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NeoOffice or OpenOffice ?

V

voxnj

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 16, 2008
161
0
Dark Side of the Moon
I am fed-up with the Microsoft Suite for MAC. After using the Windows Suite for years, the MAC Suite is just unacceptable. (I'm surprised that people are still recommending it and buying it.)

So, I'd like some feedback on the two apparent options: NeoOffice and OpenOffice (Aqua Beta 3). I use Word, Excel and PowerPoint daily in my work. I am looking for a stable platform with the full features and feel of the Windows Suite.

I'd appreciate your comments and advice.
 
Considering both are free, why not download both and test them yourself? NeoOffice loses its appeal after ten minutes of use. :(
 
??? Maybe I downloaded the wrong version but when I downloaded Open Office for mac the little x11 thing popped up (whatever it is when it emulates windows), the program ran REALLY slow and was misery to use.

I downloaded NeoOffice and love it since it was built for mac. I like Neo Office (but after seeing the open office recommendations Im starting to wonder if I got the wrong version...)
 
chrono1081 said:
??? Maybe I downloaded the wrong version but when I downloaded Open Office for mac the little x11 thing popped up (whatever it is when it emulates windows), the program ran REALLY slow and was misery to use.

I downloaded NeoOffice and love it since it was built for mac. I like Neo Office (but after seeing the open office recommendations Im starting to wonder if I got the wrong version...)
Click to expand...

try this

http://porting.openoffice.org/mac/download/aqua.html

its the aqua version of open office
 
voxnj said:
Any specific features you like or bugs that you've encountered in each?
Click to expand...

I've used NeoOffice and OpenOffice Aqua. Since the beta of Aqua, I really haven't used NeoOffice as I figured the Aqua port would eventually be the defacto build of Oo_Org for Mac. That being said, NeoOffice was very stable, reliable, and functional. Yes, it wasn't blazingly fast, but they did a lot of work to make it very usable and increase the speed over the years.

I have only encountered two bugs with Oo_Org. One, is on the latest beta for some reason when I do a spell check I don't get suggestions when using the US English dictionary. It knows the words are spelled incorrectly, but I don't get any suggestions. When I switch to a British dictionary I get suggestions. I'm not sure what is up with that.

The only other bug I've seen is that if I leave a document up for a long time (i.e. weeks) with unsaved changes, I've seen two different occasions where OO errored when saving changes. The only way to get it to work was to copy the text and past it into a new OO document and save that with a new file name. Keep in mind this only happens when documents are open for very long times. I'm not sure what is causing it, I'm guessing it's the way OO references file handles. It probably doesn't help that my MBP goes through tons of sleep and wake up cycles as I usually shut the lid when it's not being used for a few hours.

Overall, the aqua beta is very usable and stable. Keep in mind OO (whether in NeoOffice or the OO aqua form) has good crash recovery for documents just in case. Still, I haven't seen a crash in a very long time.
 
sclough said:
I've used NeoOffice and OpenOffice Aqua. Since the beta of Aqua, I really haven't used NeoOffice as I figured the Aqua port would eventually be the defacto build of Oo_Org for Mac. That being said, NeoOffice was very stable, reliable, and functional. Yes, it wasn't blazingly fast, but they did a lot of work to make it very usable and increase the speed over the years.

I have only encountered two bugs with Oo_Org. One, is on the latest beta for some reason when I do a spell check I don't get suggestions when using the US English dictionary. It knows the words are spelled incorrectly, but I don't get any suggestions. When I switch to a British dictionary I get suggestions. I'm not sure what is up with that.

The only other bug I've seen is that if I leave a document up for a long time (i.e. weeks) with unsaved changes, I've seen two different occasions where OO errored when saving changes. The only way to get it to work was to copy the text and past it into a new OO document and save that with a new file name. Keep in mind this only happens when documents are open for very long times. I'm not sure what is causing it, I'm guessing it's the way OO references file handles. It probably doesn't help that my MBP goes through tons of sleep and wake up cycles as I usually shut the lid when it's not being used for a few hours.

Overall, the aqua beta is very usable and stable. Keep in mind OO (whether in NeoOffice or the OO aqua form) has good crash recovery for documents just in case. Still, I haven't seen a crash in a very long time.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the helpful perspective.
 
