OpenOffice.org, MS Office 2003 Compared, Evaluated

kotj.mf writes "eWeek is running a relatively lengthy article comparing OpenOffice.org and Microsoft Office 2003, as part of an IT decision whether to migrate a 300-plus userbase office away from Office 97/2000. The not-so-surprising conclusion: OO.o can be a better deal for smaller companies that can't fully leverage Redmond's volume licensing. Hell, it'd be cheap at twice the price."

Comments

Not This Debate Again

[Nintendork]

Comment: Look, you no longer need to pay for Microsoft Office!
Response: Yeah, but what about Outlook? What about Access? What about Publisher? The client/server relationship in Outlook gives a lot of useful features. Until the open source community makes a robust product to compete directly with Outlook, the topic is moot. Many businesses still have crappy Access mdb files providing a front end for SQL. Surprisingly, every organization has a moderate percentage of people that use Publisher. When you bend over to buy Office, you get a complete product with every little feature that your employees seem to actually use. Also, there's no cost in support, training, and downtime. If 90% of other businesses are using Office, we'll be using it to ensure smooth transactions. Business does not revolve around the IT department and their open source advocating,Microsoft hating soldiers.

Comment: Office has downtime because it's crap and displays errors constantly.
Response: That's funny. Every computer I've deployed hasn't had this problem. Maybe you should go back to your "For Dummies" books. Don't forget to do some reading to understand Exchange so you don't fuck up the server. Of course if you do fuck things up and are unable to fix them, it's all Microsoft's fault. The Man is out to get you.

Comment: Outlook will infect your network with uber-viruses and kill puppies!
Response: Puppies are evil and a company that doesn't keep up on patches and AV software when using the most targeted software is just asking to be punished.

-Lucas