OpenOffice.org 3.0 Beta Released 390
Sean0michael writes "OpenOffice.org has announced their 3.0 Beta is ready for testing. The new version includes some great enhancements, including MS Office 2007 import filters, an improved notes feature, a built-in Solver component, and an Aqua interface for Macs. The site has a complete list of Beta features. Download your beta release from their site."
Aqua (Score:5, Insightful)
Missing change items (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm missing the "complete rewrite of rendering API and functionality", as well as proper SVG handling (or EPS, or PDF, hell native support for any proper vector graphics format!), and other things that would keep Impress presentations from looking like ass. What about uniform lines, circles that look at least remotely like circles, etc.? What about proper inline (and display) math typesetting? Instead of trying to remain bug-compatible with MS Office at all cost, they should perhaps think about, well, not sucking as bad.
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't understand why people think that OpenOffice gets better the more it's like MS Office. OpenOffice.org seems to try hard to be an MS Office clone, but it's like the Linux distros that try to be "Windows-like"; Windows is the reason we want something else, so why are you copying it?
Macs, for instance, do looks of things differently than Windows and Linux, and people are attracted to them because they're different, not because it's just a way to do MS-things, the MS-way, with non-MS program. Until OpenOffice, and a lot of other Open Source Software projects, understand this, they aren't much better than what they emulate. The feature bloat in both Office and OpenOffice is gross.
Looks like my favorite new feature isn't there yet (Score:1, Insightful)
Clones needed, references checked (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm DMing a D&D game right now, and most people are trying to use HeroForge spreadsheets to build their characters and show them to me. Without MS Office, I can't read them. If there's a problem with character sheets for D&D, I can only imagine how many businesses and other groups have problems with OOO not recognizing MS scripts.
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:0, Insightful)
People who use macs -most people who use macs- don't know jack shit enough about computers to explain what's good or what's bad about the way MS does things.
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:4, Insightful)
In this particular instance, this is a real and useful feature, especially for people looking to perform a large migration to OpenOffice and away from MS Office. Simply put, this feature means less work for people trying to perform such a migration and that is better than more work. That seems quite understandable to me.
Re:Missing change items (Score:1, Insightful)
If you want good rendering use Latex. If you need help using Latex use Lyx.
If you want just a copy of M$ Office Use Open Office.
Re:Still no Reveal codes feature? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Missing change items (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Aqua (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Aqua (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Clones needed, references checked (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe that's why I love Linux and hate Windows. I don't need "user friendly". I need user obedient. I don't care if it sneers at me and insults me so long as it does what I want it to do the way I want it to.
Microsoft programs do what they allow you to have them do, the way they want or no way at all.
As an added bonus with Linux, it doesn't unsult me, while my intelligence is often insulted with Microsoft's "user friendliness".
I don't need my hammer to be user friendly, either. I just want to drive a nail and no backtalk from the damned hammer. Like Linux, it is user-obediant.
Re:Missing change items (Score:4, Insightful)
Alternately, I could work on the code I know, you can work on the code you know, and the OpenOffice developers can work on the code they know. We all pay attention to user requests, and then we don't have to all go learn a new codebase every time we find a program that's missing a feature. Much more efficient that way, don't you think?
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:5, Insightful)
I use MS Office 2007 at work. I don't have a choice in the matter. If we start delivering documents in any other format, our clients will have a conniption fit. If we can't open a Word file because our office suite isn't perfectly compatible with the file, we have a major problem.
Unfortunately, I sometimes have to take my work home with me, where I don't want to pay the MS tax. The more easily I can work with Word and Excel files with OO on my home computer, the happier I am. The more OO screws up my cell formatting and causes things to print incorrectly, the more likely I am to turn to the dark side at home.
Before anybody brings it up, no, it's not an option to explain to our clients that open source and implementing open standards is the way to go. We get files from governments at all levels and work for dozens of different clients. Most of them are a hell of a lot bigger than us and won't care if some engineering consulting company thinks an open program is better. Changing office suites is a big deal to some companies. Just look at the feedback MS got for changing to ribbons in Office 2007. People bitched and moaned that they couldn't find anything and it took a whole click more to do a something they had done in three clicks before.
