Hi,
I've been using OpenOffice for over two years now on a number of
systems (Linux, Windows and more recently on Mac in the guise of
NeoOffice 2.1). Although load time could still improve, I've been
very satisfied with OOo, though I often use MS Office at work, and
have recommended OOo to several friends and colleagues, indeed I
persuaded an IT manager to install it on 40+ desktops last year and
it worked fine in every case.
A close friend of mine has written a 200+ page book in OOo Writer on
a clapped-out machine running Windows 98. However, he recently bought
a newer second machine running WinXP, a Dell GX 280, and on
installing the first OOo 2.1 and then OOo 2.2 he found all the icons
displayed white where there should be shade of dark grey. Worse still
both in Writer and Draw all shapes fail to display colour fills,
although these print fine. I've uninstalled and reinstalled Java 1.6,
the Intel Graphics Driver and OOo itself several times all to no
avail. The machine, formerly used in an office, came with a fresh
install of WinXP SR2 and I installed the latest Windows installer and
applied all patches. Although I'd prefer my friend to switch to
Ubuntu Linux, but I can't for the life of me understand the root
cause of this problem as icons in all other programs display fine and
Inkscape works a treat. I just wondered whether anyone had
experienced similar issues. This bug makes an otherwise fully
functional programme look awful.
If there are any Mac users out there, until OOo Aqua Beta comes out
in July sometime, I'd strongly recommend the newly released NeoOffice
2.1, especially if you have an Intel processor as it loads acceptably
fast on my MacBook with 1GB RAM and has successfully opened every
single MS-centric document sent my way.
Regards and TIA
Neil
Personal blogsite: http://www.outsider-insight.org.uk
