office by mistake lol.

Just letting you know that StarOffice is the office program that Open Office is based upon.

Star Office used to be free, but Sun started charging for it. Since its a GPL program, they have to provide a free version as well (hence OpenOffice).

[-Z-MAN]

Originally Posted by linkboy

Just letting you know that StarOffice is the office program that Open Office is based upon.

Star Office used to be free, but Sun started charging for it. Since its a GPL program, they have to provide a free version as well (hence OpenOffice).

Thank you. I'm already aware of this though, I was talking about Sun Microsystems with a colleague and I brought up the Star Office/Open Office matter as I was a bit confused.

[Brad]

I myself use the Office 2007 beta and its great. As of right now I currently don't know if your still able to sign up for it. But from what I have used it for so far its got allot of features.

[Drunk Vegan]

Originally Posted by iball®

Gee that's cute of you to suggest those things to your company, but it's obvious you're not up on present/future corporate technologies so I doubt they'll take you too seriously. If they do, then they can't be a "real" company and will be dead soon.
All this blab about Microsoft software being too expensive for SME's is usually coming from folks who have no idea how to sit down with Microsoft and actually negotiate a fair price and licensing agreement.
It's a LOT more than just the office applications on the desktop.
Don't get into these things lightly or you'll wind up on the unemployment line so fast your head will spin.

I work for a nationwide student loan company.. they do billions of dollars of business a year. The point of this was not to suggest a * replacement * of MS Office, but to give them a way to disseminate files to some of the clients they represent who use other platforms.

[Anti-QuickJay]

I just use MS Office...