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OpenOffice.org 3.2's download file is 150MB, and as they continue to build on its features it's only going to get bigger; the first version I ever downloaded was less than half as big. It's available free by conventional download, or by Bittorrent or eMule p2p. You can also have it sent to you on CDROM for a small fee, from a long list of online distributors which you can browse on the site by region.
OpenOffice.org is Java-dependent for certain extras. See the Java section of the Wikipedia OOo article for details, including a list of features dependent on Java. This calls for an installed Java Runtime Environment (JRE). If you have Microsoft Windows XP or later, Mac OS X, or a recent Linux distribution, you should already have native Java support as part of the operating system.
OpenOffice.org for Linux is included with nearly all full-service desktop Linux distributions. After you install the distro, you should find OOo already there in the applications menus. If you're running a mini-distro of some sort, you may find lighter-footprint substitute applications instead; Lubuntu, Puppy Linux, CrunchBang, and Tiny Core all use the AbiWord word processor and Gnumeric spreadsheet. But even on a mini-distro you can probably install OOo from the package manager if you prefer.
If your local public library has free broadband Internet access for cardholders, their PCs are equipped with CD-RW "CD burner" drives, and their policies permit it, you might want to download OpenOffice.org there and burn it onto a CD-R or CD-RW to take home. My local libraries will even hand me a blank disk for a dollar donation. Depending on local library policy, you could use a USB flash drive or USB external hard disk enclosure, instead of a CD. USB flash drives have been dropping in price.
Libraries often have a bandwidth pool that's shared by multiple computers or branches. When you try to download something, depending on what else is going on at the moment, you might not always get the data rate you were expecting: like an hour and a half instead of twenty minutes. If something like that happens you might want to just cancel the download, do something else for a few minutes, and try again.
If you have a netbook/notebook with WiFi, you can probably download OOo at a free local hotspot. If you're going to download the 150MB install file on a public WiFi hotspot, you probably want to do it on the fastest one you can find. I suggest you use the Speakeasy Speed Test on your local wireless locales to find a good fast one. How fast a hotspot is seems to depend more on the attitude of the organization's management than whether it's a library branch, coffeehouse, bakery, sports bar, oil-change place, laundromat, or whatever.
If you have to download OOo on a dialup/modem connection, obviously a download manager that can resume interrupted downloads is essential: see my download managers page for a couple of good ones. I did encounter a server once on an OOo download which didn't seem to support resumed and multi-part downloads; if that happens, try another server.
In OOo 2.0 and later, the Windows download file is a special self-extracting compressed EXE file. After the download you can run that EXE file from wherever it is, including from a CD, without problems. It first creates a folder called "OpenOffice.org 3.x Installation Files," on the Windows Desktop by default, loads files into it, and then proceeds automatically with the install. After OOo is installed, you can probably delete that install-files folder.
If you're not a computer geek, after you've read the previous paragraph, you'll probably want to skip down to the Configure section.
If you are a fellow geek, in case you ever have problems with OOo, you might like to be able to run OOo's less-drastic Repair utility (Control Panel, Add/Remove Programs, OpenOffice.org) instead of just removing OOo and reinstalling it (same place). Most users will probably never have to do either; I never have. For Repair you'll need to keep the install-files folder.¹ Modern PCs generally have gigabytes of spare disk space available for this sort of thing.
If you do want to keep the install-files folder, you may want to have the installer create it at the root of the C drive, in the early step for that, or somewhere else not on the Desktop.²
On Windows 98 for example, to change the install-files folder location from the Desktop to the root of the C drive, one made the following path change, by removing the line-through characters.
| From: To: |
C:\Windows\Desktop\OpenOffice.org 3.1 Installation Files\ C:\OpenOffice.org 3.1 Installation Files\ |
On Windows XP and later the deleted part will be longer, because of support for multiple users, but the change will be similar and the "To" string the same.
You should find shortcuts for the OOo modules at Start, Programs, OpenOffice.org, which you can copy to your Desktop if you like. Or you can just right-click in any Windows folder and pick New, to make a new blank OpenDocument file, already highlighted for renaming.
On Windows I liked to make a Desktop shortcut to soffice.exe, which you'll find in the OOo program directory. Running that opens a blank OOo window; then you can do File New and choose a document type. A Send To shortcut to the same file (a shortcut in the folder C:\Windows\SendTo\) also works well for the Windows-shell context menus, which you see when you right-click a file, for use with file types not associated with OOo.
OOo 3.x has full support for the Mac OS X native Aqua GUI. There was an attempt at Aqua support for OOo 2.0 which had to be aborted for various reasons. OOo 2.x on Mac OS X required either Apple X11 (standard non-Aqua X Windows on Apple Mac OS X) or a Java Runtime. See the Native desktop integration section of the Wikipedia OpenOffice.org article.
For discussion of configuring the document file formats OOo will use, and whether it will warn you when you save a file to a format that's not the default, see the file formats section of my Using OOo page.
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