17 replies to this topic

[shadragon]

I was just on the OO web site, and although it's a 'free' software, it appears that you have to sign up for an annual membership of some sort in order to use the free software.

Just download it, install it, and start using it. When it asks you to register, don't. You are not required to.

Correct. You do not have to register it for it to work and it never expires or turns off features. You get a fully functional program from day one and YES it is FREE.

Sourceforge is an excellent place for Open Source (FREE) software that is spyware and virus free. There are Windows and Linux variants programs they do pretty much everything their commercial brothers do. Sometimes better. If the program does not do what you want it to do you can either modify the code yourself or have someone do it for you.

The concept of Open Source software is explained here.

[Parrotman]

I just downloaded Open Office and have been playing with it. It opens and runs my PPT stuff, the word function is great. It was easy to download and install. All I did was click on " do not want to register" and that was it.

Jim

[drbill]

OK, bought the new PC at home, and it has the dreaded Vista on it....which means my very expensive MS Office XP Professional suite will not work on this PC, because it's pre-2007.

And this is a major reason why I currently run Windows XP and Office 2000 on my system. I got tired of the frequent "upgrades" costing an arm and a leg because all the apps had to be "upgraded" too. Many of my other apps won't run on Vista. I have legal copies of it and Win 7, but I haven't tried the latter yet.

On a somewhat related note... My Dell computer, sent to replace the first lemon I bought two years ago, is turning out to be a lemon as well (so far MB, RAM, video card and DVD writer have had to be replaced. on the "replacement" unit in just six months). All too frequently friends tell me to buy a Mac. They fail to see that doing so involves purchasing all new editing software and legacy apps (if they exist or will run at all on the Mac platform) unless I run both Mac OS and Win on the system. Also, it involves converting all my existing hours (many hundreds) of AVI format video files to something Mac handles (and then back them all up onto new DVDs and hard drives.

So get Open Office.

Edited by drbill, 28 July 2010 - 11:17 AM.