Is OpenOffice.org a Threat? Microsoft Thinks So 467
Glyn Moody writes "Most people regard OpenOffice.org as a distant runner-up to Microsoft Office, and certainly not a serious rival. Microsoft seems to feel otherwise, judging by a new job posting on its site for a 'Linux and Open Office Compete Lead.' According to this, competing with both GNU/Linux and OpenOffice.org is 'one of the biggest issues that is top of mind' for no less a person than Steve Ballmer. Interestingly, a key part of this position is 'engaging with Open Source communities and organizations' — which suggests that Microsoft's new-found eagerness to 'engage' with open source has nothing to do with a real desire to reach a pacific accommodation with free software, but is simply a way for Microsoft to fight against it from close up, and armed with inside knowledge."
I use it because... (Score:4, Insightful)
...its GUI is more like Microsoft Office pre-2007 than Microsoft Office 2007 is, and I have never gotten used to the 2007 interface.
Re:I use it because... (Score:4, Insightful)
My 5 year old niece uses W2007, how hard can it be? Personally I hate all them GUIs, never got the point, only editor I need is nano or a good old typewriter.
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It can be surprisingly difficult. I'm wondering a few things though: does you 5 year old niece use sections, macros, table of contents, or any advanced aspect to Word? I doubt it somehow, which suggests to me that they don't use advanced features.
Re:I use it because... (Score:5, Insightful)
99% of people couldn't care less for the advanced features in anything.
Re:I use it because... (Score:5, Insightful)
99% of people want 1 advanced feature in their word processor. Thing is, they all want a different advanced feature which the other 98% will consider unnecessary.
Re:I use it because... (Score:4, Insightful)
And that's why we have extensions. Putting everything in at the start just creates bloat.
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One? From what I can see it's usually more like zero advanced features. Choosing font/etc. while typing, exclusively using Enter and Space for formatting, sometimes Tab; getting lost with punctuations, never even heard of styles - that's the usual state of Word proficiency (and those people put familiarity with it into their CV...)
Something between Wordpad and Abiword is enough for them.
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And how many people really need a word processor any more?
People in school and those that write reports at work do and authors as well but that is getting to be a smaller and smaller group all the time. Most business communication has moved to emails as has most personal communication. When is the last time you wrote a letter?
I would be willing to bet that Office 2000 and OpenOffice both meet the needs of 99% of the users out there. Yes I know that everybody till uses a word processor but I have to wonder
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Indeed, I knew when I was in third grade and being hounded about my penmanship to the point that I never wanted to write another word that content is the most important thing about communication. Form is constantly mutable while the thoughts themselves are constant. It's the same song whether it's sung by Soundgarden or Johnny Cash, Stevie Wonder or The Red Hot Chili Peppers.
Not to mention the fact that I can type at a much closer rate to my train of thought than I can and still maintain legible handwri
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OO has no trouble with the sort of documents that a 5 year old would use, but it gets wonky with really complicated stuff that was originally made in Excel (and sometimes powerpoint documents just turn into a clusterfuck).
I like office 2007 though...I'm still not convinced that the ribbon was a great idea (though some of the new keyboard shortcuts aren't so bad) but the ne
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I'm wondering a few things though: does you 5 year old niece use sections, macros, table of contents, or any advanced aspect to Word? I doubt it somehow, which suggests to me that they don't use advanced features.
I'm wondering a few things though: did you just answer your own question? This suggests to me that there might be something circular about your logic.
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My 5 year old niece uses W2007, how hard can it be?
This comment you are replying to is not how hard it is, especially not to a newcomer as you niece, but about familiarity.
One of the key arguments against MS Office alternatives prior to Office2007 was the inconvenience, and possible financial costs, of retraining for people already familiar with Office. It wasn't that the alternatives were harder to use (Office was no paragon of truly intuitive design and neither were the alternatives so the difference in that respect was a close to naught as makes not odds
Re:I use it because... (Score:5, Insightful)
The real evil here is not the features of MS Office but how it becomes integrated with third party applications. There are a number of "gold" or "platinum" Microsoft partners providing integration with business systems who will not support anything but MS products as they fear reprimend from MS should they support a product from "the enemy." I think MS should have been split a long time ago.
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In the case of learning new things it's not always wise to compare an adult to a child whose mind is actually much more capable of learning new things. Children find it much easier to learn two languages where as adults can struggle at it.
