I am trying to download OpenOffice and Scribus but keep finding I have to download something else along the way. Is there a simple guide out there which will take me through it step by step, avoiding the use of techie-speak?

What are you being asked to download along with the application?

What site are you linking to to get the application?

Open Office requires JRE (Java Runtime Environment)and except for Mac OSx this included in the installer I have only installed Scribus on Linux and I can not remember what if any dependencies were needed. What OS are you using?

Again I agree with the posters above me.

What site are using to install these and what else are you being asked to install?

A very nice and safe site is "FileHippo", it's almost entirely freeware and will list if its shareware in the description.

A very nice and safe site is "FileHippo", it's almost entirely freeware and will list if its shareware in the description.

For lots of "Freeware" file sites like FileHippo or CNet are great. For Open Source projects like OpenOffice.org or Scribus it is best to use the download source maintained by the project. By the way please donate to these projects if you use the software, though some projects have commercial benefactors many do not so they need the money.