Libre Office 3.5.1 is available

If you are using Open Office still, or Libre Office 3.5.0 or earlier, you should upgrade to Libre Office 3.5.1.
It is available here for download, along with the help installation file.

Remember, if you have Open Office installed, remove it first before installing Libre Office.
If you are going to install the help file, install it after installing the program.

Extensions for Open Office generally work in Libre Office. You can get them here.
I recommend the Canadian spellchecker (for working in Canadian English), and Pagination (improves the implementation of page numbering).

Here are the release notes for Libre Office 3.5.1.

My earlier post about Libre Office.

 

Replace Open Office with LibreOffice

Open Office was great, but it stopped being developed April 2011. 
If you are still using Open Office, you may have begun to see problems - files crashing for no apparent reason, among other things. Many people who had Open Office 3.3 installed and then installed Internet Explorer 9 (either knowingly or via a background Windows update) found that Open Office would often crash and was not workable. 

For the end user (you), what matters is if it is working or not, and if not, how to fix it. 
For anyone out there still using Open Office 3.3.0 or earlier, I would strongly recommend switching over to LibreOffice. 

LibreOffice is continually being developed now, whereas Open Office is no longer being developed. LibreOffice is basically Open Office, but more evolved. The interface is pretty much identical (some of the icons are a bit different, but they do the same things. And, it is still free. Yes, you can still open the latest MS Office file formats, and you can export any file to PDF format.

To upgrade:

• Download the program and the help part of the program from here.
• Remove Open Office by going to (Win XP) Control Panel, Add or Remove Programs..., or (Vista, Win 7) Control Panel, Programs and Features...
• Install the LibreOffice Program, and then the help program (must do it in this order).
• LibreOffice should automatically see and incorporate your basic settings from OpenOffice
• To ensure that LibreOffice is seen by Windows as the default program - in Windows Vista/Windows 7: Start Menu, Default Programs, Set your Default Programs, Choose LibreOffice in the list on the left. Set This Program As Default. (Note: This will set your simple txt files to open with LibreOffice Writer. If you still want Notepad to open for simple txt files, go to a txt file, right click, chose Open With, choose Choose Default Program, check off the Always open with this box, and select Notepad.)
• If LibreOffice is not in this list of programs (above in the Default Programs), close this window and re-install the LibreOffice  program and choose Repair. If it is still missing, restart the computer and check again.
• done.

 

Further information on LibreOffice can be found at their site here, or at the Wikipedia entry here.  

Back to school - Useful technology for students at budget-conscious prices and general buying tips

Back to school: The most popular technology for the return to class - Parentcentral.ca
I was inspired to initially just write a rebuttal of this (above linked) article at Parentcentral.ca. But, then I decided to write up something a bit more useful to consumers. I couldn't believe the prices listed in this article! I'm not knocking Parentcentral specifically here (they generally publish some very useful articles), but I've found that often articles like these in newspapers in general don't tend to be researched by anyone with enough knowledge about technology (they just talk to people at a couple of big stores).
Seriously? For students: iPads? Laptops for $850, and routers for $120???!!! (And whats with the camcorder?)

There are always better deals out there. Sometimes you can get much better quality for a much lower price than you are often led to believe. I research and source computers and computer-related equipment every day and I find that there is a wide range of prices on products of similar quality and performance.

Let's compare some prices and items in this article to some better deals out there.
(Note: my sourcing for this post was done in the Toronto. Prices will vary in other areas. The lower prices I quote are on products of similar quality/performance or better (or, the lower-priced item is of good quality and the higher priced item was overkill for the purpose). Pricing was done Aug 24, 2011 (so beyond a few weeks from this date, the prices and technology will change))

Smartphones
Parentcentral: minimum price: $400
Tweak: minimum price: $225
Savings: $175

Printer
Parentcentral: Epson Stylus NX All-in-one wireless. $100 (Best Buy)
Tweak: HP Officejet 4500 Wireless All-In-One. $60 (on sale for this at Best Buy, normally $70 at Staples (cheaper than the regular Best Buy price))
Savings: $40
(Note: Regarding the different printers they mention in the article at Parentcentral: Over-priced or not practical. A student will need to print some things in colour - so a B&W laser is out of the picture. Also, multi-function printers are of good quality, serve more purposes, and are very cost effective so I would recommend these over non-multi-function machines. The touch-screen feature is pretty much eye-candy, adds extra cost, and doesn't make a whole lot of difference in the basic use of the machine.)

