For a long time, at least until last year, Microsoft Office has been the main program for working on the office computer. Even though the Microsoft program is still the most used in companies, it does not mean that it is the only one and that you cannot use an alternative free program at home or in the office.
The best free office program that everyone can use, both for personal use, in the company or for commercial use, is LibreOffice, available for Windows Linux and Mac PC, with excellent features and functionality, which does not feel inferior and you can today, especially after the release of the new version, compare with Microsoft Office .
Although it is not possible to talk about every function of these immense programs, let's try here to see the main functions of LibreOffice (not to be confused with OpenOffice) and its strengths, to get a general idea of what can be done.
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1) Libreoffice Writer vs Microsoft Word
The main program of each Office suite is the writing program and LibreOffice Writer and Microsoft Word are certainly the best two.
Those who are used to using Word will find in Writer a worthy replacement, very similar and absolutely familiar.
Writer and Word are practically the same as general functions and, although Word is more beautiful to look at and provides more preset templates, the set of buttons and options is practically the same.
Both have an excellent grammar checker, a reliable autosave system, support for all types of documents and files.
With Writer you can open files created with Word, both Doc and Docx and you can save documents in these two formats (by changing the default option).
Writer is capable of practically everything you can do with Word.
2) Spreadsheets: Microsoft Excel vs Libreoffice Calc
Spreadsheets are an important part of an Office suite and Microsoft Excel has always been the number one program.
Depending on your needs, Calc from LibreOffice may very well be sufficient for most uses.
Calc and Excel work the same way and not too experienced users won't notice any difference between the two.
However, Microsoft Excel remains much more powerful and more experienced users who use Macros will not be able to give it up in favor of Calc.
Unfortunately Calc has its own macro language, not always compatible with Excel's VBA format.
This means that if you want to switch from Excel to Calc, it may be necessary to redo the various macros.
Conversely, however, the Calc macros translate well in Excel.
Calc is still excellent for those who only need to do spreadsheets without using macros.
3) Presentations: Microsoft PowerPoint vs LibreOffice Impression
The word PowerPoint is now synonymous with video presentation.
An alternative program like Impress can be an excellent alternative even if for graphic quality and options it will not be able to convince Powerpoint users.
The main problem with Impress is the tiring import of PowerPoint presentations.
If instead you start from scratch then Impress is fine, even if it gives the feeling of being a few years behind Powerpoint, lacking modernity, graphic options, animations and the possibility of collaborating in a group.
Impress, however, is easy to use, it can save ppt and pptx files and has a nice free application for Android called Impress Remote that allows you to remotely control a presentation with your mobile phone, making a great impression in meetings.
Impress is an excellent program, not recommended only if you work with people who already use PowerPoint because of possible compatibility problems.
4) Database: Microsoft Access vs LibreOffice Base
If Microsoft Access has long been the default database management program, LibreOffice Base can be considered a rather worthy competitor.
The main difference between Base and Access is availability: Access is only available for Windows, while Base can be installed on Windows, Mac and Linux.
Otherwise the programs are very similar, both can create masks, reports, SQL and tables and can be attached to external databases.
Conclusion
For most activities and functions, if you don't want to throw money out of the window, LibreOffice should be the choice, unless a Microsoft Office program is specifically required for your work.
In addition, the two suites are very compatible with each other, so you can try LibreOffice, open and edit documents that can then be reopened by Microsoft Office and vice versa, without having to make conversions or special configurations.
I personally use LibreOffice and I also installed it on the PC of my parents and some friends who almost didn't notice the change.
LibreOffice, which can be downloaded for free from the official website in Italian, has now reached version 4.2 and has become significantly better than other Microsoft Office alternatives such as OpenOffice (similar but less updated today).
It can also be downloaded in a portable version, which does not require installation, to be kept on the USB stick.
LibreOffice is compatible with all popular document formats (including Visio, Corel Draw and Microsoft Publisher files as well) and is also capable of converting documents to PDF from its save options.
LibreOffice can also be integrated with the most used content and document management systems including Alfresco, IBM FileNet P8, Microsoft Sharepoint 2010, Nuxeo, OpenText and SAP NetWeaver Cloud Service .
LibreOffice also has a module for writing and solving mathematical equations and the ability to write XML code .
In its latest version LibreOffice has also improved its interface qualitatively and has become faster to load and save documents .
Thanks to Open365 you can use LibreOffice Cloud also becoming a perfect and free alternative to Office 365.
