MSWord docs on Linux eeePC

[Séamas M.]

Quick question for any users of Linux on eeePC.  I bought one of these for my wife this week as she'd like to be able to carry something small and light on short business trips and have the facility to read and edit MSWord documents. When I load Word files from a USB stick into OpenOffice they generally read in OK but are marked as read-only.  The same applies for any other MSOffice file that is read.  Is this a Windoze-Linux issue (about file permissions?) or is there some setting I can tweak to get full read/write access?

Other than this we're quite impressed with the machine, younger son now wants one instead of a PS3! 

[Charlotte]

Never seen it before - but I nuked the original OS and installed something better.

I use OpenOffice rather than AbiWord.  Easy to download onto the vanilla eee, though.  Maybe try that?

[pcolbeck]

It's not an OpenOffice / Word issue I often edit Word docs in OpenOffice. I suspect it's more to do with the way the eee PC is setup to mount the USB stick. Check it hasn't mounted it read only.

[border-rider]

I was going to say the same thing.  When you open a Word doc any file, it will appear as read-only if the eeePC user doesn't have write permission to the volume it's on. Try either saving it to the local drive, or copying it there first and then opening it.  Or changing the USB permissions

[Séamas M.]

Holy Sh**, that was quick!

Thanks guys, I'll have a look at the mount status (although my Unix memories have got very faint).

What OS did you go for Charlotte?

[Charlotte]

I went for eeeXubunu.  It's ver' good.

You can get it here:  http://forum.eeeuser.com/

All you need to know (and rather a lot you don't) is to be found over there 

[mike]

wotsited.  Works fine for me if I save it to the local drive.  I'm scared of linux so it's still the completely standard setup.

watch out for doing major edits on the eeepc though, I did some highlighting and re-wording on my EPC on the train last week, but when I got it back onto the work PC I couldnt remove the highlights.  It took ages of buggering about with notebook to get the text back into the document without highlights. 

Total time saved = minus several.

[border-rider]

Another eeeXubuntu user here

I have to say that the standard Linux install that the eeePC  works just fine once you install the "advanced" desktop.  For office apps, email & browsing you don't need more.  eeeXubuntu is slower to load, and needs more disc space,  but has a shedload more applications.  I've found that on business trips I tend to take the eeePC now and leave the "sensible" laptop at home, so it was worth upgrading the OS and the memory (I put 2 gig in).  In fact I went further and installed the Gnome desktop, which I prefer to the XFCE one that is standard with XUbuntu.

Also, I run Ubuntu on all my other PCs, so there was a benefit of compatibility and familiarity

[Séamas M.]

Thanks again Charlotte, that forum looks very interesting.

Mike, the plan is to do mostly text edits and leave formatting for the desktop PC. I'm really trying to avoid her asking me to install XP on it.

I'll do a bit of research before messing with the OS, the trouble with tweaking someone else's PC is they don't always agree with your great ideas. 

[Mr Larrington]

Black mark, Séamas.  You have failed to include the picture:

[Séamas M.]

I'm still "researching" it. 

[juliet]

I wants one of these to take travelling with me   But I am sitting on my fingers till the end of the summer because with a bit of luck they'll have brought out the next one & thus people will be offloading their old ones all over ebay.

[Séamas M.]

Quick fix for today was to copy the files from the USB stick to local memory and everything opened up just fine.  The USB was mounted as read-only but I couldn't quickly find a way to change the permissions.

I'll get to play again when she gets back home tomorrow evening.  By the way, she chose pink so that I wouldn't be tempted to borrow it for long.