Categories: Techtoday
There are many ways to improve an old, underpowered iMac running Mac OSX 10.4.11 and 512 MB RAM (such as installing Linux or FreeBSD) but if the machine is maintained by an IT department, you have to make do with what you can - like installing LibreOffice.
Installation
Although the iMac had a severely buggy Microsoft Office for Mac 2004, I checked for a PowerPC-compatible release of LibreOffice almost immediately. The LibreOffice site guides users to the right file, but if you're downloading the installation package from Windows or Linux don't forget to click Change System, Version or Language. LibreOffice will display a list of languages and offer two versions for PowerPC. LibreOffice 3.5.3 is the recommended release appropriate for the aging PowerPC iMac.
I went to work downloading the 170 MB file via torrent. Installing LibreOffice is a typical .dmg process though Windows users accustomed to double-clicking installation files will receive a helpful window that may confuse some users. Just click and drag the LibreOffice icon to the Applications folder in the pop-up window.
Usage
Loading is painfully slow, clocking in at nearly a minute before LibreOffice's familiar welcome screen pops up. Clicking a separate application like Impress or Spreadsheet adds at least another minute of wait time. However, this is due more to my workstation's pathetic 512 MB of RAM than anything else.
Copying and pasting text between InDesign CS2 for Mac and LibreOffice Writer worked better than expected. Working with Acrobat 7 for Mac and Writer was also bug free though again the underpowered iMac took its time for most tasks.
The developers did a good job with LibreOffice's Mac OSX interface and any user who has experience using OpenOffice or LibreOffice in Linux wouldn't have any problems. In fact, it was comforting seeing the de facto Linux office suite in Mac OSX (though I abhor OSX.4's window and file management system).
Although LibreOffice is included in most of my Linux machines (openSUSE and Ubuntu), I don't really use it much, spending more time on LyX or Gedit. It has certainly gone a long way from its first release when it crashed on my openSUSE machine and Impress displayed very odd behavior. The only symptom I found curious was that when creating a new document in Writer, the default language was Unknown even though it's a U.S. installation.
Spinning Pizza and LibreOffice 3
In the old days, OpenOffice/LibreOffice was dubbed more lightweight than its Microsoft counterpart and was ideal for the frugal and efficient Linux machine. These days, however, revisions and improvements may have bogged it down somewhat. There was a time when a Unix/Unix-like machine with 512 MB could handle OpenOffice easy, but my experience with LibreOffice 3 and the PowerPC iMac OSX.4 machine showed that even open source applications aren't always slim and svelte.
Installing LibreOffice 3 on an old PowerPC iMac is a great way to update its capabilities, but unless you also upgraded the hard drive and RAM, prepare yourself for time spent with the spinning pizza.
0 comments:
Post a Comment