Ask Dr LJ - help with Open Office running on a Mac

[goddessfarmer]

EDIT and update timestamp - So, #2 below is intermittent. #1 below has been reported already, a YEAR ago, and they have done nothing about it. I know OO is free, but this severely limits it's usability - I still have to have Excel in order to begin things. I am not a programmer. Is Open Office only for the Elite Geek Community? Are the rest of us condemned to sell our souls to The Establishment????

So I have two "problems". Each of them has a work-around but they are still tiresome.

#1: When I open a new, blank spreadsheet, and try to enter data, it is not visible in the cells, even though, when I have the cell selected, it shows up in the formula line on top. BUT!  If I open s spreadsheet generated in excel (or numbers, saved as excel) with anything in it at all, this problem doesn't exist.

#2: gridlines - I want to see the gridlines on the spreadsheet. I can make it draw on lines around the cells for a block of cell, but again, that's doing it the long way. I feel like I just haven't found the correct command yet. And oh, yea, if I first generate a spreadsheet in Excel, then open it with Open Office, I get my gridlines, but when I then add a new sheet to the file, I need to generate my gridlines.

Comments

[vibrantabyss.livejournal.com]

Coming from the other side of the world... and on 3.3.0 (version is likely important) check the Mac equivalent of:
Tools | Options | OpenOffice.org Calc | View

When you 1st open Calc. Are gridlines turned off? (default they should be on, but seems to be the place to mess with them globally)

If it is let me know and (a) I'll see if I can figure out how to change that stuff and have it stick (mine seems to reset if I close OO)

In a similar vein, if you select one of the cells where nothing is showing up, and:
right-click | Format Cells | Font Effects

Is the font color "automatic" or "white" (or otherwise hardset to the same color as your cell background)? There is also a place to set font transparency, and I'd guess at 100% that would mean see-thought regardless... but that is a more convoluted hunt...

Let me know if that provides any clues at all, and I'll dig harder for solutions...

[goddessfarmer.livejournal.com]

ok. so here's something strange. I opened a new spreadsheet, and the gridlines were there.

I tried the font effects, changed some things, played around with font color, etc.... and still no text (or numbers) in the cells.

[gravitrue.livejournal.com]

Gnumeric is a much better free spreadsheet, though I've never tried it on a Mac.

OO is not elite; elite geeks don't have to actually use spreadsheets or word processors often enough for them to write good free ones. In my experience, OO has always sucked; it kinda almost does the job most of the time, is open source, and doesn't cost money, and that's about all that can be said for it. There's a lot of background as to why, but the upshot is that I have trouble imagining anyone recommending it who has actually had to use it as a daily tool unless they are someone who absolutely requires that their software be open source.

[goddessfarmer.livejournal.com]

Can you recommend something else that will talk to Excel across both Mac and Windows platforms? The newest version of Excel for Mac doesn't talk nice to older versions, I can't buy an older version, and the people I'm sharing files with can't afford to upgrade. Excel also doesn't talk nice cross-platform, which we need.

[gravitrue.livejournal.com]

If the problem is that you (and just you) are on a mac and you're trying to share spreadsheets with people using an older version of excel on windows, then gnumeric might work for you. There are probably other potential solutions, but I'm on vacation and don't have time to hunt right now.

If buying an old version of excel for mac is a problem because M$ won't sell you one, then there's ebay and craigslist; another possible if intensely gross solution is to run a windows emulator on your mac.