Computer Articles - Internet and Computer News » Microsoft Office

OpenOffice 3.0

admin — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 17:09:33 +0000

This week OpenOffice 3.0 was released and once again I found myself questioning as to why we spend good money on Microsoft Office when there is a completely free alternative available that does the job just as well. After all, it’s not as if Office 2007 is cheap; the professional version comes in at an impressive £350 and it’s not as if I even like Office 2007.

Unlike previous versions which used a standard Windows interface, I find the latest incarnation completely out of keeping with other applications which all keep to roughly the same, familiar user interface. Perhaps old age it starting to catch up with me but even after a year of usage I still find myself spending what seems like an eternity looking in vein for even the most basic of functions. Software for the Windows Operating System has always adhered to a certain menu layout so that users could quickly and easily pick up a new application, but it seems Microsoft now require us to spend weeks figuring out where they’ve moved a basic function such as ‘find’ which should be located in a drop down ‘edit’ menu.

OpenOffice does include almost everything that you could require from an office suite and fortunately the interface is laid out in a fashion becoming a Windows application so it shouldn’t take long to pick up. The applications below shouldn’t be considered cut down versions of the Microsoft equivalent; this is a powerful piece of software in its own right and most users won’t notice any difference in functionality:

Writer: The equivalent to Microsoft Word which includes all the usual features such as AutoCorrect, AutoComplete, AutoFormat, Styles and Formatting, Spellchecker, Grammar Checker and illustration tools. Unlike many other applications (including previous versions of Microsoft Word), Writer can also open and save the .docx format that is used by default in Office 2007.

Calc: Similar to Microsoft’s Excel spreadsheet application, Calc includes all the standard functions as well as more advanced features such as an Intelligent Sum button and Scenario Manager.

Impress: This is designed to replace Office’s PowerPoint presentation application to allow you to create multimedia applications using a combination of clipart, drawing tools, animation, transition effects, text tools and special effects. Work can be shared using a number of formats such as the standards .pdf, .html and Flash.

Draw: Does pretty much what it says on the tin; Draw allows to create graphics including sketches and plans quickly and easily.

Base: An advanced database application for managing raw data, forms, queries, tables and reports which also includes a number of wizards that should get newcomers up and running immediately.

It’s at this point that the penny drops and I realise that there is something missing; unfortunately an e-mail client as an alternative to Microsoft Outlook appears to be absent which for an Internet company such as Refresh is a big issue hence why we probably haven’t yet made the switch. While there are free alternatives available such as Outlook Express and Mozilla Thunderbird I personally have never found they come anywhere close to Outlook in terms of functionality.

Perhaps for the next incarnation they will consider the inclusion of an e-mail client but this omission aside, OpenOffice is a near perfect application which can be downloaded free of charge from www.openoffice.org. The 142mb file size, whilst large, shouldn’t take more than about half an hour, even on modest broadband connections.

Readers Questions/Suggestions

admin — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 18:01:38 +0000

Once again, it’s time for me to publish a few of the e-mails that have arrived in my inbox this week.

Mozilla is becoming well known for its Firefox browser and Thunderbird e-mail client, but its Sunbird calendar is less well known. Put simply, it is a clone of the calendar in Microsoft Office but it is completely free and worth a look for anyone who wants an office calendar program without the expense of buying Microsoft Office.

Ian MacMillan, via E-mail

Nicely spotted Ian. Whilst completely free of charge and still in very early stages of development, Mozilla Sunbird is certainly worth downloading for those in need of an easy to use calendar application for their PC without the need for purchasing a package such as Microsoft Office.

The idea of the calendar will be for it to work across multiple platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux etc) as it works using the XUL user interface language provided by a number of applications such as Mozilla Firefox. As a result of this interdependency you will be required to have one of the free programs from the Mozilla suite installed such as Firefox or Thunderbird which I have reviewed before in the past.

To download the Mozilla Calendar head to www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/ and if you don’t already have Firefox head to www.mozilla.org – Both downloads are extremely small and free of charge.

Those interested in other projects that the Mozilla team are working on should head to http://www.mozilla.org/projects/ – To be honest most of it will be way over the head of the average user as a great deal of it is designed for developers but there are certainly some interesting applications to take a look at.

Having downloaded AVG Anti-Virus as suggested in one of your previous articles I am now getting lots of pop up ads when visiting a site – Should this be happening?

