How to replace Microsoft Office with free software

Microsoft Office is a wonderful suite of programs, but it’s not cheap. And some people I’ve talked to just can’t get used to the 2007 version and don’t want to. If you’re looking for free alternatives, you’re in luck – there are several options out there, and they will replace all but a couple of Outlook features.

Open Office

Open Office is a completely free, open-source software suite that handles “word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, databases and more.” That means it handles everything Office does except email and OneNote, and has the addition of a very decent graphics program for editing images.

It’s absolutely free for everyone, businesses and individuals alike. It works very well (I’ve used it for years), and almost identically to Office. But as I said above, it doesn’t replace your email.

Thunderbird with Lightning

Thunderbird is Mozilla’s open source email client. With an add-on called Lightning, you get the calendar feature from Outlook, too. It won’t set meetings like Outlook, but it will keep your schedule beautifully. The only two things it won’t do, that Outlook will do, are:

• Archive your emails in a sensible, easy fashion. There are some really complicated roundabout free solutions for archiving email via Thunderbird, and a few paid ones I haven’t tried. Most individuals don’t keep emails forever, but if you’re working on a book with a friend via email or running a small business with emails you want to archive just in case there’s ever any confusion about what got promised to whom and when, it may not satisfy you.
• Sync with your phone, at least not out of the box. Thunderbird is not designed to be synced with the email app on any mobile phone. There are some paid programs that are supposed to help with Windows Mobile-based phones, like BirdieSync and FinchSync. For iPhones, Funambol has a solution which is free, but requires a free account on their server and actually uses their server to sync the data wirelessly (for most people, I don’t think this would be a concern, but I don’t know how secure or private such a set-up would be, and you’re also advised to double-check whether this will incur fees from your mobile provider.

If you don’t need either of these features, or need them but are are happy with the workarounds listed here, Thunderbird will do what you need, for free.

Online solutions

Zoho.com is my favorite online replacement for Microsoft Office, and it comes with a web-based email program similar to Yahoo’s. The Zoho development team seems to be dedicated to the project. If you like Gmail, you may not be thrilled with Zoho’s alternative, but I think Zoho’s word processor, spreadsheet and other Office-style apps beat Google Docs hands down. Zoho files can be made shareable or private, which is helpful if you want a group to be able to access something. Additionally, Zoho has a Notebook feature which is really cool – a bit like OneNote, but online.

One Note replacements

One Note is pretty cool, but I actually needed something online that I could access from various computers. As I said above, Zoho’s Notebook program is one strong alternative. Another is Springpad, which I completely fell in love with. Springpad lets you set up various Notebooks (as many as you like) and create within them all the tabbed pages you want, and tabs beneath your tabs and so on. It has templates for recipe binders, address books, workout trackers… oh, you name it. What’s not in there, you can create yourself. It works wonderfully, and unlike some of its competitors, its mobile version is pretty fully functional.

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Posted in Technology on October 29, 2009