Writing maths formulae - Office 2007 or OpenOffice?

[Jimbo Mahoney]

I would like to word process my Maths work (Open University) and can get Office 2007 for ~ £39, or OpenOffice for ~ £0.

I've downloaded OpenOffice to give it a whirl, but I'm a little confused by the fact it has Writer and Math. It seems Math is used to write (complex) formulae, which can then be inserted into Writer. Is this necessary for every formula you want to use?

Any help/advice is welcome! Thanks!

 

[ChrisB]

For math stuff I'd recommend doing equations in Latex
Open office has a number of plugins which will process it for you.

I've always hated the way word does equations, it's by far the worst part about it Although I still use it for quickly done stuff

 

[sidethink]

LaTex is the best way but can be a little daunting for new users. Virtually every university I know prefers their technical documents to be typeset in LaTex. Good macro's for it are well guarded secrets in various faculties.

I've also seen people use MathType with great success (I think it integrates into Word) and have heard of, but not seen, Leibniz.

 

[Antar Bolaeisk]

Word 2007 has a very good system in place now to type equations, basically type them in as you would in Excel and it performs all the formatting automatically. Certainly not the best system in the world but it's been able to handle all the equations so far in my engineering course that I've thrown at it.

 

[boosfuk]

Openoffice is great out of the box for maths - no plugins are required. I have done an recent OU maths degree and part of a physics degree using Openoffice and it has handled every need very simply.
You can use Insert->Object->Formula to do the maths in Writer without having to run the Maths module separately (or setup a keyboard shortcut via Tools->Customise makes it quicker). You can select symbols etc from the window or enter them yourself using notation (e.g. sqrt(10)).
I found LaTex too complex and overkill for what was needed.