Microsoft Office Free Trial Software

[Jim]

So, when I was setting up my new PC, I found out that I had losted Office. Since I use Word and Excel daily, I knew I had to dish out the minimum of $350 for another copy. So, I went to Microsoft and found out, they have a 60 day free trial of Office 2003. Something I didn't know and I bet a lot of other people don't know. So now, I have 60 days to keep my money or find my copy

http://www.microsoft.com/office/trial/default.mspx

[physio]

Hey Jim, did you take a look at http://www.openoffice.org/ ? I'm using it on the laptop, it's free and I never missed any features....

[Cleo]

Open Office is very good.

I have Micro$oft's office loaded and it does have a few features that Open Office doesn't have but for most people it is all they need.

[Jim]

Hmmm...I never saw that. But, since FREE counts for an awful lot with me, I believe I will give it a try.

[Alphawolf]

Does anyone understand how open source (free) software works out financially?

I mean- even if people really enjoy contributing their time to a project for free someone has to pay for the servers.

Are they sponsored by companies that want to take away from MS?

[Cleo]

You do pay for support.

If you use the code and make changes to it to give needed features or to improve it you are suppose to give your code back to be possibly added into the next release.

[Cliff]

Just a question about open office
if someone sends me a exel spreadsheet file via email
can open office read it in the same way the official ms office would

[Cleo]

My spreadsheets and Word docs look the same in both.

About the only reason that I still use Micro$oft's app is because it has a Mac interface while Open Office has the X11 interface. I believe that On Windows this is not the case and both use the Window's interface.

[Cliff]

Originally posted by Cleo
My spreadsheets and Word docs look the same in both.

thank you Cleo