How2Day: Free Office Substitutes

Utilize your computer to its fullest capacity with a free Office substitute software. B2M Productions/Polka Dot/Getty Images
An office-productivity suite like Microsoft Office is necessary for many applications, whether work, school or entertainment. Unfortunately, Office can be prohibitively expensive for students or those with a limited income. Luckily there are free alternatives. Logically, a free office substitute would include a word processing program and spreadsheet program. Those that do not at least cover these tasks are not discussed.

OpenOffice.org offers an extensive office software suite of products, including Writer and Calc word processing and spreadsheet programs. Draw is a photo editing program, and Presentation takes the place of slide presentation programs such as PowerPoint. An added bonus is Math, an equation editor. The free software is available for download to more than one computer, but files are location specific.

A full suite of office software is available from Google. Google Documents and Spreadsheets cover the word processing and spreadsheet functions, while Google Presentations allows the creation of slide formatted files. The Google Drawings program allows the user to create flow charts, diagrams and other simple drawings, but does not allow for photo editing. Because the Google software suite is completely Internet-based, files of all types can be accessed from any computer with an Internet connection.

A limited free software substitute is available from IBM Lotus Symphony. Having the basic components to handle word processing and spreadsheet duties are the Lotus Symphony Documents and Lotus Symphony Spreadsheets. The only additional program available is the Lotus Symphony Presentations to create slide formatted files. Although the software can be installed on multiple computers, a file can only be accessed on computers where it is saved.

The LibreOffice software, an office software suite produced by members that assisted with OpenOffice.org, offers several programs. The LibreOffice Text Document, Spreadsheet and Presentation applications will take care of most office demands. An added LibreOffice Drawing program allows the creation of diagrams and flow charts, while LibreOffice Formula acts as an equation editor. Files are location specific when using LibreOffice and users should be advised that the software may overwrite OpenOffice.org applications.

SoftMaker Office offers an extremely minimal office software suite. Consisting of only TextMaker and PlanMaker, the software accomplishes word processing and spreadsheet functions. Available for free download, the files created with SoftMaker office are site specific and can be opened in only one location unless it is saved in multiple locations.

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