Andrea Winnchild, via E-mail

One thing that you should have learnt from me by now is that I’ll never recommend that you download a program that will also expose the user to pop-up adverts and Spyware.

The problem is likely to be caused by a piece of Adware or Spyware that you also have installed on your computer and it is just incidental that this was installed at approximately the same time as AVG. To rectify this I would recommend that you visit the Microsoft (www.microsoft.com) website and download their Anti-Spyware utility or download Spybot Search and Destroy (http://security.kolla.de) which are both very good programs designed to rid your system of such annoyances. If you require any further instructions regarding these two utilities please head to www.computerarticles.co.uk and download one of my numerous previous articles on the subject.

Whilst talking about removing rubbish from your system it might be worthwhile me taking this opportunity to mention that the CCleaner utility that I mentioned several weeks ago which is designed to remove obsolete files and registry entries from your system has been redesigned and fully updated. This is certainly a worthwhile application for most users who wish to clean up their system which can be downloaded free of charge by heading to www.ccleaner.com. Once again, a full review is available at www.computerarticles.co.uk.

Accounting Software

admin — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 16:58:01 +0000

We’ll kick straight off this week with a letter from one of my readers:

I am a keen reader of your Herald Express column and have downloaded some useful free software as a result. I was wondering if you know of any free downloads of Home Accounting software so I can manage simple income & expenditure, ability to categorise entries & bank reconciliation? Nothing too sophisticated.

John Green, via e-mail

I’ll be honest, I really didn’t have a clue where to start here; although I’m self employed I’ve never touched a piece of accounting software for more than two minutes without running a mile. I have always managed to get along quite happily by using the sales figures automatically generated by our system along with a stack of invoices detailing our outgoings and the whole lot then gets dumped in to an Excel spreadsheet; it’s by no means the most organised system but then by using a few simple formula I have the information I need

My problem locating a suitable piece of software for John has been compounded by the fact that such software seems to polarise users easily; the same piece of software will typically receive just as many 5/5 reviews as it does 1/5 reviews. I’d imagine that since accountancy software has such a steep learning curve that for everyone who gives up after two minutes, there is another that perseveres and finds the application quite capable once the surface has been scratched.

After a good look around I settled on Microsoft Office Accounting Express 2008. This decision pains because although it is free, this application is a huge 250mb download and this in my eyes is excessive for any application, let along one designed for simple bookkeeping.

My decision has been reached because, unlike most of the accounting software which has a habit of looking alien, this package looks and feels very similar to Office which should result in a much less steep learning curve.

There is a more comprehensive paid for version of the software available however the Express package covers most imaginable needs of a home user or small business owner. You can create invoices and quotes, generate sales and returns, input bills and charges as well along with more modern features such as eBay and Paypal integration. Those that are VAT registered can generate their VAT returns through the application and those with employees can take care of the Payroll. You are also able to import your existing financial data from other applications such as Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Money or Quickbooks along with importing and reconciling online bank statements.

To get started simply visit www.msofficeaccounting.co.uk and click the ‘download free express’ link and you will automatically be redirected to the download site designed for the UK version of this software complete with pound signs and UK taxation systems. It’s very rare that Microsoft release anything for free that could be considered fully featured and although this application does have its faults I am confident that providing you can stomach the large download then you won’t be disappointed.

Kubuntu

admin — Sat, 15 Jul 2006 15:03:13 +0000

Last week we talked a little bit about Linux and I introduced you to a program called Slax which served the purpose of being a perfect introduction for those new to this Operating System. The big downside to Slax was that it wasn’t really designed for installing on to a hard drive and so didn’t really lend itself to being used as a long term alternative to Windows.

This week we’ll take a look at a Linux Operating System which is designed to be installed either as a direct replacement or installed permanently alongside the Microsoft offering going by the name of Kubuntu.

Because Kubuntu is based on the KDE graphical interface those of you that tried out Slax last week will find this variant of Linux extremely easy to get to grips with. Where it differs is that Kubuntu isn’t designed from the ground up to be easily portable and as such it comes bundled with more software and is also easily installable on your hard drive.

By heading to www.kubuntu.org you can download the 700mb package free of charge. This software can then be put on to a bootable CD so that your new Operating System can be tried out before you choose to continue with the installation. The problem here is that Kubuntu runs pretty slowly off of a CD so don’t let this put you off putting it on to your hard disk.

The first time I used Kubuntu it set up and installed pretty much all my hardware (with the exception of my printer) automatically without any intervention and I was up and running on the Internet immediately. This is pretty impressive when you compare it to the half hour installation routine that is involved when setting up Windows for the first time.

