Softmaker FreeOffice

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jrb
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Softmaker FreeOffice

#1 Post by jrb »

I just recieved this email from Softmaker. :D
Dear SoftMaker customer:

Christmas comes early this year!

From now until December 24, you can download SoftMaker FreeOffice for Windows and Linux for free – and help needy people at the same time: For every download, SoftMaker donates 10 Euro cents to charity and development projects around the world.

SoftMaker FreeOffice is a full-featured office suite for home and business use. And if you later decide you want even more features, you can switch to its commercial version, SoftMaker Office.

Spread the word! Tell friends and co-workers about our Load and Help 2012 campaign. We want to set a new record for donations this year!
http://www.loadandhelp.com/
I've been using their office suites for several years now and am very happy with them. Especially once they are stripped down to a reasonable size ~20MB. This can be done by stripping out most of the uneeded language files, just leave your own.

mcewanw
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Re: Softmaker FreeOffice

#2 Post by mcewanw »

Yes, I received that email too. It seems to be a cut down version that can open docx and xlsx, for example, but not save to these formats. I haven't downloaded to check that though. Quite useful nevertheless since opening files of these formats is more important than being able to save to them methinks.
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greengeek
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#3 Post by greengeek »

I just downloaded it and it looks great. I am running Slacko 5.3 and downloaded the 32 bit .deb version and clicked on it. It didn't seem to add itself to the document menu (even after a restart of X), but I found the textmaker file at /usr/share/freeoffice and just dragged it to the desktop, then selected an icon from /usr/share/freeoffice/icons.

It can read docx, but not create them as far as I can tell.

This looks fantastic. I will have a play for a few weeks on different puppies, then I will probably pay for the 2012 Softmaker Office package to get the full docx capability.

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chrome307
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#4 Post by chrome307 »

Got the email today in my inbox and decided to grab a copy myself.

http://www.loadandhelp.com/home-en.html

or

http://www.freeoffice.com/en/download/freeoffice

All you need to do is provide your name/email and they send you a message with the download links and a serial number.

Language dictionaries can be found here:

http://www.freeoffice.com/en/download/dictionaries

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softmaker textmaker file corruption sometimes?

#5 Post by mcewanw »

I've been using 2008 for Linux in the past and a couple of years ago bought SO 2010 for Linux which reads and saves docx format.

Though I've found Softmaker office pretty good, 2010 is much slower than 2008 on my Puppy Linux. But, more seriously, if I have more than one complex textmaker document open and save results after an editing session, the resultant saved file sometimes gets corrupted (a mix of bits from the other files). Corruption has occurred using either textmaker 2008 or 2010.

Anyone else ever experience a similar problem?
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BarryK
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#6 Post by BarryK »

I would like you guys feedback on FreeOffice. I am in contact with someone at Softmaker, and there is the possibility of compiling FreeOffice optimised for Puppy, and including it in an official release of Puppy.

So, I would like to get feedback from users of FreeOffice!
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Terryphi
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#7 Post by Terryphi »

Does Planmaker open spreadsheets in the Libreoffice/OpenOffice format?
Features section on website makes no mention of this.
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#8 Post by johnrpm »

I downloaded the tarball and precise asked if it was a package, answered yes and it installed to the document menu, added the
registration info and it works, I am amazed because things do not usually work out of the box for me as a noob.
I shall have a play with it, but I feel a bit guilty not sticking with open source, I have been trying to get the wife over to linux for some time, so this may help.

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vicmz
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#9 Post by vicmz »

I'm downloading the .tar.gz package, they say it's got a script to help install, I'll test and tell later.

As far as I remember, I could both open and create ODF format documents with SoftMaker Office 2008. It never had any errors, but I missed the more flexible handling of tables from LibreOffice, I find this latter more comfortable to insert and edit tables in documents. However, SoftMaker Office 2008 is smaller and does what I need.
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L18L
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Softmaker FreeOffice

#10 Post by L18L »

BarryK wrote:...So, I would like to get feedback from users of FreeOffice!
I am not yet a user but I having installed FreeOffice I was very amazed about localization of comment:
textmaker-free.desktop wrote:...
GenericName[zu]=Umshini Ohlela Amagama
Comment=The TextMaker word processor lets you work on any type of document.
Comment[de]=Die Textverarbeitung TextMaker ermöglicht es Ihnen, beliebige Arten von Dokumenten zu erstellen und zu bearbeiten.
Terminal=false
Categories=Application;Office;WordProcessor
...
Comment (different from name and generic name) is displayed in jwm menu and translation works!

