Alternatives to Microsoft Office
If you've recently tried to upgrade to a new version of Microsoft Office, you might be astounded by the price that it commands. It can cost over $400 for the professional version. Quite a pretty penny to pay.
You can find other more reasonable alternatives. Most of which are free or at the very least very low cost.
One very reasonably priced alternative to Microsoft Office is Microsoft's own Works. This is basically a stripped down version of the more robust Microsoft Office. However, Works usually does about almost everything the typical office user might need, and in most cases would be perfectly sufficient. What Microsoft does with Works is usually use an older version of it's products and put in Works, so unless you need the newest whizbang features, you'll most likely find the product to be just what you need.
One software suite that is sweeping the corporate world is Open Office. A truly revolutionary idea, Open Office has been created by developers as Open Source software. Which means that the programming is done by independent programmers around the world rather than a central corporation like Microsoft.
Many users have found that Open Office is a good alternative to Microsoft's Office products. It offers free alternative versions to Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Access. And the best part is that it's completely free. There is no charge for using Open Office, it remains free for all users whether personal or corporate. It remains very compatible with most versions of Microsoft Office. Which means that if you create a document in Open Office and mail it to a friend or coworker with Microsoft Office that the document will open fine for them, and vice versa. However, many users have complained that Access isn't very forgiving of the differences between the programs.
One way of dealing with documents that is gaining a lot of steam is Google Documents. By simply creating a Google account, you can get free access to Google Documents, and immediately start creating word and excel documents very similar to how Microsoft Office works.
Many users like the fact that while using Google Documents all of your documents are web based, which means that you're protected from data loss on your personal computer. After losing years of work in 10 seconds when a hard drive went bad, I feel more comfortable that Google with it's backups is a lot more likely to be able to preserve my documents.
Google documents is very workplace friendly. It allows you to easily share documents with your coworkers. If you're working on the same projects, you can collaborate very easily by using the same documents.
There are numerous options to avoid the high costs of Microsoft Office. Even though they are the leader, it's possible to create compatible documents you can share with others and save money at the same time.
 Microsoft Office 2003 Professional Pro Full Version  US $275.00
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 New Perspectives on Microsoft Office 2003 US $.99
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 Acer Aspire OneWindows XPMicrosoft Office 2007Webcam US $600.00
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 MICROSOFT OFFICE 2007 PROFESSIONAL FULL VERSION PRO US $102.50
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 MicroSoft Office 97 Professional Edition SR 1 US $5.00
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