Here’s a tip that will save you hundreds of dollars plus give you something really cool.  It’s no secret that we live in a Microsoft Office world.  The problem is, purchasing Microsoft Office costs hundreds of dollars and not everyone has the budget for that, especially nowadays. 

If you’ve never heard of Open Office, then you’re going to love me for this post.  Open Office is a free package software that gives you a word processor, (like Word) a spreadsheet (like Excel) presentation software (like Power Point) plus database management and graphic design software.

The first thing you might be wondering is how is this all free?  The simple answer is that it is ‘Open Source’ software.  This means that no one individual owns the license to the products.  The products were designed by volunteers who use an online community forum to write, improve and grow the software under development. 

There are those in this world who believe no one company should control and profit from software.  As a result lots of computer geeks formed relationships and began creating and sometimes even improving on trademarked software such as Microsoft Office.  In fact, Microsoft has been known to borrow some of the ideas that this online group of Bohemians have created, and utilize the features into Microsofts own products.

Here’s the link to Open Office which is completely free to download and use.  It has versions for Windows, MAC and Linux.  You can’t beat free and if you know how to run Microsoft Office, then Open Office will have a pretty easy learning curve.  The video below gives you a brief run down of Open Office’s features.

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