The 10 Coolest Open Source Products of 2008 198
An anonymous reader writes "Open Source Software is about more than just the Linux operating system, and 2008 brought advances in the form of OpenOffice.org, IBM Lotus Symphony, Firefox and Android. But Linux is still the heart of the FOSS movement, and this year brought key developments in the operating system as well. Here's a look at the coolest open source products to come across the transom in 2008." Along roughly similar lines, davidmwilliams points out the year in review of the iTWire's "Linux Distillery" column.
Zzzzzz (Score:5, Insightful)
Android *is* new - but is hardly newsworthy by now.
Re:I don't get it... (Score:3, Insightful)
I think.
WTH? (Score:5, Insightful)
5 of the 10 are just Linux distro's. Ubuntu 8.10 AND 8.04 were both on the list as seperate entries!?!? And Lotus Symphony, a version of OOo, was listed along with OOo as seperate products. For the most part this could have been condensed down to:
Linux, Firefox, OpenOffice, Android
Which is so boring a list that it's of no use to anyone actually using open source already.
Re:Zzzzzz (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks for that. I tried to RTFA and found it was one of those "one paragraph and ten thoudsand ads per screen" sites so I didn't go any farther.
How can you trust any tech site with a gawdoffal layout like that? Pathetic!
Re:I don't get it... (Score:5, Insightful)
Which brings me to the fact that the real key to having the oft-heralded Year Of Linux, is to have a Year of the Office Replacement first. (I'm not sure that Open Office is currently anywhere near that happening). MS Office / Exchange are the whole key to Microsoft's dominance, not the OS. Find a viable solution for that, and Linux will follow.
Re:Zzzzzz (Score:2, Insightful)
More Importantly (Score:3, Insightful)
These are all projects with mainstream corporate backing.
In my opinion the list should include projects done by people who don't have vast sums of cash to back them.
Arduino (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I don't get it... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I don't get it... (Score:2, Insightful)
Why would there be training in using Open Office? Or Microsoft Office for that matter?
I work for a company with about 90,000 employees world wide. I think our local office (300 employees) has maybe two Microsoft Office installations, and I can't remember anyone talking about getting training in either of those packages. We have, however, had training in using Lotus Notes
What next? Training in using a fucking printer? Turning on the monitor?
Granted, I work for a company insourcing tech support, but still - why would anyone need training in using another office suite than the one they're used to? If they can't work out the differences on their own in a few days, they shouldn't be using office software to begin with.
Re:Zzzzzz (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I don't get it... (Score:3, Insightful)
1)Export from JDE (yes this can do CSV, not nearly as useful)
2)Export from GL reporting package (no real alternative provided)
3)Addon for Excel that's basically a macro package into the JDE financial, again no ready replacement
4)Edit functionality in our Enterprise Content Management system
5)Export functionality from our fixed asset software, no alternative but raw dump
etc.
All of that could be worked through but it would be at a VERY significant cost and possibly at the cost of choosing a significantly less useful alternative. The good news is that more and more stuff is going web based, the bad is that a bunch of advanced functionality still relies on Office.
Re:Projects on the horizon:* (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I don't get it... (Score:4, Insightful)
Try IBM's version.
I don't really have any problem using OpenOffice, but it's kludgey. and pretty slow.
Lotus Symphony, on the other hand, seemed very polished to me, and significantly quicker.
It's still not Office 2000/2003, but it is worlds better than the pile of excrement that is Office 2007. Which, by the way, I have not heard more than 5 people say they like, including the previous side-post.
I would even say that, personally, I like the spreadsheet application in symphony better than excel in most instances; They have quite a bit of experience with those, so it makes sense.