Open Office vs Libre Office?

[02bin3]

I was curious as to which one of the above Office programs was the most user friendly?  I've been using Open Office off and on and find it difficult to find commands to use that are fairly easy to find in Microsoft Office.  For example:  pasting with unformatted text.  Still haven't found a way to copy text from the internet and then paste it to an Open Office document in a plain text like Arial Narrow.  Is Libre Office easier to navigate than Open Office?  Thanks

[DaveLembke]

http://www.howtogeek.com/187663/openoffice-vs.-libreoffice-whats-the-difference-and-which-should-you-use/

This might be of help. I use both. Nothing to me stands out as one better than the other, but maybe others who use it for more than just word documents and spreadsheets can add their input on it.

On older computers I use Open Office 3.3 for offline use so no security risks with running out of date version 3.3 from 6 years ago. However computers that get online should always have their Open Office or LibreOffice kept up to date to patch for issues and keep on the latest and greatest.

[02bin3]

Thank you for your reply.  Since they have a common ancestor, that explains why one may be no more difficult to learn than the other.  I was hoping to find one that was closer to MS Word.  I had tried Word Perfect, however, Microsoft no longer will interface with the Quattro Pro program, so sending a Quattro Pro document to someone with MS Office was useless.  I liked Word Perfect, but that was a definite drawback.  I think that my problem is that many of the terms in the drop down menus would be familiar to someone with publishing experience, but for the rest of us, it is as good as being written in Greek.  Thanks again.

[DaveLembke]

Very welcome and regarding:

I think that my problem is that many of the terms in the drop down menus would be familiar to someone with publishing experience, but for the rest of us, it is as good as being written in Greek.

Both are feature rich, and sometimes it just a matter of playing around with settings to figure out what functions do etc. There are lots of guides to both of them online such as youtube views with how to's.... so if your looking to do something similar to MS Word but arent finding it, you can either find it by playing around or perhaps a youtube video showing how to carry out whatever your trying to do in the document. There are also books on each the the "For dummies" guides on them if you want a book to refer to.

They are about as close as you can get to MS Word without going with MS Word. Certain features so close to MS Word and the ability to save documents in MS Word formats, and open MS Word documents with these... I was surprised hasnt turned into a major legality issue between the projects and Microsoft with infringement. However to avoid infringement they may have left out that one feature that you require in order to be just that much more different to avoid lawsuits.

[02bin3]

Thanks for the info on the "Dummy" books.  Never gave that a thought.  I will have to check Amazon and see what they've got available for those programs.  I've been using MS Word since 1994, and have adapted to its various incarnations, so it is a little hard to flip the old grey matter over to new terminology and ferreting out what menu is hiding what and where.   

[patio]

The built in Help files in both apps are pretty extensive as well....on top of that their Forums are well attended....so there's 2 more options for you.

[02bin3]

Thank you for the tip on the Forums.  I have been trying to use the HELP on Open Office, but the problem is, I don't speak their language.  And I will try their Forums.