Application: OpenOffice

Just a note before I begin today's post...I've figured out how to do the podcast thing, and will bring making the Bluescreen Free podcast in the upcoming week or so. Stayed tuned for further updates.

Today I will be talking about OpenOffice which is an excellent office suite for Linux. Not by any means the only one, but one of the better suites for transitioning from Microsoft Office. It consists of several modules, there is writer, math, calc, impress, and draw. I will talk about all of these modules in turn. One of the great things about OpenOffice is that the data format for all the different save files is in xml, and is an open standard. This means in the future your save files will be able to be opened in other applications.

First: Writer


This is the word processor component of the suite. It has some very impressive features, the best being the ability to export to pdf. You can also import you Microsoft Word documents into it, which is essential for transitioning. There is a windows version of OpenOffice as well, which helps for the transition. If you have a lot of word documents, you can convert them first before making the jump to Linux. My personal favourite feature of Writer is the Stylist feature, where you can customize styles and then quickly switch between them as you are creating your document. There is also a submodule in the suite called Base which allows database integration. I've used this with Writer to generate reports based on individuals check ins on a fun little project I was working on that didn't see the light of day ;-).

Second: Math


To be honest I haven't used this one yet, as far as I understand it's for making mathematical formulae. This will definitely be useful when I'm writing on astronomy, or the mathematical side of computer science. To be honest though my day to day activities normally don't require formatting mathematical formulae ;-)


Third: Calc


This is the spreadsheet module of the suite. It is a full featured spreadsheet program, and like writer has a database access component. This is very useful, as I've used it to import, and export information into a MySQL database. It was very easy to do. This program has a full set of formula commands as well so the transition from excel is completely painless. It's just a case of learning the new functions.

Fourth: Impress


This is the presentation manager. It has a few things going for it that Power Point doesn't. One is you can create a presentation, and you don't need impress to show it. One of the most annoying things I had to deal with using Microsoft Office was getting Power Point Pack and Go to work properly. I didn't have any difficulty at all with Impress.

Five: Draw


This is similar to Word Perfect Draw, and is a vector graphic drawing program. It's a good complement to Impress, and Writer.

All in all OpenOffice is a powerful suite of applications, that in some cases (in my opinion anyways ;-) ) even surpasses Microsoft Office. The one thing this suite is lacking is the functionality of Outlook, but as I showcased in a previous post, Kontact more than fills that role. I would be surprised though, if the OpenOffice crew didn't add PIM functionality to a later version of OpenOffice.

Next time I'll be talking about a fun application that enabled me to IM with all my contacts whether they used ICQ,AIM,MSN Messenger, or Yahoo Pager, it even has IRC capabilities. It's called Gaim, and is one of the best Instant Messenger applications I've used.

-NT