I've not had a problem with Win 2007 other than I find it ugly and don't care to pay for it while I'm
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I call BS on this one. I've been using Office 2007 for a month, and I still can't "master" the changes from 2003. Let's see--which Word ribbon has the "Print Preview" function? Is it View, Review, or possibly Page Layout? Nope, none of the above. You have to go to the Circle Icon (whatever that's called), select "Print," and then get Print Prev
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That's because you are trying to learn 2007 using your knowledge from 2003. If you try to learn 2007 as if you'd never known a Microsoft interface before, you'd be surprised at how easy it is. You are bringing a decade of bad UI experience into your expectations, which is skewing your opinion of 2007.
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I find it very odd that you haven't made the connection that the round circle is the same as the File menu in old Office versions. All the same functions. How have you not made that simple connection?
And how is it not logical that Print Preview wouldn't be a part of print? You act like this is nonsense. The old method was nonsense.
And your Excel comment doesn't make sense because Excel 2003 didn't do that either.
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Flamebait? Really? You make an excellent point. I've tried Open Office and it isn't good enough to be worth the hassle. It's actually easier to find an Office torrent than it is to install a legit version of Open Office (or at least it was 2 years ago).
I'm a "Mac guy" and a usability expert (or at least that's how I make my paycheck), and as much as Microsoft misses the mark on good UI, Office2007 is no worse than previous attempts. There are actually usability improvements (albeit ones that stem from pre
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Ooo has an incredibly ugly UI and some glaring usability issues. I think it would win many more converts if it focused on usability for its next release even if it never added a single new feature. Drag the UI kicking and screaming into the 21st century and smooth some of the rough edges in the process. From my own experience, I tolerate the UI simply because the suite is fre
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I frequently hear the "print-to-pdf" feature touted as a major advantageous feature of Ooo - but with the wide availability of pdf 'printer' programs I don't see this as a feature at all. A separately installed pdf-printer program is available to all other programs (print to pdf from esoteric scientific program, notepad, browser, whatever) instead of tying the feature into Ooo itself. In fact, this seems contrary to the mentality of most programming (and by extension, to the open source movement) logics -
Re:I use it because... (Score:5, Informative)
I'm aware of PDF printers and I use them, but none of them are as simple to use. The one built into OpenOffice works with a single click a button, and a file dialog. That's it. Most PDF drivers lead you through 2 or 3 dialogs and fail to pick up the document metadata or hinting stuff like column flow because they're being called as if they're printers. The Impress app also exports presentations as Shockwave Flash files which is also a similarly excellent feature. It would be great if Ooo exported into more formats, things like EPUB for example.
It certainly doesn't stop you adding a PDF printer driver (such as PDFCreator on Win32) and using it from other apps though.
Re:I use it because... (Score:4, Informative)
Not really gonna weigh in either way here, but Office 2007 has a free plugin from Microsoft that lets you print to PDF and it does preserve links.
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And that plug-in would have been shipped as a feature, except for Adobe's teeth gnashing and threatening of lawsuits.
Here's a pro-tip: PDF is only an open format if you're too small a company to effectively compete with Adobe.
Re:I use it because... (Score:5, Insightful)
Because I had to support so many different programs I can't develop a memory for all the different shiny icons there are. A few of them are alike, but most are just too different for me to know what's what in any program. So, with simple text menus I can just read and find what I need faster. Icons hold no meaning to me.
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That’s because it’s a half-assed solution, that sits between two already crappy starting points: text menus, and icon bars.
That mouse-controlled icon bars are stupid, in a text processor, should be totally obvious, so I’m not commenting on them.
And menus are bad, because they are very limited, simple UI elements. No multiple choice, no parameters, no nothing. For that they use modal dialogs. Which are just plainly idiotic.
The idea of the ribbon came from the more than a decade old InfoBox
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Luckily for me, my company is still using MS Office 2003. I really don't have any need for office software on my home PC, but if the need arises I'll surely go OO.
I do think Excel is the best spreadsheet out there, certainly the best of the three I deal with at work The other two are Quattro and Lotus, which makes it pretty easy for Excel to excel in the spreadsheet wars. Lotus wants to take over your whole computer like some damned virus. It's the most "in your face" spreadsheet I've ever used, and getting
My guess.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Is that while it currently is no threat, they are preparing for the future. Whether or not the threat actually does arise or not is irrelevant, as MS has the money to throw at this minor inconvenience, to attempt to stop it before it becomes a major threat.
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Microsoft didn't get where they are by throwing money around just because they have it.
MIscrosoft employs around 20,000 people (Score:2)
They employed one person to take a look at OO?