Surge Protector
Parentcentral: $53 (Best Buy)
Tweak: $25 (Active Surplus)
Savings: $28

Router
Parentcentral: Netgear Wireless-N Gigbit router. $120 (Best Buy)
Tweak: D-Link Wireless N 150 Home Router. $30 (Canada Computers or Staples)
Savings: $90

Office software
Parentcentral: MS Office 2010 for Home and Student. $160
Includes: Word, Excel, Powerpoint and OneNote. Some very advanced functions might not be available in this version.
Also of note here: There is a free Starter version of MS Office 2010 that you can only get pre-loaded on some new laptops. This version only includes Word and Excel, and you can't run any macros or add-ins and they don't have a lot of advanced features the full version has, and it has advertisements.

Tweak: Open Office. Free.
Fully functional office suite. Word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, database, and math programs. No advertisements. Compatible with the latest MS Office formats. You can configure it so it will save in MS Office formats by default. Thousands of add-ons also available for free. And, there is a Canadian English spell-checker add-on available. Also, built in one-touch export to PDF format from all of the programs in the suite (no need for other PDF software/Adobe Acrobat).

Savings: $160

Notebook/Laptop
Parentcentral: Sony VAIO 15.5 inch laptop. $850 (Best Buy)

Tweak: HP G-Series 15.6 inch laptop. $430 (Future Shop)
This HP model is similar to the Sony model in quality/performance and features, but is better in these regards: more powerful/faster processor, larger capacity hard drive, much lighter weight (and costs $420 less!)

Savings: $420

Netbook
Parentcentral: $270
Tweak: $200
Savings: $70

Service
On-site basic setup of a computer system
Parentcentral: Geek Squad: $130 (flat fee)
Includes
no extra software or customization or optimization of system. They only
hook you up to your Internet connection*, one peripheral and install one
piece of software. Performed by a technician with almost no experience to a few years
of experience. Includes delivery of system (if system purchased at Best
Buy).

Tweak: Thor Tech Support: $30-$60 (1-2 hours (average amount of time) at an hourly rate)
Includes full
setup and connection of all devices and Internet connecting*, various
free-software installations (office suite, security, and useful
utilities), tutoring of the operating system basics, and customization
and optimization of operating system. Performed by a technician with
over 20 years experience.

(* must already have an Internet service plan with a provider (ISP))

Savings: at least $70

Stores
Future Shop
This is one of the best places to go for a deal on a laptop if you are looking for a good budget laptop. They have about the biggest selection at generally decent prices. They also have decent prices on external desktop hard drives (made by Seagate). But watch out as there will be some models of Seagate drives decently priced and some Seagate models that are greatly overpriced.

Best Buy
Contrary to popular belief, you aren't generally going to find better deals here. Sometimes they will have a great sale prices on an item. But usually, the items on sale are sub-par quality and their regular prices are usually higher than other places (for computer and computer-related equipment). They generally don't stock better-quality items. They will sometimes have a good sale price on decent printers. Shop around elsewhere first. Once you find what you want, check to see if they have it on sale here for less.

Staples
Generally overpriced in most areas of computer technology. But, there are some gems here. This store has the best selection of printers at good prices. They also have a good selection of routers at decent prices. This is also a good place to go for printer ink/toner and paper, school/work back-packs, and office furniture (including low-priced basic computer desks and chairs).

Active Surplus
Lowest prices in Ethernet cables. Also here: USB cables, surge-protected power bars, and thousands of electronic and odd items.

Canada Computers
Great selection of some computer peripherals and internal parts at generally low prices. A good place to go for: external hard drives, routers, keyboards, mice, USB sticks, card readers, video cards, and more.

Other small stores
There are a lot of other great small computer stores around Toronto (especially around College and Spadina, and along College from Spadina to Bathurst) with good competitive pricing, but you need to know what you are looking for before you enter (see shopping tip below).

Tips
Shopping
All stores will generally have a large ranges in prices for items in each category (and a large range in quality). It helps to do advance research before you go to the store to buy something. If you know what you want to get in advance you can ignore the salesperson's advice (which is usually to buy whatever has the highest mark-up/profit margin for the store). Usually, what they try to sell you is, for good quality items, over-priced, and for the budget items, just poor quality. There are good quality budget-priced items out there, but the sales people won't usually steer you towards them.

Printer Paper and Ink
When you are buying paper, for decent quality printing, buy the paper and ink made by the printer manufacturer. There are chemicals in the individual brands of ink and paper that are made to work together. They do that as they make their money mainly on these items (since you have to keep buying these over and over) as opposed to the printer.

