Given a choice between Office 2019 and the just-releasedLibreOffice 7.0, your pick should be open-source's top office suite LibreOffice. After all, as Jared Spataro, then Microsoft's corporate vice president for Office and Windows group, said,Office 2019's applications are "frozen in time.They don't ever get updated with new features." Of course, what Spataro wants is for you to move to the cloud-basedMicrosoft 365where the "apps keep getting better over time."
Microsoft has made it clear that it sees the desktop office suite future on the cloud, not on your PC. As a "last resort" -- Microsoft's words, not mine -- Microsoft recommends Office 2019. Maybe paying an eternal subscription fee for Microsoft works for you. It does for many users. But, if you want an old-style office suite which lives on your PC, LibreOffice is now your top choice. Oh, and did I mention? LibreOffice won't cost you a cent.
This new major release comes with several improvements. At the top of the list for users who've spent their working lives with Microsoft Office, the best feature is better compatibility with DOCX, XLSX, and PPTX files. LibreOffice 7's DOCX is now saved in native 2013/2016/2019 mode, instead of 2007 compatibility mode. This greatly improves interoperability across multiple MS Office versions. The program can also now export to XLSX files with sheet names longer than 31 characters and exporting XLSX checkboxes. A long time Office XLSS bug, the "invalid content error" when opening exported XLSX files with shapes has also been resolved. Finally, he PPTX import/export filter has been improved.
Other noteworthy new features include:
Most of the other significant LibreOffice improvements are in Writer, LibreOffice's word processor. These include:
LibreOffice is now available on all major desktop operating systems. This includes Windows, macOS, Linux, and ChromeOS. You can also run LibreOffice from the cloud withLibreOffice Online.Collabera, which offersLibreOffice servers to cloud companies, alsosupports LibreOffice Online instancesfor Debian, Ubuntu, CentOS, openSUSE, Univention Virtual Machines, and Docker images
This office suite is a true open-source project. While most of its code is committed by corporate developers from companies such as Collabora,Red Hat, andCIB, 26% of it comes from individual volunteers.
LibreOffice 7.0 is LibreOffice's bleeding-edge release. While more than a beta, it's meant for early adopters and power users. The current production edition is LibreOffice 6.4.5.
For enterprise-class deployments, LibreOffice's parent organization The Document Foundation (TDF) strongly recommendsworking with one of its commercial partnersfor long-term support, dedicated assistance, custom new features, and Service Level Agreements (SLA)s.
The TDF also recommends that if you're migrating from a proprietary office suite. you should turn to value-added certified professionals.
LibreOffice 7.0 is available now. The minimum requirements for proprietary operating systems are Microsoft Windows 7 SP1 and Apple macOS 10.12. It will run on any Linux distributions.
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