Mac productivity suites: Head to head
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NeoOffice splash screen
NeoOffice splash screen
By Christopher Dawson
View this screenshot gallery of Mac office suites, evaluated from the perspective of a teacher.
NeoOffice is the OS X port of OpenOffice
NeoOffice Writer
NeoOffice Writer
The default document template for NeoOffice
OpenOffice Writer
OpenOffice Writer
Notice the X11 windowing for OpenOffice
Apple Pages
Apple Pages
The default word processing template for Apple’s office suite
Microsoft Word 2008
Microsoft Word 2008
The gold standard?
X11 needed some time to think
X11 needed some time to think
This command prompt might be a bit disconcerting for average users
That's better
That's better
Fortunately, it goes away eventually and OpenOffice launches
Formatting and images copied into OpenOffice
Formatting and images copied into OpenOffice
Or not…this was a cut and paste of a fairly simple numbered list with some graphics from NeoOffice in OpenOffice.
Formatting pictures
Formatting pictures
Not the prettiest dialog box ever, but NeoOffice proves to be highly functional.
Charts in Apple Numbers
Charts in Apple Numbers
Apple’s spreadsheet application has a great interface and highlights relevant information in multiple colors for easy modification on the fly.
Making charts in Office 2008
Making charts in Office 2008
The chart ribbon gives you easy access to different chart types.
A pie chart in Excel
A pie chart in Excel
This was easy and it looks great; however, the formatting palette incorporates so many functions that it can be overwhelming.
Charts in NeoOffice
Charts in NeoOffice
These actually aren’t as easy to create, nor are they as easy to make pretty; this gets the job done, though.
Charts in OpenOffice
Charts in OpenOffice
Again, it gets the job done.
PowerPoint 2008
PowerPoint 2008
The ribbons are better executed here than in Office 2007.
Formatting palette
Formatting palette
But the confusing palettes remain.
Themes in Keynote
Themes in Keynote
There’s more where these came from. You have to give Apple some credit.
Inserting media into Keynote
Inserting media into Keynote
Again, there’s something to be said for the Apple ecosystem.