Yep, definitely a threat to their core business model. Not.
This must be a big joke (Score:2, Insightful)
OpenOffice.org is a threat? I do not think so and here's why:
1: It looks aged compared to its counterpart from Microsoft
2: Still takes a while to load and looks ugly!
3: It's not as featured as Microsoft Office. Those who profess that the 80%/20% rule is what
matters do not have a clue on how human beings behave.
4: Most educational institutions and workplaces still accept Microsoft Office as the "default"
office suite...even for editing simple documents.
5: Its develo
Re:This must be a big joke (Score:5, Interesting)
Rebuttals:
1. And Microsoft Office looks aged compared to anything I've seen on CSI. I'm not sure I want my office software looking like something I've seen on CSI, so being aged isn't a bad thing. Oh, and get off my lawn.
2. It takes a while to load because Office has probably already pre-loaded most of itself and just pops up a main window when you open a document. Ever wonder why Windows is so slow to boot?
3. Yeah, I wish I could do python scripting in Open Office, or save straight to PDF from my OpenOffice Writer, or create equations with LaTeX in my OpenOffice Impress presentations. Oh wait...
4. Educational Institutions are normally the first to try new things, since they have a higher proportion of geeks in the place. There's also well documented cases of local governments switching to OO.org and Linux. And some switching back after getting sweeteners from MS, but that's the point of the original article. MS sees a threat.
5. What do you want it to develop into ffs? Emacs?
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2: Still takes a while to load and looks ugly!
If you're on Linux this will solve any performance problem from the second time you open OO.
$ sudo apt-get install preload
More info here [sourceforge.net].
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It's not a threat to the advanced Office user market, but it is a threat to Microsoft's dominance in the "I want to send a recipe to my friends" type casual users. There's room for both, just like Paint is not a threat to Photoshop but Photoshop is not a threat to Paint.
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Hey, astroturfing ?
The points you make can be rebutted, someone already did it, for me the main point is that OO gets the work done, end of story.
Really, I have something else in my life to do beside running after forced endless Microsoft upgrades...
Cheers :-)
Re:This must be a big joke (Score:4, Insightful)
1, many MS customers are still using old versions which by definition *are* aged...
2, looks are not terrible important, and load time less so... in the win9x days when you had to reboot constantly and reload all your apps it mattered a lot, these days people will leave it running all day.
3, it has a slightly different feature set and in some ways is more featured than the ms offering, that said many customers use old versions of ms and most only use a small subset...
Remember that when MS took over from wordperfect, it was MS who had the inferior product considered a joke by any serious users of wordperfect...
Traditionally, using OOo has been considered detrimental because of the prevalence of proprietary ms formats, but this is gradually changing.. And despite the best efforts of MS the world is moving towards more open data formats which makes alternatives to ms seem less risky.
At the same time, the economy isn't doing so well and companies are looking for ways to cut costs... For many of those companies, IT is a cost and not part of their core business so faced with the choice between several "adequate" products may well go with the cheapest.
The best product rarely wins, as MS have proved time and time again... It is usually the cheapest or best marketed product which wins. The people making decisions are rarely even qualified to judge which product is best, they will merely choose and expect everyone else to put up with it.
Staff at such companies will complain whatever you do, but ultimately their complaints will get ignored anyway.
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However, that doesn't mean that it is not a threat. The punchline is Margins. It isn't good enough for Microsoft to get Office onto a given person or organization's computers. They aren't a charity. It is only good enough if they make money, preferably for them a lot of money, doing so(or, in certain cases, sell it cheaply to reinforce its status as the "standard" for office software). Every time an organization or municipality plays the "Well,
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FYI, none of that matters because there are enough people, businesses, and governments using Open Office that it is a threat just for its potential. It is a classic "innovators dilemma" situation. Besides, it also runs across platforms so that one there there puts it on the 'it is a potential threat' list with its uptake bumping it to the 'it IS a threat' list.
time for a short break from this training session.
LoB
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Flip Flop (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem is they continually flip flop, one week they are seeking open source interaction and the next week they are attacking it and it's supporters. It all seems to be driven by nothing more than the current marketing image they wish to present. Although it does seem that M$ leans more to open source when they get screwed over by some patent dispute.
Really for them to put a foot forward they actually need to release their own branded version of a recognised open source software package and adhere to the requirements of the licence, even should their version substantially vary and they choose to host and make it available.
