Word Perfect Office vs M$ Office

[JohnnieB]

Because it’s the de facto industry standard, I’d been using M$ Office for so long I’d more or less forgotten what the term “user friendly” meant, but now that I’m retired and can choose what word processors, spreadsheets and other software I use, I’m relearning its meaning.

I used Word Star back in the DOS era and in Windows for Workgroups era, the company I worked for used Word Perfect and Quattro Pro until we were forced to downgrade to the more expensive, less user friendly, M$ software in order to communicate electronically with anyone outside the company network, so when I loaded Word Perfect Office X5 on my home systems, it was like being reacquainted with a long lost friend and I was up and running almost instantly.

When I switched to M$ Office 2007 at work, it took me forever to figure out how to do the same things I’d been doing almost daily in the previous versions of Word, Excel and Access, however after a quarter century lapse in usage and jumping countless incremental versions of the Word Perfect Office software, I’m able to do what I want without searching through endless non-intuitive menus.

I love the Oxford Concise Dictionary look-up and Thesaurus features in Word Perfect. You can actually find words you’re not sure how to spell exactly and get definitions for them so you know you are using the correct word. (IE: Sight, Site and Cite are often misused in this forum. )

I’ve also switched to Firefox and Thunderbird, but those are new to me and I’m still learning the in’s and out’s, so I haven’t decided if they are better or worse than I.E. and Outlook.
Since they actually work, I pretty sure they won’t fall in the “worse” category.

End of rant,
John

 

[venomballistics]

I avoid everything M$ as much as I can in favor of open source solutions.
take Open Office for a test drive

 

[CAJUNLAWYER]

Unfortunately the Courts all use MS word-excell-powerpoint etc so for comity I am forced to use Word. Also none of the data programs are compatible with the Mac so I am stuck with windows.

 

[JohnnieB]

I avoid everything M$ as much as I can in favor of open source solutions.
take Open Office for a test drive

I took a peek at Open Office and liked it, but my youngest son is a software engineer and sent me a 3-pack "trial version" of WP Office X5.

As for brand avoidance, I avoid Intel. In fact, I've never bought or built a system with anything except AMD under its hood.

John

 

[mwtdvm]

I also despise MS Word. WP is a much friendlier program and if you are doing any type of repetitive tasks where macros are involved, it is the way to go. Unfortunately MS bundling their software has resulted in a whole lot of folks frustrated with MS Word but stuck with it.
Also, FWIW I used Dragon Naturally Speaking at work and it runs much better in WP than MS Word.

 

[JohnnieB]

Unfortunately the Courts all use MS word-excell-powerpoint etc so for comity I am forced to use Word. Also none of the data programs are compatible with the Mac so I am stuck with windows.

Hi Caj

WP Office X5 speaks M$ better than M$ speaks M$
Seriously, I can create or open, edit and save M$ files that can be used by Word, Excel etc.

I'm not 100% sure if the previous version (WP Office X4) is 100% compatible or not, but if you want to give it a try, here's a link that it selling the OEM version for pocket change (Lawyer sized pockets ) and the retail version can be obtain at Amazon for not much more that that.

Trinity Software Distribution Corel WordPerfect Office X4 Standard OEM - ON SALE

John

 

[venomballistics]

I took a peek at Open Office and liked it, but my youngest son is a software engineer and sent me a 3-pack "trial version" of WP Office X5.

As for brand avoidance, I avoid Intel. In fact, I've never bought or built a system with anything except AMD under its hood.

John

same here ... been thinking of a new system build.
time to brush up on the hardware psudo standard

 

[bk43]

I am trying to get away from MS Office on my new computer but can't because others can't open files you send them that aren't MS. I spent 3 hours this week redoing a document I sent in OpenOffice because nobody could open it. I hate it but we use the computer for both business and pleasure and business is a MS world.

Wait until you folks that like MS Outlook Express get Windows 7. You can't even get mail without adding MS versions of Facebook and a photo album. Plus you have to go to a MS server and enter a password to even pick up your mail.

