4 ms·

Office. If Linux desktop had microsoft office, I could use it. Libre office is an unmitigated, ugly pile of shit.

by jstalin 10y ago

bittercynic 10y ago
Libreoffice meets my needs just fine. I spend a couple of hours a week in their spreadsheet and word processor, and don't really have any complaints.
- dhimes 10y ago
  Agree. Libreoffice works quite well, and although their presentation software isn't as pretty as powerpoint, I actually prefer their slideshow mode on multiple monitors. Quite sexy, in fact. There's no reason for any government office or public school system at any level to be paying for office licenses IMHO. We can communicate and teach quite well with L.O.- and donate a share of the saved budget to FOSS.
  - Forlien 10y ago
    Where do you draw the line for how much you can cut costs and sacrifice a little bit of productivity or retraining? For example, I often see programmers talk about having proper tools to do their job, whether that be high quality keyboards, faster computers with more memory, or subscription IDEs like Intellij. Should government programmers be denied these things because it is possible to program quite well without them?
    - dhimes 10y ago
      Great question. I was thinking of the people who use office for communiqués and presentations and such. You don't need Microsoft Word to write an interoffice memo, nor do you need it to write a request for proposal. That would free more money so that the people who did need or could truly benefit from premium tools could get them.
- herbst 10y ago
  Same here. I am also happy they did not throw away the confusing but great working ui for that big icon bullshit. Using ms office is a very depressing eperience for me these days.
appleiigs 10y ago
Yes, Office. Office compatibility still a problem for Macs in 2017. Either from FUD or in actual functionality, Office prevents people from switching from Win10 to MacOS. Two people asked me about moving to Macs. They repeatedly asked me about Office compatibility (the FUD). For one of the users, I wasn't sure if it was OK for functionality. She is a lawyer (ie. power user of Word) and I know in Mac Excel for me is not usable. Both of them didn't need to buy new hardware (they are fed up with Windows, not the hardware), but I couldn't even mention Linux as a alternative for them.
- no_wizard 10y ago
  https://9to5mac.com/2016/01/21/windows-mac-ipad-microsoft-office-comparison/ https://9to5mac.com/2016/01/21/windows-mac-ipad-microsoft-of... With 2016, it ain't much. Do they use a lot of VB scripts? I have found 2016 Office for Mac has been nearly 1 for 1 feature wise.
  - appleiigs 10y ago
    The features might be 1 to 1, but the compatibility problems I found is when you use Office in Windows at work, then work on same file on a Mac at home, then go back to Windows at work. The formatting can change. As an example, in Excel charts the colors will be different, the alignment will be off. Also, I find Excel to be unbearably slow on a Mac, when the same file works OK in Windows. And yes, the VBA Editor on Mac versions aren't at par as in Windows. When I bring work home, it's usually because of a deadline and these things will slow me down (including different keyboard mappings).
Shorel 10y ago
True. And I do agree about Libre office, first thing I uninstall on Ubuntu. But you can try and use WPS office. It's made by some Chinese company, it's fast and it is compatible with Office files. I had one of my Linux epiphanies with WPS. I got a Powerpoint presentation by email, I plugged the videobeam HDMI adapter to my laptop, pressed the Fn-F8 keys to change from mirroring to using two separate displays, opened the Powerpoint file with WPS presentations and it worked beautifully. The presentation was fullscreen in the external display, and I had the notes in the laptop. The presentation was flawless. I had never had any other software work without issues for me at the very first try and I was very happy that it happened while running Linux.
- PeterisP 10y ago
  Is it really compatible with Office files? It's not enough to be able to open 99% of the files properly, the main problem that makes libreoffice/openoffice unusable for me is that if I open a MS Office Word or Excel file, change a single character, and send it back, the file is likely to have other unintended changes in formatting or layout.
  - Shorel 10y ago
    By your criteria I suspect nothing can be really compatible except the same version of MS Office that created the file. However, it has been compatible enough for all I have done in the last year and a half. If some file doesn't open or save correctly, a bug report can be filled here: http://wps-community.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=10 http://wps-community.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=10
    - PeterisP 10y ago
      Is that really that high bar to say that "nothing can be really compatible"? It comes down to a simple test that can be easily automated - take a test file (created in MS Office), run the load-from-MS-format operation, run the save-to-MS-format operation, verify that the resulting file is identical to the source file. There might be some differences in metadata (e.g. timestamps) but the document file content should be byte-for-byte identical. If not, then the software isn't MS Office compatible yet. It does mean that your internal in-memory document structure must be able to hold all of the information that MS Office files contain, and that the conversions between MS Office data structures and your internal data structures cannot be lossy, so your internal structure can't be so conceptually different in any aspect that you can't unambiguously convert to it and back - but that is required for interoperability, so that multiple people can do long term work on the same document with different tools.
tangue 10y ago
Well this "pile of shit" is the only reliable way I have to auickly open and export csv files from various sources, so I'd like to thank all contributors for this, especially considering that their multi-millions dollars concurrents are unable to read/produce a text file with delimiters.
3131s 10y ago
Do you want to share any constructive criticism of Libre Office, or tell us why you feel that Microsoft Office is better, rather than slander something that people have volunteered thousands of hours of development time to? I have never had any problems with the word processor and spreadsheet in Libre Office (the only two in the suite that I've used). Sincere thanks to the developers.
bwat48 10y ago
libreoffice is ugly, but functional enough. I use it on my windows machines as I really don't feel the need to pay for office for my home usage.