So what will it be, VLC, Firefox or maybe something Ruby. I think OpenOffice,org or a Linux distribution is way, way to far a stretch for them, they just lack that kind of mental flexibility and out of the box thinking.
No Flip Flop (Score:2)
They are quite consistent. They support Free Software when they talk, and atack it when they act.
Nothing different from what you should expect, since FOSS is competition and have quite a powerfull "PR department".
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Like IronPython?
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That screams to me that there are two separate groups, each with their own agenda. That happens pretty frequently in large companies/organizations - though it's more fun for most people to describe it as some tactic on the part of MS. Maybe it really is a plot (maybe, they really are all out to get us...), but I prefer to apply Hanlon's Razor...
Protect the Cash Cows (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Protect the Cash Cows (Score:5, Interesting)
This reminds me of a story I think I saw here years ago.
Guy is told that they will be moving over to MS Exchange (this would have been in '97 or so). So he does his job and sets up Exchange. World goes to hell. E-Mail doesn't work several times a day, server crashes routinely, etc. His boss and users are on his ass constantly. It all becomes too much for the guy, who was told to do this over his own objections.
Monday morning, e-mail is working fine. It is all smooth sailing. Boss and users are happy. Management is content with their savvy in buying Exchange. A year or something later, the guy quits but not before leaving up to date documentation for the new guy.
First page of the documentation welcomes the replacement and says not to worry, everything he needs to know is in this folder. There are two sections: 1) What is official policy 2) What we actually do. The official policy is that we run Exchange for e-mail and here is the stuff to tell the boss about Exchange if there are ever problems. The actual policy is that we run Debian and postfix, since Exchange was a disaster, and here is how to do maintenance; tell no one except whoever replaces you.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
What doesn't MS consider as a threat? (Score:2, Troll)
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A corporation (or person for that matter) in that position must always see everything as a threat.
We typically call people who act like that paranoid and mentally unstable. It's not that different for corporations. Responding to real threats is one thing, batting at hallucinations is a whole other kettle of fish. Even corporations need to have some confidence in their ability to survive.
I think MS has lost the battle already... (Score:3, Interesting)
I've been in IT for over 20 years now; and until 7 years ago, Office was my mostly used application. Nowadays though I hardly ever use Word or Excel, I've used Powerpoint more often though. At a hospital I consult; we changed to OOo and after changing the default save format option to the corresponding Office equivalents; the users hardly noticed the difference.
These days the only application used in offices is the browser, and Firefox has already won the battle and the war on that front.
Duh, of course (Score:3, Informative)
Check the tables at the end of this Comes exhibit [groklaw.net], its Linux/OO (when it was still StarOffice) in every region. Because the target is future developers and government contracts, obviously.
They should be scared (Score:5, Informative)
For years, Microsoft has raked in money with Office. It's been THE leading revenue generator for ages with $4.4 billion in 3Q 2009. Office and related business products bring in more money than their Server/OS division. However, that number is trending down to the tune of almost 500 million from the same time last year.
Maybe it's just the recession. Maybe it was the Vista impact. However, the decline is noticeable.
Source: MS Annual Reports and Earnings Releases
OO is a work-alike-mostly-sorta to MS Office... (Score:3, Interesting)
But, my wife, who is an MS Office expert, can't stand it. It is just too limited and clunky compared to Office, she says. So, for her PC, I fork out the $$ and buy Office. Oh, and MS Office is on our shared MacBook.
For the "serious user" market, OO is not currently a threat to MS Office. But for the casual, "use it once in awhile" market, it is. Now, given Microsoft's history of competing against incumbent, entrenched players by targeting the bottom end of a market and improving over time with increasingly competitive but still cheaper technology, they are probably very sensitive to seeing OO become the easy choice for the entry-level user.
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Right, its her fault that OO.org isn't intuitive and doesn't use existing well established conventions for common things.
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Right, its her fault that OO.org isn't intuitive
(meaning it doesn't work exactly like Microsoft Office)
and doesn't use existing well established conventions
(again meaning it doesn't work exactly like MS Office)
for common things.
When Word came out lots of people said it would never get there because it wasn't intuitive (meaning it didn't work like Wordperfect) and didn't use existing well established conventions (again meaning it didn't work like Wordperfect). And for a long time, these things were a barrier to Word taking over from Wordperfect. But times change and now Word is the dominant word processor and Wordperfect
The suitability of OO depends on target audience (Score:3, Informative)
I've recommended OO for a fair amount of home users who are casual users of office productivity software. For those folks it's _okay_ and fits their needs. Albeit the OO suite isn't lickety-split fast in terms of launch and whatnot for "Joe Six Pack" you can't beat free for someone who's looking to type up a quick letter, create a quick budget spreadsheet, or whip up a simple school presentation.
