Eat your heart out, OpenOffice.

Microsoft Office 2010, due next year, will be available in a free version called Office 2010 Starter, the company's New Zealand chief technology officer Brett Roberts flagged over the weekend.

Like the no-cost Google Apps suite, Office 2010 Starter will be supported by advertising.

Although its name implies a trial version, Office 2010 Starter will have no time-limit.

But there’s a catch.

The new version of the freebie OpenOffice suite, released today, offers snappier performance than its predecessor. Plus its word processor, spreadsheet and other apps gain read support for Microsoft Office 2007/2008 file formats, including the notorious .docx.