LibreOffice vs. Zoho Projects

If you're working with numbers, LibreOffice doesn't get in your way and try to make changes as it sees fit, forcing you to repeatedly go back and undo processes you didn't want, didn't ask for, and that have no place in the document you are trying to produce. All I want to do is assemble the data, process it for the task at hand, and then print it for distribution. LibreOffice allows me to do that.

My work involves projects of 5-15 people with numerous projects running simultaneously. Prior to Zoho, I did not have a central location from which to view all project statuses at once. Zoho looks to provide this and also looks like it will deliver. I am anxious to see how our organization's use of it develops. At this time, I feel I am likely to recommend Zoho Projects because my organization has made great software decisions in the past so I have a level of trust already that the research has been done that Zoho is the best solution for our line of work.

Incentivized

• Tools like speeling, grammar, and thesaurus are super fast and intuitive
• Read-only content can be created by adding a section and password
• The right-click menus are very intuitive and change on the fly with what is needed depending on the content and situation
• Documents can be saved natively as *.docx or *.xlsx

Incentivized

• We use it to manage our sales orders as there are lots of moving parts which are necessary to get client orders done properly.
• I use it anytime I have a new idea I want to put into motion. As I can create a list for brainstorming, feedback, specific actions necessary in order to test and or implement the idea.
• Unrelated to business, it's a great way to plan travel in order to make sure you don't forget those important things like passport, flight arrangement, client meeting confirmation, and meeting prep as far as what specific documents or things do you need to bring with you.
• And since everyone is on the go and expected to keep up with work, the mobile/tablet app makes it a breeze to keep up, work on, and create new projects.

Incentivized

• It doesn't provide all the functions it should with a paid subscription.
• There are features that are only available with Premium and I have premium and they are still not available.
• Paying for the premium version doesn't provide additional services than free version
• Customer service is nonresponsive and has been nonresponsive for years even prior to COVID.

• There is no ability to add custom fields in the "Bugs" module - for example, if we want to add fields such as Version Number.
• Reporting is not integrated - its a fairly expensive add-on.
• There is no easy way to track actual and completed dates for tasks - so historical variance analysis is not easy.

We use it consistently and have a lot of documents in the OpenDocument format so it will be necessary to use LibreOffice or a compatible product such as Openoffice in the future to be able to open these files. Because the license fee for Libreoffice is zero it is not very costly to keep using it - the costs are mostly for keeping it installed on the office PCs and regularly updated, and solving employee issues with the user support.

Incentivized

I've reviewed about 8 other project management solutions and Zoho Projects is the best I've seen without being overly complicated. Zoho Projects keeps getting better! Recent new enhancements makes it even easier to navigate. There are new keyboard shortcuts that cut my time way down. The tools are very easy to use.

For all of the reasons in the foregoing evaluation. Its menus are clean, intuitive and straightforward. Any function I need to use can be accessed via keystrokes, without having to stop, move my hand to the mouse, deal with it, and then get back to the keyboard to proceed. It helps me keep my mind on my work and not worry about dealing with the mouse all the time.

Zoho Project has been very user-friendly. As a small business, we have a diverse group of people with varying skill sets. This platform has been easy for our team to learn, implement, and succeed with. The mobile version is also very handy for our team.

Libreoffice is a desktop app not requiring any server part so it is always available when the PC is working normally. Installing it on another machine if one PC fails is very quick and easy. This is a non-issue.

Incentivized

Has not been down to my knowledge.

For big/imported tables or text documents with images loaded from the internet it is sometimes getting very slow, RAM and CPU intensive, and sometimes even hangs due to some memory leaks or other bugs. This is a long-term problem and is still not resolved perfectly.

Incentivized

Speed meets my expectations.

Support is not officially offered. However, you can find answers to any usage questions or trouble-shooting online easily, typically starting with a Google search. (I believe that all forums / tips for OpenOffice apply equally to LibreOffice, and vice versa.) While Microsoft Office, for example, officially includes support, I find that typically you end up going to a Google search in any case. So, this is not really a downside. However, in all these cases, you end up doing a lot of figuring things out for yourself.

Incentivized

Although it might lack intuitiveness, once you get a hang of how Zoho Projects works, you can do a LOT. The impact good project management has on profitability is huge, and it has helped not only improve communication and coordination when working on a project, but more importantly have adequate tracking of time, due dates and potential bottle necks

Incentivized

Generally easy to perform, issues are how to ensure regular automatic updates on Mac OS X. Fortunatly we have only a few machines with OS X run by management and we can do these updates manually occasionally. Windows updates are quite easy with the support of third party software such as Ninite or Chocolatey, and Linux updates are super-easy thanks to the package manager (apt-get).

Incentivized

I think it is fair to say this:

• If you are looking for a well-rounded, GNU-licensed product that will encompass word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, and database then LibreOffice is probably all you need.
• For online collaboration, links with cloud storage, and more robust support, Microsoft Office 365 and Google Docs are probably what you or your organization needs.
• LibreOffice is at its best for regular document creation and spreadsheet management. It is more cumbersome when it comes to fonts but also when it comes to linkages with cloud-based services. It is there, but you need some more computer knowledge to make it work.
• There are other free alternatives, most notably Apache Open Office, which is also a very good alternative if you do not like LibreOffice.

Having said that, I honestly think off-line computers or laptops used off-site can certainly benefit from having LibreOffice installed.

Incentivized

Zoho Projects provides a more limited set of functionality and customization options than other task/bug trackers on the market, but what it lacks in functionality it makes up for in ease of use. It probably has 80-90% of the features of its competitors but takes about a third of the time to get up and running and realizing value.

Incentivized

With more users using it in the company there are more cases when a simultaneous editing of the same document is needed and this feature is lacking in Libreoffice even though the files concerned are shared and synced by some solution (we use ownCloud). Google Docs or MS Office365 via Sharepoint/Onedrive offer a better function for this.

Incentivized

• I am able to quickly create and edit word processing documents and spreadsheets which are for all intents and purposes equivalent to documents I could create and edit in other tools such as Microsoft Office and Google Docs/Sheets.
• Lack of an online portal for sharing documents necessitates the use of Google Sheets for automation/integration. Ideal would be an all-in-one solution.
• Having open-source software that provides common functionality eliminates the need for expensive licenses.
• Lack of dedicated support is negligible. Most issues can be resolved using online search.

Incentivized

• We needed a system to organize our growing business, so anything was better than what we had, which was nothing.
• Recording time spend is a huge reason for using project software. It has made me aware of the tasks that are taking too long and where we are not being profitable as a company.
• It has kept our team accountable for what needs to get completed and when projects are not in motion or completed timely. It's helpful to know in order to get billing out faster.

Incentivized