Microsoft Office is the "official" office suite that comes installed on all Windows devices. It is a very complete product, now considered a standard. And it is paid. Some time ago OpenOffice appeared as a completely free and open source alternative, soon becoming the favorite of millions of users around the world, especially free software lovers. What is OpenOffice exactly? We tell you here its history and other details that you will be interested in knowing.
The first (and logical) question that arises when we think of OpenOffice is because it is free. There is no explanation to design a quality office suite and distribute it without charging anything for it. Where is the benefit? well that's it the philosophy of free software...
Brief history of OpenOffice
The history of OpenOffice begins in 1992, with the launch of a first version, still very rudimentary, at the hands of its creators, Star Division. That first office program was called Star Office, the direct antecedent of the OpenOffice that we met later.
But the true office suite as we know it today would arrive in 1996 thanks to the added support for Linux. OpenOffice thus became the office suite available for a greater variety of operating systems.
This ambitious open source project continued to grow with the creation of the web OpenOffice.org, already in the year 2000. That began the period of maximum splendor of the idea. Just a few years later, the figure of 20 million downloads was reached and OpenOffice, available in 110 languages, was used on Windows, Mac and Linux computers. Yes indeed, at no time was the hegemony of Microsoft Office threatened.
In 2009 the destiny of the project takes a turn when Oracle infrastructures buys 30% of OpenOffice (the part belonging to Sun Microsystems, the main developer of OpenOffice). A year later, some of the most prominent members of the community, unhappy with the new direction the project had taken, launched on their own Libre Office, a suite that recovered the original essence of OpenOffice. There were some vain attempts to end this schismwithout success until today.
So today we find that OpenOffice, today in the hands of Apache, is a stalled project on which the shadow of the closing and final point is planned.
Open Office applications
Despite the problems suffered in recent years, it is worth knowing what OpenOffice is and what it offers its users. The software is still active (it was last updated in May 2022) and is still used by many people and companies around the world. These are the applications that are part of your office suite:
Writer
El word processor of OpenOffice, equivalent to Microsoft Word. Writer it is capable of opening and saving the .doc format, property of Microsoft Word, as well as other formats. Among other things, it can password protect documents, allows you to insert images and OLE objects, supports digital signatures, symbols, formulas, calculation tables, charts, hyperlinks, bookmarks, forms, etc. Also a powerful easy-to-use HTML editor.
The most recent versions of OpenOffice Writer have managed to improve the interface and have solved many compatibility problems with other formats.
Calc
Calc is a fully compatible OpenOffice spreadsheet application Excel from Microsoft. The truth is that in some aspects it is even superior to it, for example in terms of vulnerability to certain viruses or the ability to perform some functions such as the graphical representation of data series. Apart from this, it should be noted that Calc offers a much more sophisticated function wizard than its "rival".
Impress
Developed by Sun Microsystems, Impress is a slideshow editing program. Its operation is practically identical to that of Microsoft Office PowerPoint. It is part of the Apache OpenOffice office suite developed by Sun Microsystems. You can create PDF files and export presentations to run on any computer that has Adobe Flash Player installed. One of its weak points is that it does not have a good range of design templates.
Base
We can say that Base is the free software version of the popular application of Microsoft Access. A good tool to carry out functions such as creating and modifying tables, forms, etc. from the HSQL database management system.
Draw
Draw is a vector graphics editor, released in 2018 as a free alternative to Microsoft Visio.
Mathematics
As Microsoft Equation Edition, the application Mathematicsallows you to create and edit all kinds of mathematical formulas, both simple and complex. These formulas can be exported to PDF and even to other documents from the OpenOffice suite, such as Writer.
Is it worth using OpenOffice today?
The answer to this question depends a lot on the tastes and preferences of each user. In general, we can say that if we want enjoy the benefits of the Microsoft Office package without having to pay anythinga, then OpenOffice is a great option.
On the other hand, it should be noted that in general the quality and functionality of its applications (with the exception of Calc) are somewhat outdated and may even present some other failure due to lack of update.