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What is the difference between them? ...I mean like if I create a document under MS-Office, what problems could occur if I want to edit it later with ooo.org?

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Usually there are only minor formatting errors, if at all. There are some edge cases where using a specific Brand New Feature in Office won't work with OOO/LO and vice-versa, but those are the exception.

The biggest difference is the interface. Someone that is used to Office 2007 will take a while to find their comfort zone with anything beyond the very basic features in OOO/LO.

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what about macros? are there any problems regarding with those? – LanceBaynes May 12 '11 at 18:06
Pricing and licensing restrictions are also a very important difference: For pricing, while fully featured versions of LibreOffice and OpenOffice is free, MS-Office has price tags that range from less than $200 to over $600 here in Canada depending on how many features you're willing to pay for (and not everyone qualifies for the lower priced bundles). For licensing, LibreOffice and OpenOffice are open source though MS-Office is not (which may also be an important factor with regards to data security). – Randolf Richardson May 12 '11 at 18:49
I believe OOO/LO have support for macros, but they may not be fully compatible with MS Office. The best way to decide is to just try it on your own macros and see if they work. – Ryan Thompson May 12 '11 at 19:45
@LanceBaynes: For the most part, the Basic on both MS and OOO are surprisingly similar. – surfasb Aug 6 '11 at 9:42
@Randolf Richardson: Open-Source != exploit free. cert.org/blogs/certcc/2011/04/… dankaminsky.com/2011/03/11/fuzzmark – surfasb Aug 6 '11 at 9:43
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It has to be added here - that Word 2007+ - supports .odt (it's a OO/LO file format) - while Word 2003 doesn't.

In my experience - you can interact with both - Word and OO/LO - if and only if - you don't use any fancy formatting features.

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It's the PowerPoint slides that don't like to convert well . . . – surfasb Aug 6 '11 at 9:44

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