For kicks, I installed a copy of the Microsoft Office alternative OpenOffice.org 1.0 on my laptop running Windows 2000. The installation process is notably slick for an open source project, and it’s a nice feeling knowing that one can download, install and use this software suite for the price of absolutely zero. The programs performed acceptably, too — my Microsoft Word and PowerPoint documents were passably (though not perfectly) translated by their OpenOffice.org counterparts. With luck, this suite will become a viable alternative to Microsoft’s, but it has a long way to go before it can quit playing catch-up merely to achieve parity with Office’s ever-widening range of bloatware features. I wish them luck.