Microsoft Office Just Works, So I Can Just Work
May 17, 2018
Microsoft Office Just Works, So I Can Just Work
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Microsoft Office 2016
I use Microsoft Office 2016 for composition, everything from blog posts and web articles to ebooks and print materials. I use Access to keep track of clients, projects, and payments. I use Excel for data analysis. I use PowerPoint for occasional slideshow presentations. Previously, I was using free alternatives, which I found to be less than stable and sometimes incompatible with my clients' needs. Microsoft Office 2016 is a solid product with exceptional documentation and support communities.
- Microsoft Office 2016 is exceptionally stable, which means I'm not fighting with updates and incompatible programs.
- Office documents are universally-accepted around the world, and converters and emulators just don't do the job quite right.
- Office runs offline, which means I don't have to worry about connectivity issues working with an online-only program.
- Office (Excel and Word) works on Android, so I can review and edit documents on the go.
- The subscription model is kinda disappointing, but everyone seems to be doing it, so I guess I can't complain.
- Alternatives often had me wasting time looking for solutions or learning things again. Office minimizes wasted time.
- Subscription model means Office is always updated, so I don't have to shop for software packages every year or every version.
- Universal compatibility had eliminated previous problems I had with clients' documents and presentations.
- Great community and tech support for when I can't figure things out on my own.
In spite of the fact that I have to pay to use Office, I find it to be a great value, as it eliminates wasted time and compatibility issues. For many years, I used WordPerfect, but it wasn't compatible with Windows 8, so I switched to Apache OpenOffice. It was fine for non-business use, but I needed something more stable and user-friendly once I got into freelancing. Apache gave me too many compatibility problems, which caused some friction with some early clients. I then moved on to Google Docs, now Google Drive, but still experienced compatibility issues. Google Drive offline just doesn't work as well as I'd like it to. Microsoft Office suffers none of these setbacks, so I can focus on content creation, instead of software integration and unnecessary fiddling.