That being said, I've also tried implementing OO for my business users, in cases where their new PC's didn't come pre-loaded with Microsoft Office. I would preface their introduction to OO by mentioning that most of the familar menu commands and navigational elements were practically identical. A few weeks later I had no choice but to ante up and purchase full versions of Microsoft Office. Power users in a business environment required elements outside the scope of "Joe Six Pack." Anything from VBA to macros to other features weren't available or else didn't work as expected. And yeah, having budgeted expense goals had me wanting to purchase more Microsoft Office licenses like I'd want a hole in the head. :-/
And I know there are navigational and feature issues upgrading users from Office 2003 to 2007. I know with a mixed version environment opening documents is a PITA, and saving documents can result in formatting FUBAR's. Frankly I am dreading when I myself have to make the jump. That is almost as daunting as trying to migrate my power users at work to OO. Still all things taken equal it apparently will be awhile until OO is really an equal competitor, although it's closer than it was back in the days with Sun's Staroffice 5.x and whatnot.
Perhaps Microsoft is just keeping OO in its rearview mirror to protect its interests. Although the hints of Microsoft's covert infiltration into FOSS circles (while supposedly doing so for collaborative purposes) reeks of insidiousness. Now the cat's out of the bag I wonder how many FOSS projects will welcome them?
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I don't understand why anyone thinks either suite is special. It's a simple word processor not a desktop publishing program, a simple spreadsheet with a basic and confusing to use graphing package, and a toy single user database. The graphing is so bad
Engage? (Score:2)
Isn't that what soldiers do with the enemy?
Summary: What if!? (Score:2)
Foundstone sees it as a threat as well (Score:2)
OpenOffice Word Document Table Parsing Heap Overflow Windows XP (Service Pack 3, [++]) 3.0-9358 3.0-9358 3.0-9358 51 Upgrade to OpenOffice 3.1.1
That was just one of the vulnerabilities Foundstone sees. I would have more examples, but we scrapped OpenOffice off the network about a month or so ago, as OpenSource software is forbidden at our company for legal reasons. Apparently someone reinstalled it.
Microsoft makes money in three places (Score:2)
Windows, Office, and X-Box. Even if you don't think OO is much of a contender, the fact is that it's threatening 1/3 of their income-producing capability. It's in their best interest to fight it now.
Embrace, Extend, Extinguish. (Score:5, Interesting)
Sounds pretty normal for Microsoft.
I use IBM's Lotus Symphony [lotus.com] package, myself. Good support, and it "looks" far better than OpenOffice (which sometimes makes all the difference when you're trying to convince someone to use it. That, and it's got native Mac, PC, and Ubuntu versions.
our big barrier (Score:4, Informative)
I work at a medium size non-profit, and a couple of years ago I tried to get all of us to change to oo.org. I still use it for all my own use instead of ms office but everyone else rebelled and I had to drop it as an idea.
Like I said, it's been a couple of years now, and when we tried it what basically killed the whole thing is its problem doing mail merges. Arguably it had a BETTER interface to databases than any office product, but the problem is that everyone here has no technical inclination except for me and it requires thought. Plus back in version 2 it was buggy and it wouldn't match up formatting correctly. At lot of the research I did at the time pretty much seemed to indicate that the oo.org staff didn't care much about getting mail merges to work and it wasn't much a priority.
Maybe someone here can bring me up to date on any progress in this area. I hope that at some point oo.org can provide a really simple mail merge "wizard" (I hate that term) that works with spreadsheets that the plebeians can understand along with a database interface that can give programs like Crystal Reports a run for its money...
Everything's a threat when you have 100% share (Score:2)
"Better" (Score:2)
Most people regard OpenOffice.org as a distant runner-up to Microsoft Office, and certainly not a serious rival.
It is not about the performance of the product, it's about performance-per-dollar. And the question the customer should ask himself is is not "does this product do everything" the question he should ask is "does this product to what I need it to do." And the issue is not the present but the future, not about whether Microsoft Office is "better" than OpenOffice now, but whether OpenOffice gain
There are many reasons to acknowledge a threat... (Score:3, Informative)
which suggests that Microsoft's new-found eagerness to 'engage' with open source has nothing to do with a real desire to reach a pacific accommodation with free software, but is simply a way for Microsoft to fight against it from close up, and armed with inside knowledge.