Re:Aqua (Score:1, Insightful)
Anything originating on OS X is likely to be written to the Cocoa API, and much of that in Objective C. That combination makes it unlikely that the originator could expend the time and energy to port it. So if those projects haven't been ported to Linux it's only because Linux developers haven't done it.
On the other hand, things originally built using OS X, but not using OS X-specific features, such as Ruby on Rails, are everywhere.
Re:Aqua (Score:4, Insightful)
It makes no sense whatsoever for them to not make PPC binaries available. I have both Intel and PPC Macs, and the PPC machines are still perfectly good machines and are nowhere close to deserving of their treatment as outdated relics.
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:1, Insightful)
It's simple: there are a lot of documents out there with macros attached. If OOo gets compatible VBA support, suddenly those documents will work with OOo. Right now those documents don't work.
For example, I used to work at Microsoft, and at review time the HR department would send us a Word document with macros attached. Thanks to the macros the document was a little data entry form, and you could click on radio buttons to rate yourself. Now, a web form is a much better solution here, and I'll bet that MS uses web forms for this now. But how many of these macro-enabled documents are out there now, in current use by businesses?
The Word example is pretty trivial. It's more interesting when you consider a spreadsheet with macros. How many half-baked business modeling tools are out there that were hacked together in Excel with macros? And the guy who hacked them together quit long ago, and no one understands the thing, and they still use it?
So, in summary: VBA is important because (if it works right) it will make OOo a viable alternative for the current locked-in installed base of Microsoft Office users.
And it probably isn't just people hoping to steal customers from Microsoft who want VBA. I'll bet there are plenty of people out there who want this for themselves, so they can finally ditch the MS software and just use OOo for everything.
By the way, I'll cast my vote right now for Python as the "native" scripting language of OOo (and all free open source software). It's clean and tidy, which makes it easy to use for anyone.
Re:Aqua (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Still low limit on Calc rows? (Score:4, Insightful)
And not to defend someone who is acting like a stuck up git (I haven't read the quote), chances are that he's right, it sounds like you're using a speadsheet to do the job of a database. When someone tells you you're using a hammer to cut wood, you can't just tell them that it costs them little to put serrated edges on the hammer's head and that they should just darn well do it.
Re:Still no Reveal codes feature? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Hang in there guys (Score:2, Insightful)
Please Arrange Some Usability Testing (Score:1, Insightful)
The thing that constantly annoys me about Open Office is the obvious lack of usability testing in the user interface. There are many many actions that simply require unnecessary and redundant, or millimeter accurate mouse movements and clicks. Extremely frustrating.
In this regard the product that Open Office is trying so hard to imitate does a much, much better job.
Re:Hang in there guys (Score:5, Insightful)
While OpenOoffice.org has many features that are more than enough for the average user (e.g. Me), Microsoft Office has more and many that many users can't do without.
And Microsoft Office 2007 (once you get used to the "ribbon") is even better than Office 2003, which is better than anything from OpenOffice.org.
Personally, I'm happy with OpenOffice.org in Linux but I'm also open-minded enough to know that it's inferior to Microsoft Office 2003/2007.
It's pretty much a copy of Microsoft Office 2000 (which is 9 years old).
You get what you pay for...
When was the last time you used Microsoft Office and what version was it?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Still low limit on Calc rows? (Score:3, Insightful)
And yes, I speak from experience. My company is currently moving away from a 20 year old UNIX based legacy system where most of the reporting is done via CSV dumps (routinely greater than 65,000 rows) and Excel - Excel is easy to use, easy to pick up and most of our userbase already has a grounding in it which means there needs to be zero IT interaction with these people when they need data analysis. They know what they want, and they know how to get it - the spreadsheets are in existence for half a day maximum. We can't say the same about Access.
Its all very well and good to say 'use a database', but theres a whole load of shit that comes with that statement that takes time, money and ability to do. There is a significant portion of the market that is stuck using legacy systems that date back to the ark, systems that can write out ascii text files and thats about it - thats when it starts paying to get creative, and spreadsheets are a fantastic way to be creative with very little outlay.
