I should have thought more in terms of its cost to Mauritians. The depreciation of the rupee makes things even worse.

yes, save all your docs in Office 2007 in doc, xls, etc. Avoid the “x” part!

@ Patrick:

Yes it’s true. Companies will not want to sever links with MS. Companies just can’t afford this. Business is business. Help other businesses grow and yours will grow with links and friends!

The price in Mauritius is high but not for US and Canada. There’s the student price in Mauritius too. But still that’s not affordable for students.
@ Selven:

Great idea!! Make Notepad pl@y mp3′s! I’ll email Bill right away!
Sincerely, you got the point! You can’t do much about what you’ve bought from MS.

i like office applications that doesn’t take lots of time to load..

word 2007 come with .docx extensions? btw (y microsoft uses X ? docx? aspx?)

i never used it but i heard there is a compatibility issue between docx and doc

basically if yo have office 2007 at home and moving around to uni your document may mot be open lol

MS Office on the other hand is sold at a rather expensive price, above MUR 5000. Have you bought your licenses for using MS Office or just downloaded your copy or got it from a friend?? That’s the whole point!

Free doesn’t mean it is bad when it comes to quality, see Linux or BSD, they are free.. yet.. still owns Besides… free doesn’t mean gratis

Why do i say ms office is great, :p because there’s a whole team paid to work on that, while any ‘free’ office suite available now are written some some great team of programmers around many times VOLUNTARILY, and ..those hackers i believe are not heavy office users …hence i suppose it takes lots of time for bug findings and new features additions in those cases..its not the fault of those hackers, but its just that, office are not used that much by coders (i presume).

Besides, as far as windows or microsoft is concerned, your comment about the price, whether paid or pirated :p you still get no support, and it is still the property of microsoft even if you bought it… and legally speaking, if you wanted modify notepad to let’s say call make it be play mp3, you still can’t do it, because even if you bought it, the ownership is still ms (though i wonder who would be crazy to make notepad play mp3, that was an example.)

+s3lv3n

However, in Canada things look a little bit different. Many companies are unwilling to part ways with Microsoft Office. And because my place of work buys a lot of licenses from Microsoft, its employees are eligible for a free copy for home use.

The price of MS Office here is “affordable.” Plus, I also have a valid student card, and am therefore eligible for student discount. The student version of MS Office in Canada is CAD$ 208.00 (MRU 6240), but as a University of Waterloo student, I can get it for only CAD$ 99.00 (MRU 2970). Microsoft is currently running a promotional program where a student (in USA and Canada) can get MS Office Pro 2007 for US$ 59.00.

As you can see, in US, Canada, and I am sure in a lot of other countries also, Microsoft Office is quite affordable and is the only Office suite companies are willing to use.

Can’t students get student pricing for Microsoft Office in Mauritius ?

At first when I started using Open Office,I began to tell myself why I’m using this on Windows platform,but after some practice I’m quite at ease with the applications.

MS Office on the other hand is sold at a rather expensive price, above MUR 5000. Have you bought your licenses for using MS Office or just downloaded your copy or got it from a friend?? That’s the whole point!

And when you’re paying for something, you’re sure to get some nice things. Else, you’ll stop throwing your money at Microsoft!!

Like BlueBerry pointed out, most average users have been using Microsoft Office all their lives (at home and at work) and have grown accustomed to the Microsoft way over the years. Learning to use a new office suite is not something that a lot of people want to do or have the time to do. This is probably the main reason why MS Office is a big source of income for Microsoft.