Moving From Windows To Linux (Charles River Media Networking/Security) - page 62

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Summary

In this chapter we have examined the basics of the GNOME user interface. We have explored its similarities with KDE. We also have looked at a variety of applications available for GNOME. This is critical because the interface is not of much use without powerful applications to run in it. At this point you should be comfortable with the GNOME interface. However, keep in mind that throughout most of this book we will be focusing on KDE.

This chapter also introduced you to several system tools that either ship only with GNOME and not with KDE or ship with both but were not previously explored. We examined a new system monitor and several small but very useful utilities, and finally we looked at desktop sharing in GNOME.

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Review Questions

1.	Which Linux word processor has an interface most like Microsoft Word?
2.	What file types can GNumeric Worksheet import?
3.	Which graphics program is ideal for cataloging images?
4.	What does GNOME stand for?
5.	When was GNOME 1.0 released?
6.	Can GNOME run on non-Linux machines?
7.	GNOME’s equivalent of Microsoft Paint is called what?

Answers

1.	AbiWord
2.	Microsoft Excel, Quatro Pro, and Lotus 1-2-3
3.	gThumb
4.	GNU Network Object Model Environment
5.	March 1999
6.	Yes, GNOME can run on any Unix-like system that uses GTK.
7.	GPaint

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Section III: Moving from Microsoft Office to Open Office

Chapter List

Chapter 8: Moving from Microsoft Word to Open Office
Chapter 9: Spreadsheets with Open Office Calc
Chapter 10: Moving from Microsoft PowerPoint to Open Office Impress
Chapter 11: Other Open Office Applications

For many readers, this will be the part of the book you have been waiting for. Many PC users are not too concerned with their system or how it works. What they really want to do is perform productive work. At some point, most people find basic office utilities such as word processors and spreadsheets to be quite useful. For many people that is the primary reason for purchasing a computer. The next several chapters of this book are devoted to showing you just how to do this.

Open Office is an office suite that is distributed under an open source license. That means it is available as a free download. You can even get a Windows version of it. It comes with Red Hat and many other distributions of Linux. But you can also download a free version, as well as find out more about Open Office at www.openoffice.org .

We will start by examining word processing with Open Office in Chapter 8. Chapter 9 will show you how to work with spreadsheets using Open Office. Chapter 10 will introduce you to using Open Office for presentations you formerly did in Microsoft PowerPoint. Finally, Chapter 11 will show you some of the extra utilities that are part of the Open Office suite.

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Chapter 8: Moving from Microsoft Word to Open Office

Introduction

Word processing, as we mentioned earlier, is a very common task, perhaps the most common task performed on a PC. At some point, virtually every computer user will need to do some type of word processing. For a home user this might mean writing a letter or composing a school report. For the business PC user this can mean creating business reports , keeping records, or generating memos. When you need to generate some type of text, of course you can use the limited capabilities of a standard text editor such as Microsoft’s Notepad or WordPad, or perhaps the KWrite and Kate that come with KDE. We spent some time earlier in this book examining these text editors, and you should be basically competent with them by this point in the book. However, most people eventually find these applications to be inadequate and want something more. For most Windows users, that usually means using Microsoft Word. There are other word processors for Windows, such as Corel’s WordPerfect, but most Windows users are familiar with Microsoft Word. You can see the familiar Microsoft Word interface in Figure 8.1.

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Figure 8.1: Microsoft Word.

The chances are, even if you are only a novice Windows user, that you are probably familiar with the basics of Word. Even beginners usually have at least a cursory understanding of the essential toolbar functions found in Word. Right on the toolbar you can see buttons for saving, printing, changing the font, and aligning your text. In fact, you would have quite a time finding any word processor that did not have a toolbar that was very similar to this one. If you have used Microsoft Word at all, you are probably aware of the plethora of other functions available to you from the various drop-down menus . This chapter is aimed at making you just as familiar and comfortable with Open Office’s Writer program. It is a full-fledged and functional word processor.

As you progress through the material in this chapter, you will find that Writer has most of the features you are used to in Word. What makes the transition even easier is that many of these functions are found in the similar locations, with similar looking buttons to access them. This should come as no surprise. Both Open Office Writer and Microsoft Word are trying to accomplish the same goal, that of word processing, so it is no wonder that their functionality is quite similar. You will, however, find some instances where one word processor possesses some advantage over the other. Of course the primary advantage for Open Office will be price. It is a free download from www.openoffice.org . Perhaps more importantly, there are versions for both Linux and Microsoft Windows. That means that if you become enamored with Open Office on your Linux machine, you can also use the exact same product with a Windows machine!

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