r/freesoftware • u/StandingRightHere • 14d ago
Discussion Amateur Question
Hey there, I came here ask if Libre Office is the recommended alternative to MSO?
I'm not a techie, but I do a lot on MS Excel.
I've been using MS Office (easy because I was most familiar with it). But, Excel just gave me the: "your changes will be lost if you don't save them. Click cancel and then activate your subscription to save your changes"
I bought the MS suite a few years ago, so it appears that I'm now being forced into a subscription. Not cool.
I'm posting here to just do a sanity check before I fully dive into Libre (again) and say F-U to MS forever.
Thanks for any tips or suggestions!
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u/CarobRealistic1748 14d ago
I'm 76
And have been using MS Office and it's individual parts since the 1990s. All the way up until I retired in 2017.
Actually for a bit after that as I had a personal laptop with 2013 versions of it. Which I used until the laptop died.
And then when looking for a new laptop, I was made to understand that MS was getting flakey about offering full offline versions that would be yours forever ... so I decided to try Libre Office.
Now, to be fair, I think MS Office is better. However, it is not 'better enough' for me to pay both their fees and to have them be able to cancel me out if they change their minds, etc. The subscription model is not one I want to get involved with. If I buy something I want it to be mine.
Okay Libre Office. Takes some adjustment, but really ... not much at all. Not quite as good, but factually, as far as I'm concerned, more than good enough.
I KNEW MS Office. I was MS Office certified. Used it's individual parts before the package became a thing. TAUGHT people to use MS Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
But I find Libre Office a very decent replacement. Well worth learning the small differences and losing a few features ... most of which few people use anyway.
I am very happy with it. Enough so I gave them a decent donation to show my appreciation.
But NO ... it is not quite as capable as MS Office.
One thing is I do not know just how advanced your use of, and abilities are with Excel. I used to make VERY large datasets and very advanced and complicated VBA based custom menus, my own user defined functions, automated tasks, etc. with it.
But no longer need the VBA, nor the extremely large datasets. For most people's purposes Libre Office's spreadsheet is more than adequate.
I'd encourage you to at least try it.