Open Office might be fading

[Reorx]

"Whoo-hoo-hoo, look who knows so much. It just so happens that your friend here is only MOSTLY dead. There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there's usually only one thing you can do."...

... go through his clothes and look for loose change! Thanx Miracle Max!!!

[thom_A]

So what about MS Office users? Is Libre Office a good replacement? What features do they still need to finally give up MS Office? There are others like Word Perfect by Corel, which is a cheaper alternative for those who are spending money.

[xenopeek]

I don't think it's what features LibreOffice needs as much as what commitment the one using Microsoft Office can muster to actually make the switch (breaking out of vender-lock in). Some big organizations have done so already: https://www.libreoffice.org/discover/wh ... breoffice/.

[thom_A]

Don't even know why you have to spend money to keep upgrading your freaking word processor. I would understand it if this is a CAD or 3D program, but man...

I bought a stand-alone MS Word license many years ago for Win95. It still ran on XP and it's all I ever needed. Other than compatibility issues, what features do you still need in a freaking word processor? Apparently, these companies like MS had to make money out of something that is already capable of doing any word processing tasks. Just like Adobe adding all these useless features on Photoshop because they had to pay their regular employees' salaries. Give users a ribbon interface and make them think it's some revolutionary thing and you'll have your major upgrade.

[stormryder]

LibreOffice is a bit more stable.

LibreOffice crashes constantly, often just opening or zooming a text file crashes the system to the login screen. I would have to say it is the most unstable software I have. If I was running a business that required me to use it for more than just an occasional invoice I would have to find a better alternative.

[Cosmo.]

I cannot confirm.

Close LO completely (inclusive the quick starter), then open a file manager and make hidden files visible (ctrl-h). Go into the folder .config and rename the subfolder libreoffice to libreoffice.bck. Test.

[InkKnife]

LibreOffice is a bit more stable.

LibreOffice crashes constantly, often just opening or zooming a text file crashes the system to the login screen. I would have to say it is the most unstable software I have. If I was running a business that required me to use it for more than just an occasional invoice I would have to find a better alternative.

When you are having catastrophic problems with a very popular application that millions of people use without issue the best way to trouble shoot your problem is to assume the problem is local to your particular setup rather than blame it on an app that works fine everywhere else.
Just sayin'...

[TooMuchTime]

What features do they still need to finally give up MS Office?

It's not features. It's a standard. Microsoft pretty much has the word processor standard. If someone is thinking of using LibreOffice their first question will always be, "Can I read and write to Word files?" Of course the answer is yes, but when you use LibreOffice it is a different interface from MS Office so there is real fear that the files will be different as well.

I installed LibreOffice on a friend's computer that she lets her children use for their homework and such. She wants MS Office because it is familiar. Her daughter had to do a presentation and she said she couldn't do it because there was no software to create a presentation. Yes, I explained it all to them. I even renamed the icons so they were labeled simple things like Word Processor and Presentation. So there is no way they couldn't find it. The interface was not MS Office so it wasn't working for them.

That's the type of hold Microsoft has over the office suite market.

[stormryder]

assume the problem is local to your particular setup rather than blame it on an app that works fine everywhere else.

Assume indeed, so its my hardware? Been there done that. I've had the same issues with 3 editions of mint on more than one setup.

Close LO completely (inclusive the quick starter), then open a file manager and make hidden files visible (ctrl-h). Go into the folder .config and rename the subfolder libreoffice to libreoffice.bck. Test.

OK just did then opened a 1 page PDF tried to zoom, crash to login. Second try libreoffice didn't crash, amazing, 50% done wasting my time with all that. I don't use it enough to really worry about it.

[scjet45]

Umm... Isn't Apache OpenOffice the very reason we have LibreOffice?

Nope. LibreOffice predates Apache OpenOffice.

Basically Sun and later Oracle mismanaged the OpenOffice project, making it hard if not impossible for developers and others outside those companies to contribute to OpenOffice and play a role in the decision making process. This culminated in the eventual formation of The Document Foundation as a home for the LibreOffice project, a fork of OpenOffice born out of the frustration of its developers. Most outside developers quickly moved to LibreOffice and later Oracle laid off its own remaining OpenOffice developers. As Oracle had contractual obligations to IBM regarding OpenOffice they donated it to the Apache Foundation where mostly IBM developers continued to work on it (as IBM had contractual obligations to its customers). Over time development of OpenOffice has continued to decline to the point where now the Apache Foundation has put the project on monthly report for its inability to handle security issues. This leading to the discussion if the project shouldn't be finally closed.