You'd think Bill and Melinda have enough money but I guess not. Hell, Ford even wants me to go to a MS program to navigate or use the phone in my new truck...sucks!

Bob

 

[Farmer17]

I would try to stay with MS Word, Excel, Powerpoint and make the best of it. Almost everything is compatible, which won't be the case with other software including Open Office, and I've learned this through much frustration trying other products that I felt were otherwise superior.

 

[cp1969]

I've used Open Office (free) in the past when I ran ubuntu and as I recall, it is 100% compatible with MS Office.

 

[JohnnieB]

Did some looking in the WPO X5 manual, help files and on the net.

I was wrong imply WPO X5 is 100% compatible with M$ Office.
M$ uses some proprietary formatting for embedding objects and complex formatting, so WPO cannot translate everything perfectly.
It does, however, work with files that do not contain proprietary formatting.

It'll work okay for me since I don't send documents with complex formatting electronically and it will open incoming documents well enough for me to read the text.

Ahhh! the joys of retirement
John

 

[don95sml]

Because it’s the de facto industry standard, I’d been using M$ Office for so long I’d more or less forgotten what the term “user friendly” meant, but now that I’m retired and can choose what word processors, spreadsheets and other software I use, I’m relearning its meaning.

I love the Oxford Concise Dictionary look-up and Thesaurus features in Word Perfect. You can actually find words you’re not sure how to spell exactly and get definitions for them so you know you are using the correct word. (IE: Sight, Site and Cite are often misused in this forum. )

You forgot to mention "Reveal Codes", which is another really great feature of WPO.

 

[johngalt]

I'm a Mac guy, I'm thinking of trying out Apple's iWork package. Office 2010 now requires "activation". I refuse to spend my money on a company that treats me like a thief. Apple's products don't require entering product codes or activation - they just work.

 

[cmort666]

I've had bad experiences with previous versions of Word. One version had a bug in the outline function. When I called them, they told me the solution was to buy the next version... which required also buying another operating system.

I've mostly used Word Perfect until recently. Being out of work since February of '09, I do a lot of resumes. I do them in outline form with bullets. Lately, Word Perfect has been screwing up the bullets, replacing them with dollar signs and occasionally inserting a random character here and there. I switched to Open Office and the problem's gone away.

Until the recent problems, I always saved my documents in MS Word format. Word Perfect X3 always read and saved them with no problems.

 

[putt45]

I, too, used WordPerfect in the law office until it converted to Word. Everybody cursed Word. I bought WordPerfect, did everything in it, and saved the final in Word.
Now, being retired, I can leave out the last step, and enjoy viewing the codes in peace.

 

[oldman45]

I use Word Perfect for a variety of reasons.

1. Most law offices use WP and I can keep reports and such on flash drives for immediate updating, additions or re-wording at whatever law office I am located.

2. WP is user friendly. If I can use the functions I need, then anyone can.

3. WP Office Suites is priced lower than the other office type programs.

I began using Word Perfect when it was 5.1 and have updated each time new versions are issued. I bought WP12 a couple years back and decided I am close enough to retirement or deceasement that there is no need of updating anymore.

 

[Farmer17]

If you ever have to apply for job go out and buy MS Word immediately, Open Office, Works, etc. may or may not work.

 

[LouisianaJoe]

As long as you save your document to a format that is compatible with other word processing programs, it does not make any difference how you got there. Office 2007 introduced a new format that can not be opened with Office 97-2003.

My suggestion is to save documents in the Office 97 format and then programs like OpenOffice, Word Perfect and even Office 2007 can read the file. There are new features in Office 2007 that will not be available in the older formats, but I have not needed to either learn them or need them as most documents that I create are simple documents.

 

[ISOM]

WordPerfect or Microsoft...

For several years we used Wordperfect. It was OK but...
We consider anything MICROSOFT a virus.
We now use the high dollar PAGE MAKER.

 

[Cyrano]

I loved WordPerfect when we had it in the office. MSWord is large, clunky and not at all intuitive to use. Unfortunately it's the standard of the computer world.