Libra Office on a Mac Mini (compared to Ms Office or default installed iWorks Apps)

users
#1

Hi,

I have never used Libre Office before, or any ‘Office’ type software, other than Microsoft Office 2000, 2003, 2007 and 2010, and all on Windows pc's.

I am now (as of Sept 2015) an OU student and am of limited means, so The 'Open University Computing Helpdesk’ advised me that I could try Libre Office - as it is free and will ‘do’ whatever Microsoft Office is capable of ‘doing’ in respect of what I NEED it to be capable of ‘doing’, in order to create any and all documents, essays, assignments, projects, etc for my B.A.(Hon’s) History degree course.

Is it the case that Libre Office is as 'feature packed' as Ms Office, or are there some important features that will be missing from Libre Office when compared to Ms Office?

I ask this because the above help desk said that Libre Office is a good alternative to both MS Office (due to the price differential), and also ‘better' than the default ‘Apple iWorks’ apps, because Pages in particular does not allow ‘comments’ to be added to submitted documents, i.e if I submitted an assignment to a tutor written in Pages then if he marked it and added some comments, before returning it, that I would not see those comments because they can’t be added in the first place. I have no idea what else the 'iWorks Apps’ are also NOT capable of doing when compared to Ms Office or Libre Office, and even if any of these ‘missing’ features are even important anyway.

I mention ‘Apple iWorks’ apps because the computer I will be using for OU study is a Mac Mini, which has Pages, Numbers and Keynote installed by default.

Taking the above in account, which ‘version’ of Libre Office is compatible with the latest version of Mac OSX (my Mac Mini is at v’10.10.5 Yosemite).

Thanks

Rob

#2

No, it is not as feature packed as MSOffice.
What do you mean with "compatibility"? It can open more file formats
than other products. Sometimes you notice some difference in layout and
format compared to the original, sometimes not. Same as with any other
software when opening complex foreign file formats.

LibreOffice fully implements (and is built around) the OpenDocument
standard. If you are not interested in using OpenDocument, then there is
no reason to use LibreOffice. In particular, this is not an alternative
editor for MS Office documents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument

Dozends of software products (including the latest MSOffice) can handle
OpenDocument.
Furthermore, LibreOffice supports PDF as export format.

#3

Go to www.libreoffice.org and download the latest version. While I
can't speak specifically about your situation, LibreOffice is an
excellent office suite that's compatible with MS Office formats, as well
as the ISO standard OpenDocument formats. As the help desk suggested
it, I assume it's OK for your needs. So, why not give it a try?

#4

Your comments are contrary to the experiences of many who have used
LibreOffice and OpenOffice for years.

#5

As an ODF suite, it is an alternative to MSOffice indeed. However it is
not a good alternative if you store your work in MSOffice formats all
the time. Macro compatibility is close to zero (nice try at best).

#6

Macros are not standardised, last I checked docs are not even
disclosed or leaked. Sometimes parts of that are just
reverse-engineered.[*] In languages world semi-solutions are
frustrating.

Example: Imagine how great would be the C++ support in MS Visual
Studio if C++ was a secret language developed by competition...

[*] Which is not legal in some countries :slight_smile:

#7

Hi,

I have never used Libre Office before, or any ‘Office’ type software, other than Microsoft Office 2000, 2003,

You'll find LO quite similar in looks to Office 2003. The only thing you need to know is that it doesn't contain any sort of mail or PIM client.

I am now (as of Sept 2015) an OU student and am of limited means, so The 'Open University Computing Helpdesk’ advised me that I could try Libre Office - as it is free and will ‘do’ whatever Microsoft Office is capable of ‘doing’ in respect of what I NEED it to be capable of ‘doing’, in order to create any and all documents, essays, assignments, projects, etc for my B.A.(Hon’s) History degree course.

Is it the case that Libre Office is as 'feature packed' as Ms Office, or are there some important features that will be missing from Libre Office when compared to Ms Office?

If the Helpdesk say it's fine to use LO, then it's fine to use LO! You'll find that unless you need to create extremely complex formatted document, then LibreOffice WILL do everything you need.
For "normal" use then LO certainly contains as much functionality as MSO - indeed when I was a Systems Accountant for two large PLCs, I suspect that we could have easily used LO instead of MSO!

Good luck!

#8

Hi Robert,

The latest version of LibreOffice will work on your Mac Mini with
Yosemite. You can install versions from the AppStore, or else download
them from the LibreOffice web site. Some people have reported
differences in behaviour or bugs in the AppStore versions, as these are
built slightly differently from the currently available downloads on the
LibreOffice website by a private company.