There are many reasons to acknowledge a threat, and I'm not sure getting up close and personal is the tree that they are barking up here.
If Microsoft were to go around saying they they had no threats worth considering it would look like they have little competition and bring them under greater scrutiny from a monopoly policing point of view. Also such hubris would look iffy to current and potential inverters - investing in a company that is, or seems to be, resting on its laurels is not a good long-term strategy especially in a market where there are alternatives currently available (whether they are acknowledged by said company or not).
Ignoring the more cynical interpretations above for a moment: knowing the competition is important to any business. Whatever your opinion of the strengths (absolute or relative to other products) of OO.o it is a competitor in that particular market and MS would be foolish not to recognise that and be seen to be appropriately aware of the situation.
Jesus Christ, do you people listen to yourselves? (Score:5, Informative)
That summary was the most biased, paranoid rambling that I've ever seen. You might as well followed it up with a paragraph about how Microsoft uses those little plastic strips in $20 bills to track you when you go through airport scanners, so they know whether to equip your plane with chemtrail equipment before redirecting it to land in the secret tunnel between Washington D.C. and Area 51.
Openoffice has already affected Microsoft. (Score:5, Interesting)
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Odd... I use OO to manage over 1,000,000 items for an online retail business, and the majority are stored in csv files. Works fine for me.
Re:I installed the latest OO, definitely not a thr (Score:5, Insightful)
Firefox doesn't already know that CSV should be tied to OO? Shouldn't that have occurred at install time by OO? No, ok, I'll set it up--done.
In OO's defense, It seems that most of the time, CSV is not associated with any app, which is probably a good thing because CSV doesn't always imply "spreadsheet". True, some people want their computer to make all their decisions about which app to use for what. But those people usually also end up with a boatload of adbars in their browser and spyware and viruses on their harddrives. And they wonder why their computer doesn't work.
"Won't that be grand, the computers will start thinking and the people will stop." - Walter, from Tron (1982)
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CSV doesn't always imply spreadsheet... However spreadsheet is one of the better ways of viewing the file. If you are double clicking on an icon of a document to open up an app. a CSV file should go to a spreadsheet as it is the best way to view the file. The other uses of a CSV you normally need to load the app then import the CSV as you not trying to view the document but use the information in it.
Excel doesn't even do CSV correctly... (Score:3, Informative)
OO does a better job, but, still not correct. GNUMeric does no better. They all fundamentally do the wrong thing. Here is what they do wrong. Lets say I have the following CSV: Smith,Joe,E,121 Mockingbird Lane,Metropolis,BS,(330)555-1212,0023456789
Now, the last field there is an ID number. The zeroes are significant. All of the above spreadsheets will import that as a number and drop the leading zeroes. FAIL!
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The problem is your data is ambiguous.
To get the behavior you want you should have quotes around text fields, or you need to use a decent program like OO that provides you a dialog when you open this file where you can choose the column data type.
The fact that the programs heuristically "guess" what the field contains based upon its contents will not save you from ambiguous data.
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I agree, the import is WAD (working as designed). I don't do much with CSV, but I would think that a good database designer anticipating export/import of data would spec'ing an ID field with positional encoding of department or whatever might want to define the field with a non-numeric like a dash so that it will sort, align and print as an x position field and not a left justified number. It is not the programs fault the user is using a hammer to drive a screw.
But on the gripping hand, this is not a unreas
Re:I installed the latest OO, definitely not a thr (Score:2, Funny)
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N.B. OOo suffices for most of my business correspondence; I prefer (La)TeX/LyX for the more scientific documents.
Of course... (Score:3, Informative)
All spreadsheets feel the need to fubar csv data.
If you have 0002, most assume you mean '2', assuming you must have accidentally put three zeroes in.
If I put in a slot/port number for a wiring chart (i.e. slot 5, port 2 as 5/2), it assumes it must have been a date and tags on the current year (incidentally, even if they *were* correct in guessing it to be a year, how the hell can they assume the date is the current year? Who knows when the CSV was created, this is arbitrarily adding more precision to a val
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Fucking up CSV files -- that sounds like they've duplicated Office functionality exactly. What else do you want?
Re:I installed the latest OO, definitely not a thr (Score:5, Interesting)
unless you compare it to the full Microsoft office on the same machine it is not really a fair comparison.
"I select all the fields and go to resize them all with a single click but--nothing happens. WTF? I try again. Nothing. I look on the menu bar quickly--nothing. WTF?"