Re:Aqua (Score:4, Insightful)
But for just a second, I'd like to appreciate how *freaking awesome* it is that GPL app like Open Office exists. Sure it has problems, but it's also an incredibly hard space to work in. The Microsoft monopoly is based very much on the office formats, and the dedication of Sun and the Open Office team to build this complex thing is creating all sorts of freedom for the rest of us. Microsoft knows this, and that's why they expended so much effort trying to mess up the formats
It's pretty hard to function on the internet without some ability to deal with office documents. In fact, I suspect Open Office is creating more freedom and competition than Firefox. Writing a browser, strangely, is not *that* hard. I can think of ten or so browser projects, but only a few office suites.
Can anyone tell me... (Score:3, Insightful)
Sigh, all this focus on features. Not speed & (Score:3, Insightful)
Meanwhile, the thing is still a slow, bloated pig. Do we have to make efficiency some sort of feature, or provide fake goals and a shiny racetrack before people address the fundamentals?
Makes me sick to see open source apps follow the same fated trails as other bloatware
Re:Don't Hate! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Hang in there guys (Score:5, Insightful)
We have Word (and Word Perfect) at work, and I don't use anything in it I didn't use ten years ago.
At its best, an unused feature is bloat. At its worst it's a security risk.
If OO lacks a feature you need that Word has, you should buy Word. If not and you still buy Word IMO you're either not thinking clearly or you're spending someone else's money.
Re:Hang in there guys (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Hang in there guys (Score:4, Insightful)
Embrace, Extend, Exterminate.
Re:Aqua (Score:3, Insightful)
Open source philosophy is not tied to any particular platform or programming language. There are thriving OS X GPL projects, such as Adium, and various other networking apps, and its community members likely don't give a rat's ass that some Linux devs aren't joining in. Other OS X devs are happy to contribute, and to use the code in their own open-source projects, and that community is no less valid than the one you choose to participate in. Obviously, it's not as fundamentally free as building on an open framework, since there is a dependence on closed source, but that's not to say that their work is any less important, or that they can't build a successful community around their work. I'm sure they won't be losing a lot of sleep from your lack of respect.
Think of it this way; even if you can't use ALL the code in GPL OS X projects, there is a relatively large userbase for that platform, and so there can potentially be more resources dedicated to developing for it, and so it's possible that significant code contributions to underlying libraries used by those projects are made possible by targetting the platform. You should be happy that people are leveraging your favorite libraries on other platforms, as that can only help make them more robust. Your comment seems awfully antisocial for someone so concerned with community...
Re:Hang in there guys (Score:4, Insightful)
the majority of ms office users could easily get by with either openoffice or abiword/gnumeric. basic typed documents and simple spreadsheets are the most common types of documents and many users simply do not do anything more "involved" than that, ever, with ms office.
the only reason we have ms office (or windows, for that matter) in our office is because we support users and companies that buy them, and the most common reason they give us as to why they did is simply "because everybody else has them", NOT because they NEEDED them.
we promote and support open source solutions wherever possible. we live and work in a poor, rural part of the US and not everybody has money to burn on things they don't truly NEED. saving a couple hundred bucks or more by skipping ms office and maybe windows, too, is one way a lot of people can save some cash (so they can afford other things like food, electricity and fuel; which are all steadily rising in cost).
so what if the open source product is missing feature XYZ; how many people actually use feature XYZ and is it really crucial to have in the first place? is it worth spending $$$ just to have it? is there another open source product that'll work better? or can you simply do what you need to do a different way and save the money? the beauty of open source projects is that if people do want and need feature XYZ, it stands a chance of being added.. or if you're so inclined, you can add it yourself. how often do big, greedy corporations actually listen to their consumers instead of the ka-ching their money makes when they blindly hand it over?
Re:Still low limit on Calc rows? (Score:3, Insightful)
There is usually somebody in an organization that informs management of the best ways to use computer resources - and unfortunately for you it appears they may have dropped the ball. If I suggested sending managers reports that were raw spreadsheets with more than sixty five thousand rows I would be laughed at. There is a lot of decent reporting software out there.