In terms of how well it handles Microsoft Office document formats : well
it depends, on the whole pretty well, but there are still some (for some
people too many) issues, and no doubt always will be. No import / export
filter is perfect.

As for comment management, there are issues there too, especially when
moving from one format to the other, but Office 2011 for Mac (which
costs a damn sight more), doesn't even handle comments properly between
Mac and Windows ! Perhaps things are better with the latest offering
from Microsoft with Office 2016, but that still has a cost (and
currently requires a yearly subscription to Office 365).

Nothing is perfect, but it should be good enough, especially if the OU
tech support are recommending it as a possibility. I am somewhat
surprised that the OU hasn't embraced the government's own mandate for
use of the ODF standard, but I guess old habits die hard amongst the
teaching profession.

Alex

#9

Ah, the universal question... What do you NEED it to do... That's a question only you and your professors and course requirements in the future can answer.

Overall, I don't think you'll have a problem. IMO, your biggest hurdle may be a professor who insists on submittals in either .doc or .docx format. I've yet to stumble on to a word processor that is 100% compatible with MS Word in this respect. The same probably applies to Excel spreadsheets, and I know it happens with PowerPoint. A friend just tried to open a PowerPoint doc using both the latest version of Impress from Libre Office and Open Office, and it was a royal pain.

But as someone mentioned, try to stay away from complex documents as they will be more problematic.

My suggestion would be to submit your papers in PDF format. While LO, OO, MS Office, and lots of programs offer PDF file export, not all programs have that export feature. But on the Mac Mini you say you will be using, it doesn't matter. When you are ready to create the final document for submission to your professors, from ANY program, select Print. In the lower left corner of the dialog box is a PDF button. Click on it, and you'll be able to create and store a PDF on your hard drive, and anyone with a PDF reader can read and annotate (mark it up electronically) the file and return it to you. Then, on the Mini, simply open the file in Preview and you should be off to the races.

FYI, the iWorks apps are not a "default". They are not included with Macs when you buy the computer, they are purchased through the App Store. If you were to save and submit a file in Pages file format, your professor would also need to have Pages in order to read it . However, all three programs will save a document in MS Office file formats. Be aware that you will need to know what features are supported between the programs. Keynote has features that are unsupported in PowerPoint, and I'm sure the reverse is true.

Pages 09 does have comments, I don't know about the current version. I've read in the past in a Mac magazine that Apple removed some features from the current iWorks offerings.

The fact that OU has the software installed implies their professors (at least a portion of them) have no problems with files created with the Mini. Ask your professor. :slight_smile:

#10

Hi :slight_smile:
The short answer is yes. You can trust the OU in this! :slight_smile:

Alex Thergood is more expert with Macs than most of us here. He is one of
many people on this mailing list whose advice i trust and take a lot of
notice of.

You do need a separate emailer. Many people seem to use Thunderbird but i
am not sure what people tend to prefer on Macs.

In more and more detail ...

LibreOffice has all the functionality you or anyone else are ever likely to
need.

Almost invariably when people or magazine articles attempts to claim
otherwise it's because they haven't tried, haven't even googled "how to",
nor read any documentation (available free), nor asked any of our or other
user support systems.
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation/Publications

LibreOffice is free and easy to install on all the various systems
currently in common usage for such work. It is also highly compatible with
a wide range of other programs - to an extent that even different versions
of MS Office are not quite compatible with each other! So if there is
anyone who still can't use 'our' format it's quite easy for them to use
Google-docs or even download and install OpenOffice/LibreOffice for free
and with little effort. It's a bit like if a system can't read a Pdf! :slight_smile:

LibreOffice does have features that MS Office lacks - and along with
OpenOffice (and many others) has, by it's very nature, many capabilities
that MS Office either lacks completely or that would cost a lot to add to a
standard MS Office bundle. There are many add-ons/plugins, we still call
them "Extensions" rather than use those new-fangled terms! :wink:

One feature is that you can use an iPhone or Android phone as the remote
control device for presentations. Also it is easy to change all the menus,
dialogues and pop-ups to one or more of over a hundred human languages.

The OpenSource ethos is quite different so occasionally things are called
by a different name and/or appear in a different place in the menus. We
share that ethos with many other programs and it's similar to the ethos of
OpenOffice. The ethos is a bit different from Google-docs but not hugely
so. So, once you get used to such a non-MS program then you'll find you
are much more able to change to others or swap around using different ones
to suit different circumstances.

Macros can sometimes be a problem but since the OU has said that
LibreOffice is suitable they will have taken that into account. Many
places manage to totally avoid using macros anyway. MS macros have so
often been used to infect machines with malware that many places block all
macros. Again MS macros often seem a bit incompatible between different
versions of MS Office. I've worked in offices for over 30 years and never
used or needed macros.