Included with the default installation is a range of tools for your graphics, multimedia and Internet applications as well as the extremely capable OpenOffice package which is used as a direct, free replacement for Microsoft Office. I have reviewed OpenOffice for Windows in the past and found it to be quite a capable package consisting of a Presentation, Spreadsheet, Database and Calculator utilities as well as a Word Processor. Of course if you need to use an application that isn’t included as part of the default installation this can be easily done by using the inbuilt add/remove programs manager. A bonus of using a Linux based Operating System is that pretty much all the software that you’ll ever obtain will be legally free of charge.

As mentioned at the beginning of this article the User Interface is based on KDE which is fairly similar to that of Windows and so most users shouldn’t have a problem finding their way around the basic functions of the Operating System. The system is relatively easy to use and when installed on the hard disk the performance is impressive especially when compared with Windows on lower specification hardware.

I’m certainly not suggesting that Linux is the ideal solution for everybody as to do so would be hypocritical as I personally still use Windows in my day to day life however Kubuntu is certainly worth looking in to especially if you have a lower hardware specification or resent having to pay every couple of years for the latest version of Windows.

Pretty much any variant of Linux is completely free of charge so you can download and experiment to find out which one suits you the best however the two versions Slax and Kubuntu I have reviewed are certainly good places to start.

Sneak Previews – Windows Alternatives

admin — Sat, 06 Apr 2002 15:10:32 +0000

You may remember a few weeks ago when I reviewed an alternative to PC computing; the Apple iMac. In similar contrast, there is also a range of Operating Systems for the PC that serve as an alternative to the Microsoft Windows Operating Systems, the most popular of which is generally considered to be Linux. This product is particularly popular with the Internet community as it is written in a way so that anybody can get hold of the code for free and modify it to correct any problems they may find which can then be put back into the public domain for others to use. This means that you can get hold of a stable and fast Operating System for very little or even no money.

Unfortunately however most Linux releases have not been able to establish themselves as a viable alternative for the majority of home users for a number of reasons. Primarily, the main two reasons for this is that Linux is generally less user friendly than Windows to use and that much of the existing Windows software does not run correctly under Linux.

All this may be about to change though after the release of ‘Lindows’ in a couple of months time. Currently under pre-testing, when the product is released it will retail for approximately £70 which compares to Windows XP which is currently sold at between £150 and £250 depending on whether you purchase the home or professional edition.
One of the most promising aspects of the Operating System is its ability to run existing Windows software; initially we will be only looking at mainstream applications such as Microsoft Office but eventually the team hope to have full compatibility with all existing applications. The interface it uses also looks very similar Windows so anybody with existing experience of using Microsofts’ program shouldn’t have any problems switching over to this new Operating System.

Now comes the downsides; very few people actually know anything about Lindows at the moment even though it is so close to being released. To make matters worse, even their own is somewhat vague, giving very little information on definite features or release dates. The CEO behind the project is Michael Robertson who recently sold the music website www.mp3.com, a site which has been under a lot of pressure related to the online pirating of music. Some are sceptical that Lindows will actually succeed, although if it does live up to its promises then it may pose a considerable challenge to Microsofts monopoly on the desktop market. Unsurprisingly Microsoft are currently suing Lindows for the similarity between the names of the two products, stating that it could possibly mislead customers.

I look forward to the release of this product and hope that it may pose a viable alternative to Windows as healthy competition has been proven to encourage more aggressive pricing structures by both parties and faster development of existing products as we have recently witnessed between processor rivals Intel and AMD. I recommend that you continue to check the website www.lindows.com for the latest information but be sure to read independent reviews when the product is finally released to avoid the possibility that it won’t be as good as promised.

Creating your own website

admin — Sat, 01 Dec 2001 14:48:49 +0000

After a quick break from our website tutorial last week to answer a number of readers questions, today we get back to wrapping up this multi-part series on creating and uploading your own website.

In part one, we looked at an application called ‘FrontPage’ – The full version is available as part of Microsoft Office and a cut down version – FrontPage Express is available free from www.microsoft.com. This product combined with the free Microsoft Image Editor are fine if you are happy keeping with a simple website, however, if you are planning on creating a more sophisticated site then there are a number of other products that you may want to consider trying out:

Macromedia Dreamweaver – Dreamweaver is highly regarded as the most powerful web page creator available on the market today. The program, in my opinion, builds on the features of the complete edition of FrontPage by providing much more comprehensive options and tools whilst still maintaining a high degree of user friendliness.

