I realize that I may be in the minority here.
I have OpenOffice and MS Office on my PC's.
I have used both for various purposes. I like MS office better.
Excel is better, Word is better, Visio is better
For PDF export, I use Acrobat.(even though MS has one now) (yes, I paid for MS Office and Adobe products)
The Acrobat exporter is the best.
I love open source but my time is also very valuable to me.
here are some other examples:
1. Blender is a cool FOSS project but 3DS MAX 9 is just plain better.
2. I love what Ubuntu stands for and does, but for me WinXP is just a better desktop. (I have Ubuntu running on 2 machines acting as servers. so I DO think Linux is a much better server system)
3. I think the GIMP is very cool but Photoshop CS3 is better.
4. I also use MindJet MindManager. It is pricey but very cool. There are free FOSS alternatives but they are not as good. and Yes, I have tried them.
5. Outlook is better than TBird.
In all these examples I felt that the Quality difference in the Commercial software was compelling enough to buy it.
one last example:
I absolutely love Python. it is Free, Open source and I use it in my line of work occasionally but I bought BlitzMAX. Why? both support OpenGL, Both are Object Oriented, Both 'can' be compiled. etc. etc.
The reason is simple. BlitzMax (like all of the software listed) allows me to get stuff done faster. It is designed specifically for the type of stuff that I like to do. Python is more general purpose and a bit more complicated in many ways.
Oh,
I do use Firefox and not IE7!
anyway. these are my opinions and I know they probably differ from yours.
I have OpenOffice and MS Office on my PC's.
I have used both for various purposes. I like MS office better.
Excel is better, Word is better, Visio is better
For PDF export, I use Acrobat.(even though MS has one now) (yes, I paid for MS Office and Adobe products)
The Acrobat exporter is the best.
I love open source but my time is also very valuable to me.
here are some other examples:
1. Blender is a cool FOSS project but 3DS MAX 9 is just plain better.
2. I love what Ubuntu stands for and does, but for me WinXP is just a better desktop. (I have Ubuntu running on 2 machines acting as servers. so I DO think Linux is a much better server system)
3. I think the GIMP is very cool but Photoshop CS3 is better.
4. I also use MindJet MindManager. It is pricey but very cool. There are free FOSS alternatives but they are not as good. and Yes, I have tried them.
5. Outlook is better than TBird.
In all these examples I felt that the Quality difference in the Commercial software was compelling enough to buy it.
one last example:
I absolutely love Python. it is Free, Open source and I use it in my line of work occasionally but I bought BlitzMAX. Why? both support OpenGL, Both are Object Oriented, Both 'can' be compiled. etc. etc.
The reason is simple. BlitzMax (like all of the software listed) allows me to get stuff done faster. It is designed specifically for the type of stuff that I like to do. Python is more general purpose and a bit more complicated in many ways.
Oh,
I do use Firefox and not IE7!
anyway. these are my opinions and I know they probably differ from yours.