open source office software on public PCs?

[Stacy Pober]

We have Open Office in the library computer labs, but we also have
Microsoft Office on them as well.

Some file formats come in that seem to work better in Open Office.  This
may be because we update Open Office versions more frequently.

When I've helped students in the labs with files that won't open in
Microsoft Office has been a useful solution. They usually then convert  the
file to a format that Microsoft Office accepts, though.

We have used Google Docs and I find that you have to be very flexible about
formatting and appearance when you use their tools.  The problem may occur
more often when documents are shared that were originally created with MS
Word or Excel .   Some committees I'm on share documents with Google Docs
and you sometimes get a document that looks reasonable on screen, that
prints out very oddly.  Perhaps this is Google's green initiative to keep
us from printing out electronic documents....

-- 
Stacy Pober
Information Alchemist
Manhattan College Library
Riverdale, NY 10471
stacy.pober at manhattan.edu


On Thu, Mar 22, 2012 at 3:44 PM, Carol Hassler
<Carol.Hassler at wicourts.gov>wrote:

>  Is anybody providing open source productivity software on their public
> computers? For example, Libre Office or Open Office?
>
> If so, I'm interested in how that has gone for you - whether you've needed
> to do training, what does or doesn't work, etc. We are exploring using it
> on our Windows 7 public PCs.
>
> If you considered providing open source productivity software and ended up
> not doing so, can you please explain why?
>
> Thank you,
>
> Carol Hassler
> Webmaster / Cataloger
> Wisconsin State Law Library
> (608) 261-7558
> http://wilawlibrary.gov/
>

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2012-03-22
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