OpenOffice Comes Natively to Mac!

I’m writing this today using a free open source fully-featured office suite called OpenOffice. Developed by Sun Microsystems, OpenOffice has all of the functionality, sleekness, and compatibility of expensive office suite products, in a easy to use, downloadable, free package. Now in its third release, it is available to run natively on Mac OS X.

Though still in beta stages, this release shows no signs of bugs nor short comings. Sun has really put a clean face on this Mac release–completely packaged with a simple install all Mac users will be familiar with. Mount the package downloaded from Sun and you’ll the familiar window of ‘Package and Applications’ alias. Drag and drop, and you’re installed and ready to go!

One of the nicest features of OpenOffice is that it is fully compatible with all Microsoft products as well as having better compatibility with older office programs that Microsoft has left behind. You can easily set up OpenOffice to open and save in Microsoft formats directly, something I imagine most users will want to do.

From within OpenOffice, either in Word Processing, Spreadsheet, or Presentation mode, the options are shared between them, and once set, it’s ready for everything.
1. Click the OpenOffice.org menu from the top and select Preferences, or Command-
2. Under Load/Save – General, you can choose what format to automatically save Text/Spreadsheet/Presentation files.
If saving under the Microsoft formats, as Word Documents, Excel spreadsheets, or PowerPoint presentations, it will give you an error saying some information may be lost. This is a small price to pay for free compatibility, but chances are, you probably won’t even notice.

That’s it! You are now using a free alternative to the expensive MS Office suite, with full compatibility, set up in minutes!

Click here download the beta version of OpenOffice for Mac OS X.