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Microsoft Phasing Out Office Starter Edition
nk497 writes "Microsoft has started phasing out its Office 2010 Starter edition, ahead of the arrival of Windows 8. Office Starter was included in the OEM pre-installation kit (OPK) of software sent to manufacturers, and included ad-supported versions of Word and Excel, but not Outlook or PowerPoint. That will be replaced with an Office 2010 Transition OPK, which will instead push users to download a trial of the Office suite and offer a link to buy the full version. The free Office Web Apps will also be available for users not wanting the full version."
They're just marketing tools. Nobody actually uses them.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
If Microsoft doesn't want to cater to this audience, LibreOffice is more than happy to step up and provide a high-quality, powerful, free (and Free) office suite.
I've installed LibreOffice on dozens of machines, and many friends of mine now rely on it for opening a variety of files that MS-Office can't (or won't) open for them. It'd be great to hear from any OEMs who are considering installing it as a part of the base package on their machines.
coding is life
I'll say right off, I actually use Office Starter for my SOHO work. I know this post is gonna get voted down simply for that reason, regardless of how insightful or informative this post ends up being. But, as someone who has no need for PowerPoint or Outlook yet still requires absolute 100% Office compatibility for my work, Office Starter has met all of my needs. That right there is perhaps the biggest pro of Office Starter. Even though it might not have all the features of the full Office suite, it is still 100% across-the-board compatible. A Word document or Excel spreadsheet created in Office 2010 Professional will look pixel-to-pixel identical when opened in Office Starter, and vice-versa. Although LibreOffice and similar FOSS office suites are good programs in their own right, they simply are not absolutely 100% compatible with Office. As others have mentioned above, I too have recommended Office Starter to those who only need Word and Excel (Or even just Word), and haven't heard any complaints from them. I even found the actual installation files for it in the recovery partition on my new ThinkPad laptop, and have successfully used them to install Office Starter on my home-built Windows 7 desktop. So, when Microsoft does away with Office Starter, I'll still have a way to install it on any new computers I buy or build in the future. Yes, ads are annoying. But, at least Microsoft did something right with the ads in Office Starter, and made them unobtrusive. No rapid flashing, no popups, no ads with audio. They just sit there in the corner, slowly cycling, and are quite easy to tune out once you start focusing on your work. So, I can understand why some people dislike Office Starter...but I legitimately don't understand the mass hysteria about it being a bad program, and the "good riddance" attitude of most people in regards to the news of it being discontinued. I LIKE Office Starter. Yes, I could buy a full version of Office if I wanted to...but I don't NEED to. Office Starter meets all of my SOHO requirements. Thus, I'm part of the incredibly small minority of people who actually think it's dumb for them to get rid of Starter.
You 're not allowed to do commercial things with that. Why would I need office for home use? No, I'm not a student, so what exactly do you propose to do with it?
Send a letter to my sister congratulating her with her birthday? Put all my recipes in a spreadsheet (after all, it's a database, right?). Maybe make a presentation so I can convince my girlfriend it's better to watch sports on television tonight than Jersey Shore?
Keep in mind that many companies already have a license where it's legal for their employees to run full office at home and that many charities get a "free" license from MicroSoft so their volunteers can use it. There isn't a lot of situations left where you would actually have to buy a license if you really wanted to use MS Office and not be able to do so already, or use the Starter Edition, or Libre Office. Only there the "Home" license would be required.
Oh, now I see, you want to use full blown Outlook because you like the features (I despise it with a vengeance myself). Sorry, that's not in Office Home, you need to buy the full package for that
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
You're running solo and expecting everyone else to do the same. Wrong way of understanding the masses. Although because it works for you, and really well, by all means continue to do what you do.
Business around the world need a set of tools to act as a common denominator. An Office suite is a popular method. It allows for any employee to come and go out of a company with little downtime to transition in learning a new documentation scheme. Excel files can become massively complex with formulas and macros. Word files become excessively complex when rendering a 500+ page report deliverable to clients as a way of selling research and other interpretation data. Often including all sorts of markups and embedded photos. These files will need to be viewed by all parties involved with little fuss and ease of printing and editing.
Oh, and you're running some heavy duty calculations, Mathcad is worth looking into. The licensing is uber expensive, and yet companies pay hand over fist for them. I can guarantee you, it has nothing to do with being ignorant of other options on the table.
Life is not for the lazy.