Ability Office

Meant for home and office use, the offerings with this office suite include a word processor (Write), Spreadsheet, Database, Photopaint and Draw. There’s no presentation software or mail client. Each application is well integrated with others in the suite, so you can easily insert ‘Draw’ images in ‘Write’ documents or spreadsheets, etc. 

This office suite comes with word processor, spreadsheet, database and paint software. But, it does not have presentation software and mail client

Arguably the best feature of the suite is that you can create PDF files from all the applications. Let’s look at each of these in a more detailed manner. 

You’ll find Write very close in features and appearance to MS Word XP and like Word, it can do almost everything including mail merge as well as writing macros. A few things, like automatic spelling and grammar check, will however be missing, as you type autocorrect, or insert comments, view sections and other non-printable characters in your document like spaces, tabs, page breaks, etc. You can’t draw tables using a graphical table draw tool.

The Excel equivalent Spreadsheet is also missing a few features like Data Filters. There are all the other basic features though, ranging from custom lists, macros, charts, formulae, etc.

Database features are not as comprehensive as Access and you may find it missing on a few counts like Security for the database that protects it from open access and graphical representation of relations, which are useful features in Access. But, it does have the basic functionality of a relational database, including setting up relations and indexing. 

Photopaint is an Adobe Photoshop look-alike with most of the commonly used features of layers, filters and fills and does have most of the tools. It supports 25 image formats and 94 filters. However, we found it difficult to achieve some effects like cloning, access to CMYK colors — a must for publishing (the software only provides RGB and HSB colors), achieving Layer effects etc. Draw has features to create and edit drawings, screenshots, picture objects and of course, PDF files. You can store images only in png, jpg, and the software’s own format, awg. The suite offers compatibility with Microsoft Office and Adobe Photoshop file formats. You can do most of the basic things you are used to doing with an office suite. However, before planning to buy it, consider other free alternatives like OpenOffice, which are more feature-rich. 

S N   A   P   S   H O   T Price : Rs. 2999/- (90-day warranty) Key specs : Can create PDF files from all applications.  Contact : info@ability.com.  Website : www.ability.com

The company provides unlimited support via email for all current versions of the software and free-to-download service pack updates. 

Shruti Pareek