SoftMaker Office 2008 for Free

Since Load and Help from SoftMaker has been mentioned in this thread...

The Load and Help campaign runs again this year until December 31, 2010. You can download SoftMaker Office 2008 and a nice font package for free and SoftMaker donates 10 cents to charity for every download.

Link: http://www.loadandhelp.com

I have to say that I am very impressed with the support SoftMaker offers their customers. I downloaded the free 2008 version that was being given away and lost the link to the download after the offer expired. Even though the offer had been closed for several months they sent me a new link the next day and thanked me. This last time I used a backup software to copy the email with the serial number in and rebuilt my system. After I started the SoftMaker install I found out the backup didn't copy the emails as advertised and so once again was without the serial key. Again I emailed SoftMaker and they sent me all of the info that I needed. Each time they responded in less then a day. I really like the product and look forward to purchasing the latest. I really appreciate companies that go out of their way to support their customers.

If you just want a reliable, fast, word processor,these products are largely complete overkill.

This one is very fast, and very FREE!

http://polyedit.com/free.html

This one is also good, but you need to download the patch;

http://majorgeeks.com/Crypt_Edit_d5345.html

This is also first class, and is compatible with many "standards";

http://www.filehippo.com/download_abiword/

As the previous poster said, the "Load and Help" deal has indeed expired. However at the moment, you can can still get it for free by going here: http://www.softmaker.de/weihnachten2009.htm That worked for me. Also you might try a different link posted below (not sure if it still works): http://www.softmaker.de/lh-down-en.htm

I see this offer's now expired. However, SoftMaker promises to run similar "Load and Help" charity initiatives in the future and invites you to sign up for information (I've got no reason to believe that they're spammers).

Personally, I've been very happy using the word processing program called TextMaker. It may not have quite as many features as Microsoft Word, but it doesn't have the annoyances either.

I've been using this for a couple of years. Wonderful suite, extremely light fast, better compatibility with MS formats than OpenOffice. (SMO 2010 also works with docx, which 2008 doesn't.) And great forum for support and feeback, mainly in German but with a good English section too.

From where can I download danish language pack?

For some reason the above link didn't work for me but I was able to download it from here:

http://www.softmaker.de/lh-down-en.htm

I'm not sure many people use it, but one major missing item is a Database program. It's usually one of the big four next to word processing, presentation, and spreadsheet.

Does SoftMaker have an integral address book - for snail mail? Or is there a separate addbook program to use with it?

This is a great application! I just reconstructed a budget spreadsheet using Plan Maker and it went smoothly. Must faster than OO 3.1 in loading and saving. Thanks for finding this!

Last time I looked, this was not a unified Office-type of program, but rather a collection of individual programs that perform their functions separately. In other words, they are not really integrated to where you can do something in one of them and then turn around and bring it up in one of the others. If they were to improve them so they actually worked together, I'd be interested.

dear all

but this software has no place in our scheme of things - it is not free, unlike open office

yours
v.lakshminarayanan
palani

Downloaded and tested it on Ubuntu Linux. The SoftMaker and TextMaker in SoftMaker Office 2008 do not display some Unicode characters for me, whereas OfficeOffice 3.1 does well on the same system. The latter is still my choice.

I've had it for years and only snagged it originally because the price of MS Office is way to high for someone that just needs a decent word processor. I paid 10 bucks for mine and like it better than Open Office, which I've tried, compared and uninstalled. Nothing wrong with Open Office but like and am used to the more MS Office look and feel of Office 2008. Of course, because I allowed them to, I receive email from Ashampoo a lot because they make lots of different software but I like their newsletter and don't mind an honest sales pitch. Now they're offering me the 2010 version for another 10 bucks but I only need a word processor and it's not worth the hassle of changing what works fine for what I need. I also tried Abiword, I think that's what it's called and it too was OK but Ashampoo won out because of it familiarity. And it does everything.

Thanks, I liked their 2010 version.

Well well well, would you believe it, this is just perfect for me. I've been trying it out this evening and it opens everything I want it to open, it has more than enough features and tools for my needs, it's excellent. What a great offer. Gizmo's, thank you. OpenOffice, goodbye.

Well, "future upgrades at reduced prices" seems to say that the free status is limited. I'd rather stick with a truly free product, OpenOffice.

It sounds a very good program, but can you transfer workable programs from microsoft. I have some programs that will work only with XL, I was able to transfer them to open office to use. I am all for freebies if it saves the pennies
eric

You should know that SoftMaker are v. aggressive on the emails after you sign up. Product OK but probably not worth the aggravation