I'll third this; OpenOffice is an abhorrence, NeoOffice is better but still at least two orders of magnitude less usable than either iWork or MS Office. The whole OpenOffice schtick is that it's a bit like the way Word for Windows was before Microsoft accepted what a mess it had become and threw out the old interface. It's like Blender in the sense that it's a piece of software that saw abject failure in the marketplace prior to becoming an open source doyen. That all said, both OpenOffice and NeoOffice are free so there's no reason not to try them. Though from the free realm, I much prefer Google Docs privacy issues notwithstanding. From the world of dealing with software that likes to put every single one of its features right there in your face, Docs enjoys a major win in having only the most important bits of functionality.
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iwork vs. MS Office Mac?
- Thread starter ramacaddict
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i bought my first imac on saturday. and still not sure on getting office or iwork.
the thing of corse is , i have been working with office for the last how many years .... and most documents i works with are made in office ...
if i switch to iworks *1 i need to learn it ... thats not a big issue but still i have to start from scratch *2 all docments i have at home and stil wanna use i need , or to remake /comvert or use em on the pc laptop.
i am using the imac at home , private use, so i dont have to swich documents from work to home and back ... and price is abot the same ...
iworks <-> office ?
Congrats for your purchase. If you ask me i prefer Office 2007 through VMware fusion. Other than that, Office 2008 for Mac should be wiser choice over iWork.
I have both but mostly stick to Office due to necessity. I prefer iWork's design, ease of use, and integration with OSX. Office is way too slow to load and there is constant bugs like the issue with Spaces. That being said Office has so many useful features (especially in Excel) that it's too hard to give up. Hopefully this is fixed when the new Office comes out.
The main reasons Office 2007 is better is because of macros (will be fixed in next Office), MS Access (if you need it), OneNote, and compatibility. Mac Office has a far better UI and the gap will only widen with the hideous next release of Office for Windows. I like the MacBU's work but they have to fix the bugs and hopefully one day move to Cocoa and ditch Carbon.
The main reasons Office 2007 is better is because of macros (will be fixed in next Office), MS Access (if you need it), OneNote, and compatibility. Mac Office has a far better UI and the gap will only widen with the hideous next release of Office for Windows. I like the MacBU's work but they have to fix the bugs and hopefully one day move to Cocoa and ditch Carbon.
I def. prefer MS Office over iWork. And I agree with some others here - I really can't stand OpenOffice (only used it on Windows, but i suppose it's not much different). Tried to do a proper presentation with Impress, but it was like.. gah. I nearly smashed my computer.