> Hi there,
> 
> I'm looking to replace a number of systems in my small Engineering office
>  with Openoffice, currently I use MS office (various versions) as well as
>  Word Perfect for writing on a number of machines.

Ah, memories - WP 5.1 on DOS 3.30....
> 
> One of the older machines that we are (sadly) somewhat attached to is a 486
>  running MS DOS.  It only has a 3.5" floppy drive and is not networked.

That seems to say there is no hard drive. If so, then OpenOffice.org (OO.o) 
cannot ever be used.
> 
> Is there an earlier version, or a cut-down version of the Openoffice Writer
>  application that I could install on this machine? 

The short answer is no. The very earliest versions of OO.o (pre-1.0) had a 
minimum requirement of Windows 95 and even then it needed to be the equivalent 
of SP2).

The reason is simply that there was never a non-GUI version. Even early Star 
Office needed at the least Windows 3 for its GUI.

>  Was Openoffice V1.x ever
>  used on these units, and if so, would files created on it be compatible
>  with Openoffice 3?

While there is no version which could run on those machines, all files created 
by OO.o can be opened by later versions. However, the reverse is not 
necessarily the case. You'd have to specifically save documents in the old 
format.

That said, as a previous poster mentioned. if using Linux was an option, then 
you might be able to use one of the earlier versions of OO.o, provided that 
you have a CD drive. There is no way you could install from floppies, as the 
installer would have to be spread across 30 to 40 disks :( (and you'd have to 
somehow split the executable yourself).
> 
> Many thanks for your help.
> 
> 
> Gary Dean
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected]
> For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
> 
-- 
Alex Fisher

Co-Lead, CD-ROM Project

OpenOffice.org Marketing 
Community Contact
Australia/New Zealand


http://distribution.openoffice.org/cdrom/

Attachment: signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.

Reply via email to