Dreamweaver includes tools for debugging your site and tight integration with technologies such as Flash as well as tools for debugging JavaScript and HTML errors. These may not be things that you know about too much at this stage, but soon tools such as these will soon become almost become indispensable. In addition, Dreamweaver also seems to create a lot cleaner, quicker to download code than the bloated pages that FrontPage seems to compile, the program makes it quicker and easier to program straight into HTML and your pages should be more compatible with the majority of browsers that your audience will be using.

To summarize, it is hard for me to pinpoint what exactly it is that makes myself and the majority of other web programmers prefer Dreamweaver; It just seems easier and more powerful to use in general. I do recommend that before considering purchase you should download the free trial version from www.macromedia.com/software/dreamweaver so that you can evaluate the software for yourself.

Macromedia Flash – Another popular website design tool in the Macromedia range, Flash allows you to create animated introduction sequences and navigation aids for your website that are both interesting to look at and small to download. Probably the easiest way for me to describe what Flash is about is for you to see an example for yourself – Try going to the site http://animation.about.com/cs/flashexemplars where a list of all the best Flash animations have been compiled for you.

Essentially, Flash is an animator with a number of powerful tools that allow your readers to navigate through the animation to reach specific points in your site or to perform specific tasks. Where Flash really comes into its own however is that the program creates very small files that take a fairly short while for your readers to download.

One major drawback of Flash is that your target audience will have to have a Flash player installed in order to view the animations. The player is free of charge to download and a large number of Internet users will already have it installed on their computer, however it is always a good idea that you create a non-Flash version of your site for those without.

Again, Flash is available for free trial from the website address www.macromedia.com/software/flash/ for you to look at before you considerer purchasing the full product.

Macromedia Fireworks – Macromedia Fireworks is a graphics creator and editor that has been built from the ground up with web graphics in mind. Giving you dozens of tools for creating and manipulating graphics which will be incorporated into your web page, Fireworks ensures that it is both quick and easy to make a whole host of different graphics – Practically anything from image rollovers to web-animations and static images. Essentially, it is important that your images are kept as small as possible which is what Fireworks excels at, automatically selecting the best format and compression rate so that your audience get the fastest possible downloads from your site.

Once again, Fireworks is available for free trial from the website address www.macromedia.com/software/fireworks/ for you to look at before you consider making a purchase.

To summarize, these three Macromedia products make life a lot simpler when designing your own web page however not all users will need all the features included. The most unfortunate point is the price of the complete set; around £650 although the products are obviously available individually of course. In any event, I would still urge you to download the trial versions of these three packages as they are fully featured for 30 days at which point they expire. Even if after this time you don’t think they would be worth buying, just uninstall the products and you would have had 30 days worth of free software with no commitment to Macromedia whatsoever.

Creating your own website

admin — Sat, 03 Nov 2001 14:44:54 +0000

Last week we had a look into the most fundamental ways to create a website on your PC using a program called FrontPage which is available as part of Microsoft Office or FrontPage Express which comes as a free option to Internet Explorer available from www.microsoft.com.

I’m going to assume that by this stage you have registered your site name online (e.g. www.chrisholgate.co.uk) and that you have made a simple site to put onto the Internet. If you missed either of these tutorials then please go to www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk where you will be able view any past articles.

This week we’re going to look at how to actually put your page onto the Internet using a file transfer method known as FTP (File Transfer Protocol) and to do this, you require a special piece of software known rather unsurprisingly as an FTP client. Such programs are very easy to come by on the Web and indeed one is included as part of Microsoft FrontPage however a program that I have come to rely upon is one called CuteFTP which has never given me any problems.

To acquire this program go to the address www.cuteftp.com and download the free trail version online which will function correctly for 30 days without requiring you to purchase it. The file itself should only take quarter of an hour or so to download at which point you should install the program as you would any other piece of software.

Providing you have already registered your site on the Internet or have received information regarding any free webspace provided by your ISP (Internet Service Provider) then you should now be in a position to start transferring some files to your file space. The information they have provided should include a host address, user name and password. If any of these are missing then your first port of call should be to phone or e-mail the technical support department of the people who are going to be hosting your site.