Inkjet Printers
Never power these off. If you do, the ink heads can dry out and clog and then you can't use the cartridge again. When left on all the time, they go into a low-power sleep mode, and the little power used keeps the print head from drying out.

Netbook, Notebook (aka Laptop), or Tablet

For students who need something to take notes on in class and then use at home and on-the-go for homework, lets look at these options:

iPad and other tablets
So, you want to type a lot and have a versatile device? Then don't buy these. They are priced above low-priced laptops and have no keyboards (only an on-screen keyboard) and lack a lot of other useful features.
What is it good for? If you have money to burn and want to look cool and don't need it to do much and you don't need to do much typing, this might be for you. But for a student on a budget (or a parent looking to get the best value and most useful computer tool for your teen), forget it.
Price: for a decent quality one, about $400 and up ($520 and up for an iPad).

Netbooks
The keyboard is smaller than a normal laptop keyboard (so, they're not great for big hands or if you are going to be doing a lot of typing). Smaller screen (so, things will be tiny, and if you are working on spreadsheets or doing graphic work, forget it). No DVD/CD drive. Bare bones operating system. Small hard drive (so less storage space) and a not so powerful processor. There is a reason they are called Netbooks (handy for quick Internet browsing tasks, not for much else).
What is it good for? If you only need something for quick notes and basic Internet browsing and you need something that is small and light, this might be what you are looking for.
Price: for a decent quality one: about $200 and up

Notebooks/Laptops
These come in a range of sizes - from just a bit bigger than Netbooks, to 18" screen behemoths.
Laptops have come a long way in the past few years. Now they are very powerful and have large hard drive capacities. Laptops, even the basic budget ones, generally all have full-sized keyboards, DVD/CD drive, webcam with microphone, 2-4 USB ports, HDMI port, VGA port, Ethernet port, card reader, mic and headphone jacks, and Windows 7 Home Premium operating system. If you are on the go and need something light weight, there are small/light models to choose from. If you want something that is mainly to be used in one location, anything goes, including an 18" entertainment laptop.
Laptops in the 15" screen range give you the biggest bang for the buck as they are the most common (so they are more mass produced and thus cheaper to make). Smaller and lighter ones are more expensive. Larger ones with more power are more expensive. But, if you want something light and powerful, there are a lot of models and low prices and good quality to choose from.
Price: for a decent quality one, about $350 and up.

Conclusion
Totalling up all the savings listed above, compared to the linked article, Tweak has just saved you over $1000 (or about 50% off). Those are significant savings for those on a tight budget.


In my business, Thor Tech Support, I normally charge a flat fee of $60 for the research and sourcing work for putting together a desktop computer system, or a laptop (Note: in the post above the savings on the laptop was $420 and it is a much better laptop too. With a $60 R&S fee added, it would still be a savings of about $360.) I also research and source printers and other computer parts and peripherals (at a lower price). This saves my customers not only the time and effort of doing this themselves, but also a lot of money off the price (compared to if they ended up buying something over-priced and of lesser quality, like those in the linked article).

Open Office 3.3 is available now

Open Office 3.3 is finally finished and is available for download.
You can download it from here.

I'm excited about the fact that the spreadsheet tabs can now be coloured.
You can read about more changes here.

My Top 20 Free Windows Programs - June 2010

In no particular order:

Backup
Cobain Backup - a free backup program that you can fully customize - scheduling, backing up to various drives including network drives, etc. Now uses Shadow Volume Copy so you can back up while you work on your computer.

Browser
Firefox - the latest version of Firefox is fast and very secure and remains the best with extensions of all the browsers. Check out Personas - an easy way to dress up Firefox.

Clean-Up
CCleaner - great for cleaning up temp files, temp files leftover from crashes, and cleaning up the Registry, disabling unnecessary start-up items and more.

Revo Uninstaller - an advanced un-installer program that enables you to remove the usual leftover registry items and folders.

Defraggler - from the makers of CCleaner, this program is a great replacement for the Windows defragment program. Works in all recent versions of Windows. This program lets you see what is going on (like the old program in XP). It is fast and can work even if you have less than 10% of the hard drive free.

Email
Thunderbird - an excellent email program from Mozilla (same group that brings you Firefox). I find this much easier to customize and to backup and move files around when need be than Outlook or Outlook Express. The latest version has tabs and the search feature is most excellent.