OO does not duplicate all the functionality and gui of MS Office, it is a slight learning experience as it is a different product. But i for one have had more "wow, this such a better and more intuitive way of doing things" then "where have they put that" moments using OO.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I develope a plugin that runs in Outlook.
On a daily basis I run Office 2000, XP, 2003, 2007 and 2010.
I don't really care which one you pick, or what kind of machine or what installation options you picked, OO.org takes longer to do pretty much everything.
If you don't realize this, you shouldn't be making comments comparing or contrasting OO.org and MS Office as you've obviously not got the experience to do so.
OO.org doesn't do basic things that the OS controls due out of the box without any changes. Why is
Re:I installed the latest OO, definitely not a thr (Score:5, Insightful)
You installed OO on a machine that wouldn't even run Office, then complained about start up times. You then played with the software for 5 minutes. It didn't do what you wanted. You didn't find a menu item and you moved on probably without even consulting documentation or Googling. It's possible that OO is lacking the functionality you wanted to use. Who knows. You didn't bother to find out, so why should I. Regardless, I'd say the problem is behind the keyboard in this case.
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It didn't do what you wanted. You didn't find a menu item and you moved on probably without even consulting documentation or Googling. It's possible that OO is lacking the functionality you wanted to use.
1. I gave one specific example so my post wouldn't be 1000 words. I don't have time for that at 8 AM on a work day.
2. If a piece of software is a "threat" to Microsoft Office, then it better function like people who use Microsoft Office every day expect it to function. Resizing all the cells at once is B A
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
1. I gave one specific example so my post wouldn't be 1000 words. I don't have time for that at 8 AM on a work day.
It was nothing but an example of user error.
2. If a piece of software is a "threat" to Microsoft Office, then it better function like people who use Microsoft Office every day expect it to function. Resizing all the cells at once is B A S I C functionality, not some out of the way item that should be buried four levels down in the tree.
I just opened OpenOffice 3.1 Calc, a piece of software I ra
Re:I installed the latest OO, definitely not a thr (Score:4, Insightful)
I didn't read your entire post, but, MS Office can't properly handle CSV either. If you have an internationalized Windows and in the language settings of WINDOWS (not of office or anything!!), you have somewhere ";" instead of "," as "separator", then MS Excel can't read a CSV that uses "," anymore! It's called COMMA separated list, and yet excel can't read it and uses your localized settings, so that people with a computer of a different language can't even exchange such files with each other!
Come on, it's called CSV, why doesn't MS Office always use comma's then.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Takes a long fucking time to open OO. I mean a LONG time. It opens, sweet. I select all the fields and go to resize them all with a single click but--nothing happens. WTF? I try again. Nothing. I look on the menu bar quickly--nothing. WTF?
Lameness of your writing aside, that's complete fud. On my 5 year old laptop on a cold start after reboot, OO calc loads in 6 seconds and about 3 after that... that's a LONG time? That is ridiculous.
In addition, selecting multiple columns and resizing by dragging or by double clicking works like a charm, so I'm guessing you are just trying to spread FUD, because you were dumb enough to pay for office.
I've been using open office for years and it does everything I need it to do and then some... You people
Get hardware that isn't older than your Slash # (Score:3, Informative)
Firefox knows more than you do. For example it knows that the csv extension should not automatically be tied to OpenOffice, since you may not want to run Open Office just to view a .csv file. Neither Firefox, nor any other software, can save you from your own ignorance. In other words, you're fscked.
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Can't be a very competent review with that kind of language.
I'll keep that in mind for when I write a review of OO for Wired or the New York Times. In the mean time, since this is Slashdot, I'll keep posting exactly like I have for the last 12+ years. Thanks!
Re: (Score:2)
And you'll continue to be considered an obnoxious fool that's no better than a screaming fanboy because X isn't exactly the same as Y. We wouldn't expect anything more from a unskilled windows user.
Hmm, I wonder if you would have considered me a Linux fanboi back between 1997 and 2002 when I was Linux only? Maybe you'd consider me an Apple fanboi that I use OS X on my desktop? That would be cool. I could be a Google Chrome commercial: "Fanboi for PC, Linux, and Mac."
Pay up GOOG.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
That would be cool. I could be a Google Chrome commercial: "Fanboi for PC, Linux, and Mac."
Pay up GOOG.
Actually, Fanboi runs on all operating systems and even embedded devices.
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Well, right up till sentence 3. You lost me there. Can't be a very competent review with that kind of language.
