OpenOffice provides a great alternative to existing commercial office suites. It comes with word processor (Writer), spreadsheet (Calc), presentation (Impress), drawing and graphing tool (Draw), tool for creating equations and formulae (Math) and finally a database tool which also build reports and forms (Base). All components are multi-platform and multilingual. Development is sponsored by Sun Microsystems.

WRITER
For all your documents

WRITER has everything you would expect from a modern, fully equipped word processor or desktop publisher.

It's simple enough for a quick memo, powerful enough to create complete books with contents, diagrams, indexes, etc. You're free to concentrate on your message - while WRITER makes it look great.

IMPRESS
Is a truly outstanding tool for creating effective multimedia presentations. Your presentations will stand out with 2D and 3D clip art, special effects, animation, and high-impact drawing tools.

Master Pages simplify the task of preparing your materials.

A complete range of Views are supported: Drawing / Outline / Slides / Notes / Handouts to meet all the needs of presenters and audiences, plus an optional multi-pane view to put all the tools at your fingertips.


IMPRESS has a complete range of easy-to-use drawing and diagramming tools to spice up your presentation.

'Park' your most commonly used drawing tools around your screen ready for single-click access.

Slide show Animation and Effects bring your presentation to life. Fontworks provides stunning 2D and 3D images from text. Create lifelike 3D images with astounding speed and response.

Save your presentations in OpenDocument format, the new international standard for office documents. This XML based format means you're not tied in to IMPRESS. You can access your presentations from any OpenDocument compliant software.

Of course, you are free to use your old Microsoft PowerPoint presentations, or save your work in PowerPoint format for sending to people who are still locked into Microsoft products. Alternatively, use IMPRESS's built-in ability to create Flash (.swf) versions of your presentations.

CALC
The all-purpose spreadsheet

CALC is the spreadsheet program you've always wanted. Newcomers find it intuitive and easy to learn; professional data miners and number crunchers will appreciate the comprehensive range of advanced functions.

Advanced DataPilot technology makes it easy to pull in raw data from corporate databases; cross-tabulate, summarise, and convert it into meaningful information.
Natural language formulas let you create formulas using words (e.g. "sales - costs").

The Intelligent Sum Button inserts a sum function or a subtotal automatically, depending on context.

Wizards guides you through choosing and using a comprehensive range of advanced spreadsheet functions.

Styles and Formatting makes it easy to apply flexible cell formatting options, including freely rotating contents, templates, backgrounds, borders, and many more. You can be your own spreadsheet expert thanks to templates with built-in functions, allowing you to concentrate on your real work.

Scenario Manager allows "what if ..." analysis at the touch of a button - e.g. compare profitability for high / medium / low sales forecasts.

Hide or reveal Design Themes with a single click - use CALC's defaults or add your own.

Save your spreadsheets in OpenDocument format, the new international standard for office documents. This XML based format means you're not tied in to CALC. You can access your spreadsheets from any OpenDocument compliant software.

Of course, you are free to use your old Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, or save your work in Excel format for sending to people who are still locked into Microsoft products. If all they want to see is your results, then use Portable Document Format (.pdf) - no need to buy any extra software.

DRAW
The powerful graphics package

DRAW - from a quick sketch to a complex plan, DRAW gives you the tools to communicate with graphics and diagrams.

'Park' your most commonly used drawing tools around your screen ready for single-click access.

Use Styles and Formatting to put all your graphics styles at your finger tips.

Manipulate objects, rotate in two or three dimensions; the 3D controller puts spheres, rings, cubes, etc. at your disposal.

Arrange objects: group, ungroup, regroup, and edit objects while grouped. Sophisticated rendering let you create photorealistic images with your own texture, lighting effects, transparency, perspective, and so on.

Smart connectors make short work of flowcharts, organisation charts, network diagrams, etc. Define your own 'glue points' for connectors to 'stick' to.

Dimension lines automatically calculate and display linear dimensions as you draw.

Use the picture Gallery for clipart; create your own art and add it to the Gallery.

Save your graphics in OpenDocument format, the new international standard for office documents. This XML based format means you're not tied in to DRAW. You can access your graphics from any OpenDocument compliant software.

Import graphics from all common formats (including BMP, GIF, JPEG, PNG, TIFF, and WMF).

Use DRAW's free ability to create Flash (.swf) versions of your work.


BASE
BASE is a fully featured desktop database management system, designed to meet the needs of a broad array of users, from
* just tracking your personal CD collection, to
* producing a corporate monthly departmental sales report.

BASE offers wizards to help users new to database design (or just new to BASE) to create Tables, Queries, Forms and Reports, along with a set of predefined table definitions for tracking Assets, Customers, Sales Orders, Invoices and much more.

When a personal use database is all you need, BASE offers the full HSQL relational database engine, configured for single user, with the data stored right in the BASE file, as well as native support for dBase flat files.

For power users in the enterprise, BASE delivers native support drivers for a variety of multi-user database engines: MySQL, Adabas D, MS Access and PostgreSQL. In addition, support for JDBC and ODBC standard drivers allows you to connect to virtually any existing database.

BASE integrates seamlessly into the rest of the OpenOffice.org suite applications, for example:

* supplying address book data for mail merge in WRITER using the industry standard LDAP protocol, or common address book formats such as Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Windows and Mozilla;
* creating linked data ranges in CALC files for data pilot analysis or as the basis for charts.

Open Office provider for Linux, Mac and Windows. Wait for review this software

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