gobeProductive

http://www.gobe.com/

(Reviewed by Fred Sabin, President, NJCC)

gobeProductive (pronounced “go be productive”) is a graphics based, all-in-one, fully integrated office suite containing a word processor, spreadsheet, graphics and image processing, and a presentation program. It was developed by the team who developed ClarisWorks, and is positioned between MS Office and MS Works (in competition with MS Works Suite, StarOffice and 602Pro PC Suite Plus).

It installs quickly and offers a simple startup menu to choose the application you wish to launch.

The individual toolbars look and feel similar to MS, but with more graphics and easier integration between applications. One very nice feature is the ability to save documents in both MS Word (Version 97/2000) and PDF (Version 4/5) formats. gobeProductive can also open MS Word documents, but not those in PDF format.

Unfortunately, “Help” is divided between the online toolbar help menu (which uses MIE) and a separate User Guide (in PDF format available from the website). Both are very short and simple, and do not provide the details normally available with help menus.

The system requirements for gobeProductive are a 300 MHz Pentium II or better processor with MS Windows 98 or later; 64 MB (128 MB recommended) RAM; 10-25 MB Hard Drive space; and an 800X600 or better monitor.

The list price for gobeProductive is $124.95 (plus shipping and handling). A special User Group pricing of $74.95 (plus S&H) is available for NJCC members at http://gobe.com/UGorder/. There is also a special User Group pricing of $49.95 (plus S&H) for a prior version of gobeProductive (available until June 14) at http://www.gobe.com/dealsguy.html (“DealsGuy” is a columnist that several User Groups carry in their newsletters that Gobe met at the APCUG meeting at Comdex).

I do feel that this is a good product, but I also feel that that it needs better documentation, especially for the inexperienced user that would probably purchase it.

Gobe Software has been in business since 1997, and previously produced gobeProductive for the BeOS operating system. Additional information on gobeProductive is available in a colorful flyer that is obtainable at NJCC meetings, or at their http://www.gobe.com website.