Sorry if this is well known to all but for me it was a nice surprise :D
Stuff for momanager?
----
edited later

momanager can handle this since
pinstall.sh wrote:#120926 do same for Comment field...
I was just me who was blind for this feature of momanager :oops:
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jrb
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#11 Post by jrb »

BarryK wrote:So, I would like to get feedback from users of FreeOffice!
I setup a portable FreeOffice on a usbdrive and ran the following tests using Slacko54.

Opened several MSWord documents in Textmaker, both .doc and .docx, with no problem, made small modifications and resaved as .doc's. I then opened them in MSWord 2007 (in Wine) and they all worked.
Opened text file Gutenberg 20000 Leagues Under the Sea in Textmaker, added a picture, saved as .doc, 343 pages. Opened in MSWord no problem.

Opened several multisheet Excel2007 workbooks in Planmaker, made changes and saved, reopened in Excel.

Opened several Powerpoint slide shows in Presentations, played them, made changes and saved. One of these refused to open again in Powerpoint. It contained an embedded link to an external file. Presentation told me it couldn't open the embedded object, I guess in resaving this became a problem.

I quite like SoftMaker Office. Its missing some of the bells and whistles of MSO, but that's a good thing. Its been much more reliable for me than Abiword where anything over 3 pages crashed. Gnumeric is a great program but Planmaker is just as good.

http://www.freeoffice.com/en/features
Opens and saves OpenDocument and OpenOffice.org documents
I say. "Go for it!". :D

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vicmz
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#12 Post by vicmz »

I've downloaded the .tgz package, extracted and clicked the script. It installed FreeOffice, but I had to fixmenus from terminal, then I tried to open TextMaker from the menu, I got an error. From terminal I typed textmakerfree and despite a few more errors it launched textmaker. This happened to me on Wary 5.4 beta 2.
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Okeh
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#13 Post by Okeh »

BarryK wrote:I would like you guys feedback on FreeOffice. I am in contact with someone at Softmaker, and there is the possibility of compiling FreeOffice optimised for Puppy, and including it in an official release of Puppy.

So, I would like to get feedback from users of FreeOffice!
I have been using the 2008 version because I needed a program which would also open Word files from my work. 2008 worked very well, the only problem being the lack of compatibility with .docx. I just saved everything in Word at work as .doc files but occasionally it was an issue if someone sent a .docx.

I've just started using Freeoffice, and thus far no problems. It runs on my old Toshiba Tecra 8000, vintage 1998, in MacPup. I think the program is great and the freedom from all the extra crap in MS Word [not to mention the ribbon menus] is actually a positive. It allows me to be mostly Windows free at home [work is another matter, unfortunately].

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smokey01
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#14 Post by smokey01 »

I didn't notice a 64 bit version.

Is one available?

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vicmz
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#15 Post by vicmz »

smokey01 wrote:I didn't notice a 64 bit version.

Is one available?

Yes, there is. After registration I received an email message with my serial number and download links including 32bit and 64bit, .rpm and .deb packages.
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#16 Post by smokey01 »

vicmz wrote:
smokey01 wrote:I didn't notice a 64 bit version.

Is one available?

Yes, there is. After registration I received an email message with my serial number and download links including 32bit and 64bit, .rpm and .deb packages.
Thanks I must have missed that.

Another download coming up.

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#17 Post by Puppyt »