Entertainment
Winamp - best free media player overall - yes it has playlists and you can use it with your ipod or any other MP3 player. Works better than iTunes and doesn't install other programs behind your back, and you can customize its many settings (file formats to deal with, whether it launches on its own or by your command...). Great for doing live mixes as you can queue songs up.

DVDFlick - convert and burn digital video files (many formats supported) to DVD in regular DVD video format. Also has basic menu creation features too.

VLC Media Player - for playing a wide variety of video and music files, DVDs, and streaming. When Windows Media Player won't play it, this will. The user interface isn't that pretty, but it works.

File Sharing
uTorrent - the best little torrent program around. Pronounced MOO-torrent (as the initial u is actually the micro symbol)

Peerblock - lets you control who your computer "talks to" on the Internet. By selecting appropriate lists of "known bad" computers, you can block communication with advertising or spyware oriented servers, computers monitoring your p2p activities, computers which have been "hacked", even entire countries! They can't get in to your computer, and your computer won't try to send them anything either.

Productivity
Open Office 3 - the best free alternative to MS Office. And it can open .docx files. You can create a PDF directly from any of the programs in the suite with a click of an icon. Word processor, spreadsheet, drawing program, database, you can make it save things in MS Office format by default if you need to share documents with others have MS Office, and more. Currently on version 3.2.1

EssentialPIM - A personal information manager. Similar to many of the other features in Outlook (outside of the email part). If you want a PIM that is not bogged down by the email part of Outlook - just a basic appointment calendar, contact list, To Do list and notes - this is a great program.

Security
AVG Free - anti-virus and anti-spyware, and much improved since it first came out. Easy to use and works better than the big programs that must be purchased.

Malwarebytes - A good anti-spyware removal program to use along with your regular security program to occasionally check for bugs. Has a quickscan mode that takes about 10 minutes, and a full scan mode. Also adds as a context menu so you can right-click on a file/folder/drive and choose to scan it with Malwarebytes.

Mailwasher Free - filter out Spam before it gets to your email program. Works with a wide variety of email programs. Free version only works for one email address. Paid version will work with multiple addresses.

Utilities
TeraCopy - Improves copying speed for large files and for when copying a lot of files at once. Also has better overwrite and skip options. Install it and it replaces the Windows copy function. You can still use the usual cut/copy and paste shortcuts.

7zip - decompression and compression of many many compression formats, and free!

Foxit PDF reader - works directly inside a Firefox tab as well as on its own. Faster and with a much smaller footprint than Adobe Reader. They keep making this better with every version

Crossloop - enables you to remotely connect to another computer to give or get help. Very simple to use

Got any favourite free programs I left out? Add them in comments

Open Office 3.2.1 is out!

OpenOffice 3.2.1 fixes bugs, updates logo - The H Open Source: News and Features
If you use Open Office, you should update to this new version.
It includes some bug fixes, some vulnerability fixes, and a slight change in the look/icons (related to Oracle now being the main backer as they acquired Sun Microsystems).

Download from here.

The next version out will be 3.3 in the Fall this year. It will have
some larger updates and new features.

Open Office 3.2 is out!

The latest version of openoffice is out - The Inquirer
Faster, more compatible with MS Office, and other tweaks. And, if you are upgrading from a previous version, it seems to keep your customizations nicely now.
If you don't want the Spanish and French spellcheckers installed, you'll have to manually remove them (Tools, Extension Manger).
Download it here.

Open Office 3.1 is out! Download it now

Go here to download:

download: OpenOffice.org Downloads

Here is a list of improvements:
OpenOffice.org 3.1 New Features

Open Office Tips

OpenOffice.org: 7 Things You Didn't Know You Could Do - Solutions by PC Magazine <read full post for the tips

OpenOffice.org 3.0 costs absolutely nothing but comes closer than anything else to letting you delete your copy of Microsoft Office (which probably cost you a lot). Even though OpenOffice.org—which is, yes, an application suite, not just a Web site—can't do everything Office can, it can do a lot, and it has some of its own tricks that even Office can't manage. Here are a few that may not be obvious, as well as a few ways to make OpenOffice.org less annoying out of the box.

My Top 15 Free Windows Programs for 2008

Inspired by the post at Lifehacker, and, since it's been a while since I've written up a top-list, here is my top 15 list of free Windows programs.

In no particular order:

Firefox 3 - the latest version of Firefox is fast and very secure and remains the best with extensions of all the browsers

AVG Free 8 - anti-virus and anti-spyware, and much improved since it first came out. Easy to use and works better than the big programs that must be purchased.

7zip - decompression and compression of many many compression formats, and free!

