Microsoft Word clone- Opal Office...  

It is Opal but it turns into Open Office. I don't know why they don't just call it one thing and leave it at that. When they change the name, it confuses people. What's the point of that?

So, the question is- Is it worth the 12 bucks? I don't fully grasp the difference.

Thanks for taking a minute to help!!

Open Office(OO) is the "free" alternative to the expensive MS Office. OO is open source meaning its programming code is freely available for the taking and modification. I haven't read OOs Licensing agreement if selling of a modified OO is alright, maybe it is and $12 is not that much.

I haven't tried Opal Office so I cannot say much about it but I have used OO a bit and it does work "like" MS Office: Writer for Word, Calc for Excel, Impress for PowerPoint, Base for Access, Draw is somewhat like a publisher and a Math program for creating mathematical formulas.

Between the two I would go to the original free OO, here I can be assured of regular updates, similar to MS Service Pack, and my data will comply with MS office and a growing number of OO users.

OpenOffice is a totally free MS Office compatible office suite developed and supported mainly by Sun Microsystems. This Opal Office suite is exactly the same thing. Someone is just taking your $12 and giving you OpenOffice which you could get for free from the official website. This "Opal Office" that you pay for is actually an older version of OpenOffice than what you can get for free on the official website.

So basically, Opal Office is a scam. But it's not illegal because according to the LGPL license that OpenOffice uses, anyone can make money off of it if they can find someone ignorant enough to pay for it.

I'm not so sure if it's as good or better than 'Word', I was just wondering if it was worth the money. I agree that Microsoft is way overpriced. Like they need the money. I'm thinking they would want to sell the product for a price that everyone can afford, that way people just have to purchase an inexpensive upgrade. If they charged $30-$40 for the program(ridiculous but affordable), then sold a yearly(or however often) upgrade disc for $10-$20 to keep people up-to-date. They could put out a program disc(up-to-date) every year for the same $30-$40 for people who have not yet purchased it, and also put out an upgrade so everyone else can keep up. Where's the problem???

he he, it was sitting there. But can they do that? take advantage of a completely free stuff.

So, basically you're saying it's as good as 'Word'? I can't stand not being able to open a document or music because I don't have the right program, not that I'd know how to find it even if I did have it. Will 'Open' open everything automatically? I've used 'Word' before but I'm not really very computer literate, so I don't even know what it did, except it made writing things easier. I'm learning slowly, but at least I'm moving along.

Thanks for your input.

May I ask how you can illegally download something and then turn around and protest piracy?? Selling it for profit or using it for your own use- it's still reaping the rewards unjustly, it's still piracy.

BTW, not at all like I'm perfect, I use LimeWire. A lot of my music came from there and I think it's illegal. I don't know why, I'm sharing my music with others so why can't they share theirs with me. I have also enjoyed a movie or two that was a pirated copy. I don't own any- a friend borrowed them from a friend.

So, I'm not complaining about anything, just asking a question. As far as the program in question, I didn't say it is as good as 'Word', I'm asking if anyone knows about it.

Opal Office is a complete scam. When you purchase it they just send you a link to the free download of Open Office 2.3.1 I've been using Open Office and it's really great and it's completely free. Don't get fooled into paying for it.

I finally down loaded Open Office and got the new Java link so now it works. I do believe that free is better. I remember when there was another writing clone that was free =- got it included in the computer we bought before this one - and then they started to charge for it. I like Open Office because I can put many of the articles I get into pdf format not my novel though. The other one I like is Abiworld but have not tried it for a while.