You dislike the word "functionality," too? I understand where you're coming from, I fucking hate that word.
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Can't be a very competent review with that kind of language.
Yeah, exactly. George Carlin was the world's most incompetent comedian.
Re:competent language (Score:2)
Re:duohce boag (Score:2, Insightful)
Agreed.
I understand the desire of many slashdotters to have Free software.
I don't understand the desire of many slashdotters to see For Profit software companies fail. (or to point out with fear or mockery that they are trying to make money).
Can't we all just get along?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It would be nice, but most of the For Profit software companies don't seem interested in getting along. They're competing.
As for myself, I don't think Linux needs world domination on the desktop, it does need interoperability though. Because interoperability (through truly open standards) is what gives people choice. That said, I would be happy with 20-30% Linux and/or Ooo on the desktop.
By "truly open standards, I don't mean the OOXML farce that was pulled through the ISO. Rat
Re:duohce boag (Score:5, Insightful)
As for myself, I don't think Linux needs world domination on the desktop, it does need interoperability though.
You do understand that as long as MSFT has a desktop dominance, it would do anything to make sure that there would be no interoperability with any other competing OS?
Because interoperability (through truly open standards) is what gives people choice.
[...] I don't mean the OOXML farce that was pulled through the ISO.
And MSFT many times exemplified that in their opinion a "de facto" standard (they have complete control over like OOXML) is just as good as a "de jure" standard.
That's why as long as MSFT has >50% of market, there would be neither interoperability nor open standards.
Why are you hitting yourself misses gnu? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:duohce boag (Score:4, Funny)
I don't know. Why don't you ask MS that? This fight wasn't started by the OSS community, which was largely born out of necessity as much as altruism. It's closed-source guys like Microsoft that have been waging this war since the mid-1990s. Maybe you should ask them why they can't just "get along".
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I agree there are those slashdotters who believe so much in Free software they want the for profits to fail. Not everyone, though.
There are many for profits I hope succeed. I want the bad ones (and there are MANY types of bad companies) to fail. I also want companies to play fairly and not use sticks like "intellectual property" to shut other (usually smaller) businesses and individuals down.
I believe that for applications that many, many people use (OS, Office, web technologies, etc) Free software is the
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There's more than one angle to it, here's a few I can personally relate to:
1. Some of this for-profit software seems outrageously overpriced for its functionality, a position of greed that can only be protected by eliminating all affordable alternatives. This results in hostile takeovers of free-software projects, or abusive litigation to destroy the projects, which rarely have any funding to support a court battle.
2. High quality free software stimulates innovation, in both the free and for-profit realms,
Re:Frist posat (Score:4, Interesting)
Microsoft makes money, so obviously they would use this as a competitive advantage.
The problem is not that Microsoft would compete with OpenOffice. The problem is that Microsoft will unethically leverage its position as Monopoly to destroy OpenOffice. Many commercial companies will ethically compete with each other. As a corporate culture Microsoft does not want to compete in a market. They want to have 90%+ share of a market and will do whatever is necessary to shrink or kill all other competitors. This is not typical nor ethical behavior.
So you want to love those conferences to death. I’ve killed at least two Mac conferences. James Plamondon, Microsoft [boycottnovell.com]
Microsoft does not care if its competition is another commercial venture, a non-profit corporation, a hobbyist or a government. If it competes with Microsoft in any market where Microsoft does not hold at least 90% of the market then their goal is to minimize, marginalize and even torpedo, and kill the competition. Without regard for ethical behavior or what means are necessary to do so.
Some would say "Microsoft has changed, the now want to work with the FOSS community." To see if that statement is accurate, or if as a corporate culture they are still up to their old tricks, we need to analyze their motives. In this instance, this would be to analyze their motives in regard to OpenOffice AND to glean from it how seriously they take OpenOffice as a competitor in the market. The fact that they have a position entitled "Linux and Open Office Compete Lead" is an indicator of how serious they are about both Linux and OpenOffice.
Traditionally being in Microsoft's sniper scope has not worked out well for other companies. On the other hand as someone once said:
Q. What's the difference between Batman and Bill Gates?
A. When Batman fought the Penguin, he won.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
As a general rule, I fill out bug reports for projects that don't require new userids. If they need a new userid, I look to a forum to discuss the issue. If the forum requires a new userid to post, that's where I stop.
I've made hundreds of anonymous changes to Wikipedia, and they're generally my benchmark for how much trouble I am willing to go through to do something I have no ownership in.