Foxit PDF reader - now works directly inside a Firefox tab as well as on its own. Faster and with a much smaller footprint than Adobe Reader. They keep making this better with every version

Crossloop - for remote connections with clients for help/repair - free and very simple to use

Shutdown Guard - for stopping Windows Updates from automatically restarting your computer (XP and Vista)

Winamp - best free media player overall - yes it has playlists and you can use it with your ipod or any other MP3 player. Works better than iTunes and doesn't install other programs behind your back, and you can customize its many settings (file formats to deal with, whether it launches on its own or by your command...)

Quicktime Alternative - streamlined and unobtrusive version of Quicktime

Realplayer Alternative - streamlined and unobtrusive version of Realplayer

Open Office 3 - the best free alternative to MS Office. And it can open .docx files now. You can create a PDF directly from any of the programs in the suite with a click of an icon. Word processor, spreadsheet, drawing program, database, you can make it save things in MS Office format by default if you need to share documents with others have MS Office, and more.

Thunderbird - excellent email program from Mozilla (same group that brings you Firefox). I find this much easier to customize and to backup and move files around when need be than Outlook or Outlook Express.

Picasa - a good, free program from Google for viewing, sorting and editing your photos and more

Superantispyware - A great 2nd program for manually scanning your computer after AVG Free 8 to catch and fix anything that might have been missed. I like this better than Ad Aware and Spybot put together.

CCleaner - great for cleaning up temp files, temp files leftover from crashes, and cleaning up the Registry and more.

Cobain Backup - a free backup program that you can fully customize - scheduling, backing up to various drives including network drives, etc.

Got any favourite free programs I left out? Add them in comments.

Happy New Year!

Open Office 3 is finally out!

They released the final version of Open Office 3 today (Oct. 13, 2008). If you didn't already know, it is a great, free, and open source alternative to MS Office.

Besides many other updates and improvements, it will open the new .docx files created in MS Office 2007. But, when saving, you will have to save to another format. You can choose .doc format, which Open Office and all versions of MS Office will recognize.

If you are new to this and want to give it a try, click on the link below to download it.

For those who already use Open Office, here is how to update:

To manually Update to Open Office 3
Download Open Office 3 from here. http://www.filehippo.com/download_openoffice/ (Oct 13 - the Open Office server may be down due to version 3 being downloaded by so many people all at once - it became available today. Download it from the Filehippo site for the time being). Click on Download Latest Version. If your popup blocker blocks it, click on the appropriate place to allow it to download.
Run the installer file when finished downloading
When installing, allow default settings and go through the prompts.
When finished installing, click on Start, All programs, find Open Office 3, click and drag the new Open Office Writer icon to the location you want it on the Start Menu. If you have an old Open Office Writer icon on the Start Menu, drag the new one to just above it. Once you have put the new one on above the old one, remove the old one from the list (right-click and remove).
Repeat this process for any other new Open Office shortcuts you want on the Start Menu.
Click on the new Open Office Writer icon to open Open Office Writer.
Click on Next until you get to the Registration screen. Check off I do not want to register (since you already have registered), and click on Finish. If it doesn't open full-screen, and you want it to, maximize it. Now close it. Right click on the Open Office 3.0 Quickstarter icon in the system tray (it appears after you first open Open Office Writer) and click on Load Open Office.org During System Start-up to UN-check it.
Right-click on the icon again and choose Exit.
Done.

UPDATE
Updating to version 3 will re-set your toolbars. So, if you did any customizing of them, you'll have to do that all over again.

Open Office Calc - Solution For Formulas Not Working

I've been trying to use Open Office Calc as a spreadsheet for some time now. Although it is very similar to MS Excel, there are a few bugs that really bug me. One problem I had recently was that a formula that was working was suddenly not working. I had the format correct, including using ; instead of , to separate items in an IF formula (Calc uses ; instead of , as in Excel). But it just wasn't working. I tried it in a new file and it worked fine. Through trial and error I eventually discovered that I had to reformat the whole column to accept 2 decimal places and then it worked. Then I had to go in and manually reformat individual cells where I did not want decimal places to show. What a hassle. Anyway, that is the way to get it to work if you have this problem.

Open Office 2.2 Is Finally Out

Open Office 2.2 has finally been released. There are security improvements and other enhancements. Click here to go to Open Office.

If you have a previous version, just download v2.2 and install it on top of the old version.

It's bigger than previous releases, and, since it just came out, their server may be slow for downloading. If it is going way too slow, cancel the download and try again.