OpenOffice, the suite of “office” software (word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, etc.) that competes with Microsoft Office, has just released its latest version, 3.0. OpenOffice, over the past few years, has evolved to the point where it’s just as good as MS Office for most people’s purposes. It has gotten so good so quickly because it’s open source – it has a community of volunteer developers constantly working to improve it. Also, where MS Office costs hundreds of dollars, OpenOffice costs $0. It’s free to use.
You can get it here. Their server is so swamped that their homepage is down right now, but you can at least link to mirror sites where you should be able to download the office suite.