Any Open Office users out there?

[alfredo]

I have been a confirmed AppleWorks user for years, but I really like Open Office. I am using the XWindows version of Open office, the native OSX version is going through a massive rewrite, delaying its release.

So far I have only used the word processor and the drawing, but from what I have experienced so far, I can say it is a very good office suite.

The only things I don't like about it is the slow launching and that PDF's aren't as easy as native OSX apps.

What has your experience been like?

[MrSoundAndVision]

1. Very smart program

I guess I like it too. I mean, open source = good right? Anyway, all I really noticed about it was that my skills in the MS office suite commute. And that it isn't made by a software company hell-bent on ruining computing for capitalism!

[alfredo]

2. that's another thing I like about it. The emphasis is on

usability, not profit margins. Sun was PO'd at MS for their games, so they put a bunch of money and effort into Star Office, setting up OpenOffice as the open source arm of the project. It has worked so far.

[mike_c]

3. so far I like OOo a lot, but have some minor complaints....

Of course, I push the file converters pretty hard, with lots of tables, figures, equations, and special characters. I've actually gone BACK to a dual boot machine just to run MS-Word and Powerpoint. Well, XaraX too, but that's another story. I know there are alternatives, and I've used most of them over the last several years, but in the end there are still some applications for which a native Windoze MS-Office suite still works best. For most word-processing tasks, however, OOo integrates seamlessly with MS-Office.

BTW, XaraX has crashed on my Win-XP Pro partition a dozen times tonight. Even big 2D rendering gives MS problems. Giving Micro$oft it's due, however, at least XP drops the app and then recovers.... So far.