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 Post subject: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Tue Mar 29, 2011 6:26 pm 
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Yeah, I know that the first thing I'll hear here is "use openoffice". Well, I don't like openoffice. I don't like its amateurish GUI and I don't like its "all-in-one" approach and most of all, I don't like the fact that it's all Java-shit. And I don't like its memory usage and responsiveness, which feels "sluggish, like a wet sponge". ;P

In any case, I use Word to write articles, don't want anything much of it, just formatted text and some tables. I don't even care for clip-art and shit like that. I've been using past versions of MS-Office for more than 15 years, and I've never used shit like that.
I also use Excel for various reasons; again, I don't need much. I'd like *some* proggie that would make bar-graphs and shit like that in 3D and looking REALLY pretty and pristine, with textures and transparencies and shit, but currently there's absolutely NO suite that will do that; not MS-Word, not OpenOffice Calc, nothing.
Apart from that, I could use some sort of powerpoint viewer, but I've never made presentations, except when I used to lecture at the University, and even then all I needed was some pictures, so I don't care about *making* presentations.
The reason I wanted something *other* than MS Office is that it's bloody huge, it feels bloated, even the installation options make no difference; like, you select Powerpoint, it says 980MB size... you de-select Powerpoint, 978MB size. I mean, come on! And also, using it has become more trouble than work, and it's damn slow too. Even switching languages, I usually have to wait for Word to let the system change keyboards and then continue typing. And I'm working on a six-core with 8GB of RAM. Mercy!

All in all, I just want a good version of Word and Excel. These days, I tried Corel Wordperfect suite, which is kinda OK but expensive and looks like a cheap rip-off of Office 2003. I also tried IBM Lotus Symphony, and discovered it's OpenOffice in disguise -- and has a problem uninstalling itself.
Right about there I thought that maybe I could find a stand-alone Word replacement and a stand-alone Excel replacement. After trying a few, I found the Atlantis word processor, which is small, agile and really snappy and fast and responsive! I think I'll be sticking with that for basic document creation.
Also, I found SoftMaker Office, which is essentially a word processor, a spreadsheet and a presentation maker. The word processor is comparable to Atlantis, equally snappy and light-weight and handles DOC and DOCX a little more gracefully than Atlantis, and the spreadsheet looks the same, and enough for my needs. Oh, and both Atlantis and the SM-Office have normal space-saving toolbars and no shitty ribbons and crap like that.

All in all, do you guys have any such sweethearts to suggest? I know I've written a shitload here, like I usually do, I just wanted to share my experience. Any more suggestions, guys?

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Wed Mar 30, 2011 1:12 pm 
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At the moment I'm happy with my version of M$ Office. It might be helping that I get them for free through MSDN(AA) :) I agree with you that it is bloated for my needs (The last time I used excel for anything? That's over a year ago.... Unless you count opening excel files to view them. Same for all other Office programs aside from Word and OneNote...)
I actually tried OpenOffice once as well. Didn't like it and removed it straight away.

About ribbons: In M$ Office 2010 Ctrl+F1 minimizes the ribbon. There is even a button for it. Not sure whether it is in M$ Office 2007 as well.... Having said that, I actually like the ribbon for its accessibility.


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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Wed Mar 30, 2011 4:12 pm 
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Mate, I'm getting most software for free (benefits of the trait).
However, I'm sick and tired of waiting for Word. It's damn slow! And the ribbon might be accessible and all that, but in reality, I just need a few buttons and the rest of it is just bloat. Like, font type, size, alignment, that's about it. That could easily fit in a single toolbar line. I hate losing all the monitor real-estate for things that I never use. Talking about lost real-estate, how about more than 1GB of disk space, again, for just a word processor and a spreadsheet?
Oh, and Word is slow. Excel is not fast either, but it doesn't make much difference because you don't see it. Does anybody care that Excel can handle a trillion columns by a gazillion rows? Or that it has ten thousand functions that are useful to a handful of people?
Oh crap, I'm ranting again... point is, guys... I've got one of the fastest processors ever, with a shitload of RAM... these days I'm even testing the almighty Radeon 6990... and Word doesn't feel any faster than back in 1996... feels slower, actually...

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Wed Mar 30, 2011 4:35 pm 
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You think Word is slow? You should try Outlook with IMAP accounts. That will make any state-of-the-art PC feel like a PC XT - and will have you ripping your hair off in under a minute! lol

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Thu Mar 31, 2011 6:24 pm 
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Hey... maybe it's my fault 'cause I'm typing too fast?
...I think for the hell of it I'll try and dig out Office 95 or something like Word 6 and see some true speed...

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Fri Apr 08, 2011 12:27 pm 
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robert05041 wrote:
Oh..!! earlier i was not knowing, that we can use Outlook with IMAP accounts also... I was only using open office as an alternate, but thanks for giving this information..


Why do I have a feeling spam bots are getting smarter?

Robert, I deleted the links in your signature, and you have 24 hours to say something that establishes you as a real human being rather than a spam bot.

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Fri Apr 08, 2011 2:39 pm 
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I banned and deleted him.

I think spammers are now actually using cheap human labor instead of bots - his IP address resolves to India and he managed to by-pass the anti-spam question, which a bot should not be able to.

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Thu May 05, 2011 12:59 am 
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winstep wrote:
I banned and deleted him.

I think spammers are now actually using cheap human labor instead of bots - his IP address resolves to India and he managed to by-pass the anti-spam question, which a bot should not be able to.


I actually faltered on that anti-spam question for a bit. I sat there for about 1/2 hr trying to figure out the NEXT number in the sequence before I was told I was thinking about it too hard. I felt kinda dumb :oops:

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Thu May 05, 2011 1:11 am 
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AHAHAHA! You were actually too smart for your own good. :wink:

But hey, that's an idea: like that only Winstep users with an IQ above x are allowed to register with the Winstep forums. :wink:

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 Post subject: Re: Alternative Office suites
PostPosted: Thu May 05, 2011 3:57 am 
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winstep wrote:
AHAHAHA! You were actually too smart for your own good. :wink:

But hey, that's an idea: like that only Winstep users with an IQ above x are allowed to register with the Winstep forums. :wink:


I think you've got that relatively covered, mate. Only users with an IQ above y ( where y<x ) would want Winstep. The rest are content with plain vanilla Windows.
:P

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