LibreOffice is a free and open-source Office Suite from The Document Foundation, presented as the successor to OpenOffice.org. The suite includes Writer (word processing), Calc (spreadsheets), Impress (presentations), Draw (vector graphics and flowcharts), Base (databases), and Math (formula editing).
$0
free and open source under the Mozilla Public License v2.0
Zoho Tables
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Zoho Tables is a no-code spreadsheet-and-database hybrid, combining familiar spreadsheet workflows with the advanced capabilities of a relational database. With five distinct views—Grid, Gallery, Kanban, Calendar, and Form—Zoho Tables allows users to visualize data in the way that best suits the task. It can also be used to build interactive dashboards to bring key metrics together, monitor progress, and gain valuable insights at a glance. Beyond…
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.
Zoho Tables has been great! I have outlined many of my descriptions in my previous answers. It works great for many things, and could do with just a bit more refinement in the ability to customize what it can turn into. However, the best part of Zoho Tables is the simplicity of its original "blank" state. With the right pre-made User-defined automations for primary zoho apps such as projects and CRM, this would become our commonly used tool as a central hub for all our operations.
Ability to create subgroups in a simple fashion in the Zoho Tables. That allows for drop downs. Does not change the formatting of any cells unless specifically addressed by user. But a light column is added at the start of the table with a button to dropdown each row.
Ability to fill a cell with color without reason or specific selection of field options, add an option for a simple color bucket fill.
It would be great to have an efficient way of updating tasks, projects, etc all on one table easily set up by the user! (Ie. When column "Next Action" equals "Add Task to Project 1" without using deluge)
The best pre-made automations for Zoho Tables would be with all {} being user defined selections:
- Update {Selected Task Field} on {Task} when {Column}...
- When {Row} on table is created or edited: Add {Column} as a Task on {Project} in {Task List} then map {Related Table Columns} to {Project Columns}
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.
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.
Simple to use and as a Zoho user, for over a year, I had no issues whatsoever implementing tables almost within minutes to replace Airtable and other databases that were being used as intermediaries, without the automation. Highly recommend (note: in very early stages of testing)
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
Zoho Projects is great for it's intended use to track and manage projects, and the CRM is also great for it's intended use. However, when you are managing operations, everything essentially "ties" together when you are needing to make next decisions. This really comes into play for meetings, and to do lists, etc. Sometimes, all of the detail does not matter when you are trying to operate efficiently. For example, during a meeting, many times we will review KPIs (comes from CRM but in Analytics), then projects, and then general topics. At all points throughout the meeting, tasks are coming up which need to be added, etc. All range vastly resulting in a lot of different places. With Zoho Tables, I am basically working on a blank canvas of cells that can pull data from where I need it too and the more user friendly the ability to set up automations and workflows to be a central hub/home base type tool, the better it would be!
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.
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.
I have not had much ROI on this specific tool just yet. But I do foresee the ability to streamline a lot of our operations as we are beginning to scale.
