Hi. So my girlfriend wants to try out Linux (Elementary OS, she thinks it looks pretty) and needs my help setting everything up (she’s not that good at tech). I’ve never use Linux before. From what I’ve read MS Office is not supported on Linux, but there’s Libreoffice. My gf uses a lot of MS Office for high school (Word & Powerpoint mostly), so I’m curious if Libre is a good substitute? As in compatibility, features, etc.?

  • monovergent 🛠️@lemmy.ml
    0·
    27 days ago

    In an academic setting, LibreOffice is a good substitute if:

    • Documents will not be passed back and forth between LibreOffice and MS Office for collaboration
    • Teachers accept assignments in PDF format

    I got away with using LibreOffice in university since:

    • Opening and reading files prepared in MS Office almost always works
    • Every formatting option I had used in MS Office was also present in LibreOffice
    • Professors accepted work I prepared in LibreOffice and exported as PDF to guarantee that my formatting stays intact
    • Students and professors almost always used Google Docs for collaborative work

    From experience, a moderately-formatted document with images will survive about 3 round trips between MS Office and LibreOffice before something breaks (things on the page get completely rearranged or get stuck and can’t be moved or deleted).

    And despite having used LibreOffice for several years now, I still feel like I’m having a stroke when I see the default interface. For sanity, either set the user interface (under View menu) to tabbed or sidebar, or customize the toolbar to match that of Google Docs.