The history of Apache OpenOffice explains as much: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_OpenOffice#History

If you're interested in more look up the history of StarOffice, OpenOffice, LibreOffice, and The Document Foundation on wikipedia.

Sun opensourced/GPL'd Staroffice as OpenOffice<- without which, there would be NO LibreOffice today. So how could that be misconstrued as "mismanagement" on Sun's part ???
https://www.openoffice.org/press/sun_release.html
Instead, we should all thank the (now defunct) Sun Microsystems for that bit of generousity, unlike Oracle, or IBM, ...
The only purposeful "mismanagement" of anything that Sun had opensourced, has always been Oracle.
Oracle was/is the Sun killer.
After Oracle bought out Sun Microsystems, for fear of Sun's MySQL, Oracle systematically killed their inhouse OpenSolaris,..., OpenOffice, (Opensource) MySQL, ..., and and every other thing that Sun Microsystems had ever "Open"ed to the Public.

So we all owe a great gratitude to the (now defunct) Sun, and their past developers, for giving us (no matter how indirectly or directly) our LibreOffice.
If anything is "fading" it's java, which again, Oracle hasn't put a lot of effort into fixing.

[killer de bug]

I don't think it's what features LibreOffice needs as much as what commitment the one using Microsoft Office can muster to actually make the switch (breaking out of vender-lock in). Some big organizations have done so already: https://www.libreoffice.org/discover/wh ... breoffice/.

MIMO, France's inter-ministerial working group on free software, runs LibreOffice on almost 500,000 PCs. The software is used in many departments including energy, defence, agriculture and education.

First time we are ahead in something.

[xenopeek]

Sun opensourced/GPL'd Staroffice as OpenOffice<- without which, there would be NO LibreOffice today. So how could that be misconstrued as "mismanagement" on Sun's part ???

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenOffic ... ibreOffice and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenOffice.org#Governance.

[scjet45]

Sun opensourced/GPL'd Staroffice as OpenOffice<- without which, there would be NO LibreOffice today. So how could that be misconstrued as "mismanagement" on Sun's part ???

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenOffic ... ibreOffice and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenOffice.org#Governance.

Like I said before, and that has been "historically", and "factually" proven, that
without Sun's opensourceing efforts, there would NOT have been a LibreOffice, ..., as we Linux user's know it today, let alone, an Android is ok though ? -get it now? Linux gives up as much as it takes.
It's not hard to understand.
Unless, of course, anyone is too busy kissing IBM/Redhat/Oracle's/...
Do u understand that part now?
In other words, this is NOT aboout (Open)Solaris, vs Linux, vs, BSD, vs Windows, vs, ...,, when instead, it's sadly about not knowing which cow has been actually milked to death the most. !?

So let's not pretend to (NOT) play the devil's advocate, shall we ?

[Tomgin5]

I enjoyed StarOffice. Of course I was doing manual drafting and tape layup for circuit boards back then (1981?).

[xenopeek]

without Sun's opensourceing efforts, there would NOT have been a LibreOffice

Sure, and without them mismanaging the project since open sourcing it there would NOT have been a LibreOffice either

[killer de bug]

Unless, of course, anyone is too busy kissing IBM

What's the problem with IBM? They didn't give enough to Linux?

[scjet45]

without Sun's opensourceing efforts, there would NOT have been a LibreOffice

Sure, and without them mismanaging the project since open sourcing it there would NOT have been a LibreOffice either

glad you agree with the latter part.

[InkKnife]

without Sun's opensourceing efforts, there would NOT have been a LibreOffice

Sure, and without them mismanaging the project since open sourcing it there would NOT have been a LibreOffice either

Sun was a good FOSS citizen. The problem is that Oracle bought them and Oracle is evil, so evil in fact that the head of Oracle actually has a private lair on a island with a volcano.