If you now start CuteFTP and click on ‘New’ in the site manager box that will open up then the program will give you the opportunity to enter in all of the settings that have been provided to you in order to access and upload files to your Internet site. For example, the Red Station Domains site that I recommended for hosing last month will require you to enter ftp.uploadserver.co.uk as your host server, you should then enter your user name and password into the boxes supplied and, as with all providers you will have to select ‘Normal’ login for the login type.

If you then click on ‘connect’ the server should log you in displaying all information about the status of your connection in the upper box on your screen. On the right hand side of the screen you will find a listing of all the files currently residing in your webspace and on the left hand side you’ll see the files and folders stored on your computer.

Your hosting company should have informed you of the correct folder on the server you should store your files in. Simply enter this folder and then just drag and drop your website files you wish to upload from your computer (left hand side of the screen) on to the server (right hand side) then your website should be ready for its first visitors.

To finish with, I’ll leave you will a couple of helpful hints –

- Don’t be afraid of phoning the support line of the company who has agreed to provide your hosting. Many of them are just a local or national call rate and they should be able to resolve any problems you are experiencing.

- Always check your page thoroughly in a web browser such as Internet Explorer after upload to ensure that all links you have provided to other pages on your site work correctly.

- Try your page out on a number of different computers to see how it looks on various machines and alter accordingly to ensure as many people as possible are able to view it.

- Save the first page you want your visitors to see when they load up your website as index.html as their computers will always load this page by default.

CD Writer Drives

admin — Sat, 18 Aug 2001 14:27:19 +0000

Continuing on from last weeks article related to the uses of compression techniques used within music files, this week I’m going to shed some light on an area that will allow you to put this technology to good use. It’s all very well being able to download hundreds of un-copyrighted music files from the Internet and play them on your computer but it’s another thing altogether when it becomes possible to be able to put these tracks onto your own CD so that they can be played anywhere whether it be on your home hi-fi or on the move in your car.

Not only this but by using a CD writer you are able to do a number of other useful tasks such as create a backup of all the important files from your computer or create backups of expensive CD’s such as Microsoft Office in case you lose the original.

Until recently this sort of technology was a little bit too expensive and difficult to use for the home user but this has all changed now that good quality CD-writers are currently shipping for around £80 or so including easy to use software such as Ahead Nero or Adaptec Easy CD.

The process used to create a CD is quite straightforward; firstly you have to ensure that you are using special CD-writable disks which typically cost around 30 pence each and pop one into the drive, select which files you want to put onto the disk and then a specialist piece of software such as the two titles will burn the files or tracks onto the disk. A standard CD can store 650 Megabytes of data or 74 minutes of audio on it which on an entry level drive would take around 12 minutes or so to complete.

Obviously there are a number of models and specifications of CD writers to choose from on the market and so now that I’ve whet your appetite we’ll discuss what to look for in your new drive.

1) Internal or External – There are two distinctly different flavours of CD-Writer; those that are kept inside the computer and those that connect via a cable to the back of the machine. The pros and cons or each one are numerous but I’d say that if you have a standard desktop PC (not a laptop) then you’re better off getting an Internal drive for reliability and affordability although you may require someone to install the drive into your computer for you.

2) Price – One of the most obvious factors; I would be very hesitant on spending more that around £150 on a new internal CD writer unless you can really warrant spending the extra cash on such a drive.

3) Features of the CD-Drive – Standard CD-writers can only write to a disk once and then it can only be read from after that – however the majority of new writers have the ability to re-write to special disks so that you can delete information stored on a disk and re-write over it much like a cassette tape. Since these drives are pretty standard now you should ensure that it has this feature.

Another new feature is ‘Burnproof technology’ that ensures that the CD is correctly written time after time. Drives without this technology are sometimes prone to misburns which will cause the CD you were writing to become unusable. It isn’t a necessary feature but if you can find a drive with this ability at a good price then it would be worth looking at.

4) Speed of drive; The speed rating of the drive not only determines how quickly the CD-writer can pull data off of the compact disc but also how fast it can put data onto the disc when writing. A typical speed rating for a CD-drive is 42x16x12 which means that the drive can read at “42 speed” which is 42 times the speed used by a standard hi-fi compact disc player, it can write a disc at “16 speed” and re-write over the data currently on the disc at “12 speed”

5) Included software; CD Writers require special software in order to function and you should ensure that this is included in the box when you purchase the drive or the CD writer would be essentially useless.

Apart from the points listed above, ensure that the drive is made by a name that can trust and that it’s backed up with good after sales support and I don’t think that you can go too wrong when making your new purchase.