After using a cutdown version of SoftMaker I found on the Puppy forums (Textmaker only - circa 2002?), I gradually migrated to 2008/2010 for Windows and since have gone the whole hog with SMO for Linux 64-bit on my desktop, with TaZoC's original LH64 version. Originally I installed via the DEB format option and was very happy to see Puppy downloading any necessary dependencies. Planmaker, Textmaker and Presentations found themselves in different places in the Puppy menu and I think I had to cobble some icons together to have it clearly accessible for newbie users (my wife and various colleagues shortfallen without their Win machines - found no problem with SMO for the first time, and in a Linux environment :) ) .
With subsequent upgrades with TaZoC's base, and updates on SMO2012Linux I opted for the tar.gz version and of course, haven't got the nous/time to repackage as a pet for my own use and thus include all menu entries and icons like a proper polished job. All loads very well from console with the commands "textmaker12", "planmaker12" and I've edited the "Open With" commands to have docx and xlsx open practically immediately with SoftMaker. Makes me smile every time I use it, thinking of those who consider the MS version as the bee's-knees... Operation speed is up on that of SMO2010 for Linux, I can confirm.
Full purchase gives the individual owner licence for the SMO on three machines (concurrently, I understand - take that, MS!). I've explored this option with also using the 32-deb version on my laptop, running Pemasu's Dpup Exprimo 5X15. No quibble there from SM license-wise, and I rather think that in the Dpup environment I get better performance overall with the 32-bit version than 64-bit on the laptop (tried it with LH64 on the same machine, and also with FatSlacko - more stable in Exprimo). With frugal Puppy installs, and SMO installation off-root/outside of pupsaves seems to work fine.
What I appreciate most about SoftMaker is the support/forums they have. I've made various comments there as a Puppy user (as "arobbo"), but in brief answer to Barry's recent query in this thread I can summarise:
1) difficulty in setting up in Puppy menu structure for listing/icon inclusion in wbar, lxpanel etc;
2) CUPS is now the default print manager (hooray!) however duplex printing seems to be cancelled out somewhere - others have noted this in other Linux flavours, in printers with automatic default as duplex, still prints resolutely as single page documents.
3) automatic GTK library access for dialog theme preferences in Puppy has eluded me - I get all options including "Linux (grey)", but not "Linux (System)",
4) No automated options for slimming down installation - extra language libraries have to be removed manually. This is a necessity for those installing in the pupsave, as the memory savings are considerable.

So if these issues can be averted for future SoftMaker FreeOffice users, so much the better - the follow-on effects will only improve the experience for those who choose to purchased product.

[EDIT: P.S. there are some CSV file formats that Planmaker makes a hash of, even when you try all the various column/type formats when opening. Gnumeric on the other hand opens the same csv files with no error]
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greengeek
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#18 Post by greengeek »

So far I have experienced two problems while using Freeoffice:

1) When my laptop battery shut off due to lack of charge I found that Freeoffice appeared not to have saved the text that I had last entered, even though I had clicked the Freeoffice "save" icon. (power went off probably five seconds after clicking save). This may be nothing to do with Freeoffice - possibly more to do with Puppy not having updated the HDD savefile yet? but I thought I'd mention it anyway. (or maybe Freeoffice decided to go back to its .bak copy of my document for safety? Not good behaviour if that is the case. Hopefully this is a puppy savefile issue.)
EDIT: This has happened to me several times now on different puppies and in my opinion definitely seems to be a Textmaker2012 bug. The problem seems to occur when Textmaker decides that your actual file is bad, and that it needs to restore the file from it's own .bak version of the file. This seems to occur when Puppy encounters a disorderly shutdown (eg: laptop battery goes flat).

At the next boot Textmaker seems to decide that the real file must be bad EVEN THOUGH YOU HAD SUCCESSFULLY SAVED IT TO A SEPARATE DATA PARTITION PRIOR TO THE SYSTEM FAILURE!! At that next boot Textmaker goes ahead and AUTOMATICALLY changes the good file to match it's outdated .bak copy. It does not offer to let you compare the two files.

I recommend turning off the Textmaker backup facility if you experience this issue.

2) If I create an rtf document with Freeoffice it appears that Abiword cannot read it. The text background seems highlighted and makes the text invisible. Might be an Abiword issue rather than Freeoffice but not sure yet. See pic

Overall Freeoffice is looking good. It certainly gives me the ability to read docx and write .doc reliably, so at last I have good compatibility with the rest of the family.
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vicmz
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#19 Post by vicmz »

I tried installing to USB drive (portable) as described in the official website. I couldn't boot to another Puppy yet but it should work on other Puppies just as on Wary (I'm using the .tgz package). Only thing is I have to look for the textmaker icon among all files in the freeoffice directory, the price to pay for portability. Also it seems a little bit slower from a flash drive.
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greengeek
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#20 Post by greengeek »

vicmz wrote:Only thing is I have to look for the textmaker icon among all files in the freeoffice directory,
On my HDD install, the icons are at /usr/share/freeoffice/icons.

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