Word processor for 6.1

[Ted Mittelstaedt]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Nikolas Britton" <nikolas.britton at gmail.com>
To: "Perry Hutchison" <perryh at pluto.rain.com>
Cc: <freebsd-questions at freebsd.org>
Sent: Monday, September 04, 2006 7:58 PM
Subject: Re: Word processor for 6.1


> On 9/4/06, Perry Hutchison <perryh at pluto.rain.com> wrote:
> > > > Anyone know where I can find a working word processor for 6.1?
> > > > AbiWord and OpenOffice both require Gnome, which won't build.
> > ...
> > > KOffice 1.5 has OpenDocument support.
> >
> > Not that I'm any more eager to get into
> > a KDE mess than a Gnome mess :)
> >
> > File format support is not important.
> > I just need something for my 9th-grader
> > to use for school papers.
> >
>
> FreeBSD and Linux will not meet your teenagers needs, If you really
> want to introduce your kid to UNIX then buy a Mac... trust me on
> this... I interact with many high school and college kids on a daily
> basis. Any used Mac capable of running Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and
> NeoOffice2 will suit your childs needs perfectly:
>
> PowerPC G3, G4, or G5 processor.
> Built-in FireWire.
> 384 MB of memory.
> 5 GB of disk space.

Just keep in mind when you look for used Mac's that the Tiger OS normally
on DVD.  There was a trade-in program where you could get CD's of
it if you sent in your DVDs - I did - but some of the older Macs out there
that have firewire ports only have CD drives.  Also, any older Mac you
find will need ram - Tiger gobbles it.  If you can find an older copy of
Panther
OS it gives you  lot more lattitude in what older Macs will work - it also
does
not require FireWire, so even the original iMacs will run it.

You can compile most text-mode open source applications on Panther and
Tiger,
but if you want to compile X programs your better off with Tiger.

Frankly, if we had the money at my employer I would probably use
rack-mounted
Mac servers and Tiger as a platform to run many of the server applications.
But
a new Mac server is stratospherically expensive compared to a basic HP DL320
running FreeBSD.

Ted