Compatibility issues are often talked about in the Microsoft world because
MS seems to constantly create problems around this issue. Each version of
MS Office uses a different "transitional" version of their OOXML format and
this forces people to keep buying different versions of MS Office in order
to remain compatible with each other. It could even be seen as a marketing
ploy. This seems to be true of macros too, as well as formats.

You wont have to worry about this though because the OU has stated that
it's Ok to use LibreOffice and our format stays the same throughout all the
various versions. So you should be able to easily share documents with
other people, and if anyone struggles then they can download and install it
for free anyway.

It is not really accurate to call it "our" format because it is an ISO
format that is developed by a world-wide organisation that is comprised of
a vast number of different companies (and individuals). So unlike
Microsoft's ever-changing formats it doesn't keep changing at the drop of a
hat. So the "LibreOffice" format is also the "OpenOffice" format, is also
the "Calligra" format, is also the "KOffice" format, is also the "Abiword
and Gnumeric" format, is also the IBM Lotus Symphony format, and on and
on. The documentation describing the format is freely available to anyone
= so even far off into the future almost "any Tom, Dick or Harry" could
throw together something to read and use the format. The MS formats
(including their old Rtf format) is not future-proof in this way because
even their own implementations of their own formats is a bit different from
the way they defined it - and inconsistent between any 2 versions of their
programs.

While almost everyone else has been happily using 'our' OpenDocument Format
1.2 for many years Microsoft decided to try implementing the older ODF 1.1
instead in their 2007 and 2010 versions. Although everyone else seemed to
find it very easy to write code to use that format for some reason MS
couldn't quite manage it and botched their reading of ODF spreadsheets
really horribly. They have promised to have ODF 1.2 in their 2013 and
their "365". However MS have made similar promises about
"interoperability" for decades and they somehow don't even seem to manage
compatibility between their own programs very well. Almost everyone else
manages a much greater level of compatibility without making such a big
fuss about it. Apple apparently removed ability to use ODF in Pages in
January of this year, just as people seem to be freely using the format
much more widely when sharing documents. If they reinstate it then Pages
might become much more popular but being unable to handle both the main
formats seems a bit arrogant/dumb, especially since Pages is such an
extremely low priority for Apple.

Everyone (even Apple) can use the old MS formats originally used natively
in MS Office 2003 and earlier;
.doc rather than .docX - for Word processors
.xls rather than .xlsX - for Spreadsheets
.ppt rather than .pptX - for Presentations (at least for ones done using
an office suite rather than some dedicated program)

These currently seem to be the best formats to use when sharing between
almost anyone, even between people using different recent versions of MS
Office.

For most programs, certainly for LibreOffice, just go to the "File" menu
and down to "Save As ..." and then choose the "Microsoft Word (or whatever)
2003/Xp/2000". Those numbers at the end occasionally change but as long as
it's 2003. This is all far tooo difficult for most MS Office users to
understand and that is why people keep going on about "compatibility
issues".

I have had a lot of success sharing documents in ODF as the format is
becoming MUCH more popular quite rapidly nowadays but if i know someone is
limited to only some old version of MS Office (or Pages or some-such) then
i use the old MS formats and sometimes i use it just to be certain.

Blimey!! MUCH more than you needed to know!
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#11

Is it the case that Libre Office is as 'feature packed' as Ms Office,
or are there some important features that will be missing from Libre

Office when compared to Ms Office?

This really depends upon your specific use case, and what else you will
be using in conjunction with LibO, or MSO.

If all you are doing is using the basic office suite, with no additional
templates, extensions, etc, then both programs have features that the
other lacks, and both programs have features that are more akin to bugs,
than functional items.

OTOH, if you are using templates for MSO that have an MSRP of
US$100,000, then LibO will be a horrible fail for you.
Likewise, if you are using software that expects to interact with MSO,
the LibO will be a fail, for you.

No, it is not as feature packed as MSOffice.

This is true. I can't trigger the Blue Screen of Death when opening
documents with LibO, when opening the same document with MSO results in
an instant Blue Screen of Death. As such, LibO is obviously
dysfunctional, and inferior to MSO, for doing responding in the
appropriate manner.
(Fourteen years on, and the same documents that gave MSO97 on Win2K the
Blue Screen of Death, trigger the Blue Screen of Death with MSO2013 and
Win 8.0.)

jonathon

#12

Well, I've never had any issue with MS documents and I have never run MS
Office on my own computers. Given the comments made by the OP, I
suspect LibreOffice is entirely suitable form them.