OpenOffice.org
OpenOffice.org presents a complete and free office suite. It consists of
the following modules:
- Writer - a word processor similar in look and feel to Microsoft Word, offering a comparable range of functions and tools. Includes the ability to export to PDF files, and can function as a WYSIWYG HTML editor. Many functions and number formats from Calc (below) are available in Writer's tables.
- Calc - a spreadsheet similar to Microsoft Excel with a roughly equivalent range of features. Calc provides a number of features not present in Excel, including a system which automatically defines series for graphing, based on the layout of the user's data. Calc is also capable of writing spreadsheets directly as a PDF file.
- Draw - a vector graphics editor. It features versatile "connectors" between shapes, which are available in a range of line styles and facilitate building drawings such as flowcharts.
- Impress - a presentation program similar to Microsoft PowerPoint. It can export presentations to Adobe Flash (SWF) files, and to PDF files.
- Formula-editor - a tool for creating and editing mathematical formulae
- Base - a database program similar to Microsoft Access. As with Access, Base may be used as a front-end to a number of different database systems, including Access databases (JET), ODBC data sources and MySQL/PostgreSQL. While ooBase can be a front-end for any of the databases listed, there is no need for any of them to be installed.
All programs (as well as a part of documentation) are translated to many languages. Spell checking to those languages is maintained, as well as hyphenation and dictionary of synonyms.
By its functionality OpenOffice.org could be compared to the well-known but not free MS-Office, and could be completely accepted for it's alternative. You could open most of the MS-Office (Word, Excel, Powerpoint) documents, to edit them and save them either in the standard for OpenOffice.org format, or in their original one. The file format of OpenOffice.org is standardized, open, internationally approved XML format, providing future accessibility and usability of your data and small file size. You could read and safe documents in many other formats, as well as export them directly to PDF.
Help for the program you could receive through its forums and mail lists.