Free Office Suite Alternatives to Microsoft Office

There are two free alternative for Microsoft Office - OpenOffice.org and IBM Lotus Symphony. Both suites can be downloaded to your personal computer for use.

OpenOffice.org (http://www.openoffice.org/)%20) %20is a comprehensive open source office suite that contains:

• Word processing
• Spreadsheet
• Presentation software
• Graphics software
• Database

OpenOffice.org will open Microsoft 2007 Word, Excel, and Access database files.  It is compatible with Windows 7 operating system.

IBM Lotus Symphony (http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/home.nsf/home )  is open source office suite.  It includes word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software.  It will also open Microsoft Office 2007 Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files.  The web site does not indicate that Lotus Symphony is compatible with Windows 7 operating system. 

The bottom line is that there are free office suite alternatives. They may not allow all of the capabilities of Microsoft Office, but are surely good enough for 99% of most users computing needs.