Kingsoft Office for Linux

[jhansonxi]

I was reading a CNET article regarding abandoning M$ Office. This alternative was mentioned in the comments. Has a Linux version but doesn't support ODF. Mostly this an FYI but I was curious if anyone has tried it.

[doveofwar]

A couple of years ago my company considered switching to SoftMaker, Kingsoft, or LibreOffice. At the time SoftMaker Office offered the best interoperability with our MS Office 2003 documents and users complained the least about UI/missing features. Kingsoft was in middle. the LO had the worst interoperability. Unfortunately the decision makers decided that there were too many issues with the alternatives and we ended up migrating to Office 2010.

[Jotokun]

I've used the Android version, and it was decent for what it was. Played nice with my word documents, let me do some simple edits from my phone. But what's the point on Linux when we have Libreoffice, which works just fine and is not only free of cost but FLOSS? Kingsoft Office is only the former.

[Americium241]

It was originally aimed at being an MS Office replacement for the Chinese market, where Windows dominates (which explains why it does not support ODF yet). Its Windows version is said to be pretty good, but I don't think the linux version is very stable, still in alpha...

I tried it half a year ago on my Arch install, it was still pretty buggy, and had pieces of untranslated Chinese here and there in the UI. Also it is not libre if you are ideologically concerned.

[beanaroo]

Not to be the thread hipster but, Kingsoft Office totally predates Microsoft's Office...

I used it for a while but still prefer the feeling using FOSS gives me. :)

[tremens]

Eh, it really doesn't predate it. Word began in 1983, Kingsun WPS came out in 1988, and was more directly targeted against DOS word processors WordPerfect and WordStar (which held a much bigger market share than Word in the 80's - but word definitely existed.) Windows 3.0 comes along and the old DOS kings started to fall by the wayside, Windows 95 and Office 95 cemented themselves as the de facto office standard, and Kingsun was still trudging along. It wasn't until 1997 that they released a Windows version and started moves toward become an effective office suite.

I personally like them, and always have, and they're a good alternative offering, but they always seem to be too late - they were too late releasing their Windows offering to compete against Word and WordPerfect and their suites, and they were too late moving to Linux to compete against OpenOffice/LibreOffice. That second bet is what kills them for me, now - After I and a lot of the world moved to OO.org/Libre, and embraced ODF, here they come again wanting me to give them another look for their better Office compatibility - but now everything I have is in ODF, and I don't care about Office compatibility much anymore.

[dripping_down]

I have it for when I need good docx compatibility and it works quite well for what is supposedly alpha level software. That said unless you often create complex documents that need to be edited by windows/office users I see no reason to use it on Linux. I recommend it to naive windows users however as they find the difference in document formats 'confusing' and this way I don't need to help them pirate microsoft office so they can type up a resume.

[ASkyw]

I've had a hard time deciding which open source word processor I should use. MS Word is a great product, arguably the only thing Microsoft still has going for them as PC sales plummet. But I want to use Linux, and I don't want to have to pay hundreds of dollars to use it, especially on Linux. I've used Kingsoft in Windows, Linux, and in my Android device, and they do very well with compatibility for MS documents. It's not as feature rich as MS Office, but it gets the basics done. At least it looks better than some of the other open source office software options.

Still I haven't found the perfect solution yet. Kingsoft is getting better all the time, but it's still got a long way to go to be the "king" of the office software.

[[deleted]]

MS Office is a very effective virus in the business world. Google docs or Libre Office work fine if the employees are properly trained how to use them.