SpookyLars said:
I think that OP asked about Neooffice and OpenOffice, not M$.
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I was hinting at the fact that MS Office 2008 is a mess, and that if they tried the earlier package they might have more luck. The other two options can easily be downloaded for free - so try them and see if they do what you want.
 
voxnj said:
I am fed-up with the Microsoft Suite for MAC. After using the Windows Suite for years, the MAC Suite is just unacceptable. (I'm surprised that people are still recommending it and buying it.)

So, I'd like some feedback on the two apparent options: NeoOffice and OpenOffice (Aqua Beta 3). I use Word, Excel and PowerPoint daily in my work. I am looking for a stable platform with the full features and feel of the Windows Suite.

I'd appreciate your comments and advice.
Click to expand...

i would suggest openoffice. better lookin and much faster.
also, why woouldnt u give a try to iWork?
 
I've been using Neooffice exclusively since I downloaded and tried OO and it crashed. I didn't try the Aqua version, though. I'll go give that a try when I get a chance. I find Neooffice to be slow but usable. I also use iWork. I would rank the office suites for Mac in this order...

1 - Neooffice/OpenOffice
2 - iWork
...
98 - Office 2004
99 - Office 2008
 
relative speeds of the various suites?

Great recommendations. I've been using Office 2004 for the past couple of years, but just haven't felt comfortable with it. I spend all day with at the office with a windows version and I don't seem to adapt to '04 well. Moreover, it seemingly runs slow, even on my 2.0Ghz Macbook. I haven't heard many good things about '08 and so I haven't tried it. I'm downloading the 3.0 aqua release of OO as I type this and hope it will prove to be more speedy. How do the various 'office suites' compare to one another in terms of speed?
 
MS Office for Mac takes way to long to open:mad:, so off I went looking for alternatives, played with Open Office, then went for Neo Office. I settled for the latter. I like the feel of Neo Office better, as does my wife who recently needed a "publisher" type program. She too likes the Neo Office better.Seems to be more compatible with our non Apple friends. I also realise , as "newbies" we are probably doing things wrong, as far as compatibility issues with our non Mac friends.

I look at it this way, I left MS for :apple: to free myself of MS. We both are seriously trying to use just :apple: programs, but are finding we need a Publisher type program as well as compatibility. iWork is good, when we need more compatibility with friends we use Neo Office:)
 
Another vote for Aqua. I do a lot of projects. I have Office 2007 on bootcamp (my favorite), Aqua and iWork on my OS X side. Overkill? Yep, but I do use all 3 and each has their good and bad points IMO. If I had to keep one I would keep Office 2007, then Aqua and iWork last. iWork is alright, but I don't like it as well as the other 2. Personal preference.

Aqua is the best free one out there IMO. Try it out and if you don't like it then delete it.

I absolutely hated Office for Mac. Again my opinion.
 
I am using OOo 3.0 Aqua (RC-2)... very nice! I don't understand why anyone would pay money for MS Office.
 
TH-Gunner said:
Sorry for the off topic, but I was looking through the OOo Aqua and saw this:

http://porting.openoffice.org/mac/screenshots/ooo-aqua/index-Images/1.jpg

What is that "spaces" like thing for Tiger? It's some X11 goodie, I think, but does anyone have any further info on it?
Click to expand...
If you mean the virtual desktops visible at the upper-left of the menu bar, I believe that is VirtueDesktops. Its a native Aqua app. I used it with Tiger and found it to be a very nice app, highly configurable and there are some nifty visual effects. I would still use it on Tiger to this day; however, I prefer Spaces in Leopard, which Apple as typical made highly usable and functional. I think Spaces is a feature in which Apple hit the nail on the head the first try.

Btw, it is Aqua native, but I do recall that it was packaged with some other Aqua utilities that installed with some Fink package, the latter of which of course is mainly for opensource stuff that compiles and runs with X11 on OS X. Nowadays I use Macports haven't noticed those goodies.
 
I don't feel like writing a big thing so I'll just dot point.

  • NeoOffice 2.2.5 is much faster on my Core Duo MBP than the RC2 of OpenOffice.org
  • OpenOffice.org does use Java
  • OpenOffice.org uses pinstripes
  • They both might use Java but they're aren't written in Java entirely
  • They require a computer with a sufficient amount of RAM
 
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