by Gourab Modak

Created on: January 10, 2010

In the software market, Microsoft Office, and OpenOffice dominate the office software category. With innovative features anyone would love, these two have quickly made it up the ladder of success. However, with this success comes the question, "Which one is better?". Like Rome and Carthage, these two software programs became quick competitors. So which one is better?

To better answer this question, you need to know what you want in your office software. Usually, you will need a word processing program, a spreadsheet program, a database program, and a slideshow creating program. While comparing these, it is also necessary to compare the price of each office suite. 

If you compare Microsoft Word 2007 to OpenOffice Writer 4, you will see a dramatic difference in both the look and the feel of it. While OpenOffice was praised for being easy to use after transferring from Microsoft Office, it can't be praised for doing that anymore when comparing it to Microsoft Word 2007. Never the less, it's easy to use. It has the full funtionality of Microsoft Office, but without the ribbon. You can put in regular text, all of the text effects in Word, and you can do pretty much everything that Word can. 

Now, Excel and Calc compare in the same way. Calc can do pretty much everything that Excel can, but the interface just isn't as pretty. I don't really use Calc or Excel that much, so I'm no one to make a comparison between these two. But what I can say is that you can get pretty much all of the functions of Excel in Calc.

Now, while comparing OpenOffice Impress to Microsoft PowerPoint, I have to say, there is some difference. Impress makes the process of creating a slideshow a lot easier. It starts out with a wizard that does most of the work for you. It asks you for what background you want, what your template is, what your presentation is about, and it also asks you what effects you want in there. Of course, you have the opportunity to change anything you want afterwards. Even without that, it still beats Microsoft PowerPoint. You can find many tools a lot easier than in PowerPoint, and the backgrounds are a lot prettier than those in Office.

In both office suites, you will find a lot of extra things. In OpenOffice, you will find Draw and Math as the two extra programs. In Microsoft Office, you will find a lot of extra programs including InfoPath, Outlook, Publisher, and OneNote. Out of all these programs, only OneNote is unnecessary. However, in OpenOffice, both extra programs can be essential at times. If you really need to design XML, check your email away from your browser, and Publish small scale pamphlets, the fact that OpenOffice doesn't have these things can sometimes be a setback. 

However, when you bring cost into the equation, it all makes sense. If you really need to buy MS Office Pro for 500 USD, go for it. If you really need the extra pieces of software, it is completely okay. But if you just need some of the basic things, you'll see that Microsoft overdid the price. Why spend 149 USD on Microsoft Office Student when you can just download OpenOffice in it's full form for free? 

OpenOffice overall is a great software suite. In fact, it actually beats the value of Microsoft Office. While Microsoft Office is overpriced, OpenOffice is way too underpriced.

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