Office. If Linux desktop had microsoft office, I could use it. Libre office is an unmitigated, ugly pile of shit.

by jstalin 10y ago

Office. If Linux desktop had microsoft office, I could use it. Libre office is an unmitigated, ugly pile of shit.

Libreoffice meets my needs just fine. I spend a couple of hours a week in their spreadsheet and word processor, and don't really have any complaints.

dhimes 10y ago
Agree. Libreoffice works quite well, and although their presentation software isn't as pretty as powerpoint, I actually prefer their slideshow mode on multiple monitors. Quite sexy, in fact. There's no reason for any government office or public school system at any level to be paying for office licenses IMHO. We can communicate and teach quite well with L.O.- and donate a share of the saved budget to FOSS.
- Forlien 10y ago
  Where do you draw the line for how much you can cut costs and sacrifice a little bit of productivity or retraining? For example, I often see programmers talk about having proper tools to do their job, whether that be high quality keyboards, faster computers with more memory, or subscription IDEs like Intellij. Should government programmers be denied these things because it is possible to program quite well without them?
  - dhimes 10y ago
    Great question. I was thinking of the people who use office for communiqués and presentations and such. You don't need Microsoft Word to write an interoffice memo, nor do you need it to write a request for proposal. That would free more money so that the people who did need or could truly benefit from premium tools could get them.
herbst 10y ago
Same here. I am also happy they did not throw away the confusing but great working ui for that big icon bullshit. Using ms office is a very depressing eperience for me these days.

appleiigs 10y ago

Yes, Office. Office compatibility still a problem for Macs in 2017. Either from FUD or in actual functionality, Office prevents people from switching from Win10 to MacOS. Two people asked me about moving to Macs. They repeatedly asked me about Office compatibility (the FUD). For one of the users, I wasn't sure if it was OK for functionality. She is a lawyer (ie. power user of Word) and I know in Mac Excel for me is not usable. Both of them didn't need to buy new hardware (they are fed up with Windows, not the hardware), but I couldn't even mention Linux as a alternative for them.

no_wizard 10y ago
https://9to5mac.com/2016/01/21/windows-mac-ipad-microsoft-office-comparison/ https://9to5mac.com/2016/01/21/windows-mac-ipad-microsoft-of... With 2016, it ain't much. Do they use a lot of VB scripts? I have found 2016 Office for Mac has been nearly 1 for 1 feature wise.
- appleiigs 10y ago
  The features might be 1 to 1, but the compatibility problems I found is when you use Office in Windows at work, then work on same file on a Mac at home, then go back to Windows at work. The formatting can change. As an example, in Excel charts the colors will be different, the alignment will be off. Also, I find Excel to be unbearably slow on a Mac, when the same file works OK in Windows. And yes, the VBA Editor on Mac versions aren't at par as in Windows. When I bring work home, it's usually because of a deadline and these things will slow me down (including different keyboard mappings).

Shorel 10y ago

True. And I do agree about Libre office, first thing I uninstall on Ubuntu. But you can try and use WPS office. It's made by some Chinese company, it's fast and it is compatible with Office files. I had one of my Linux epiphanies with WPS. I got a Powerpoint presentation by email, I plugged the videobeam HDMI adapter to my laptop, pressed the Fn-F8 keys to change from mirroring to using two separate displays, opened the Powerpoint file with WPS presentations and it worked beautifully. The presentation was fullscreen in the external display, and I had the notes in the laptop. The presentation was flawless. I had never had any other software work without issues for me at the very first try and I was very happy that it happened while running Linux.

PeterisP 10y ago
Is it really compatible with Office files? It's not enough to be able to open 99% of the files properly, the main problem that makes libreoffice/openoffice unusable for me is that if I open a MS Office Word or Excel file, change a single character, and send it back, the file is likely to have other unintended changes in formatting or layout.
- Shorel 10y ago
  By your criteria I suspect nothing can be really compatible except the same version of MS Office that created the file. However, it has been compatible enough for all I have done in the last year and a half. If some file doesn't open or save correctly, a bug report can be filled here: http://wps-community.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=10 http://wps-community.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=10
  - PeterisP 10y ago
    Is that really that high bar to say that "nothing can be really compatible"? It comes down to a simple test that can be easily automated - take a test file (created in MS Office), run the load-from-MS-format operation, run the save-to-MS-format operation, verify that the resulting file is identical to the source file. There might be some differences in metadata (e.g. timestamps) but the document file content should be byte-for-byte identical. If not, then the software isn't MS Office compatible yet. It does mean that your internal in-memory document structure must be able to hold all of the information that MS Office files contain, and that the conversions between MS Office data structures and your internal data structures cannot be lossy, so your internal structure can't be so conceptually different in any aspect that you can't unambiguously convert to it and back - but that is required for interoperability, so that multiple people can do long term work on the same document with different tools.

tangue 10y ago

Well this "pile of shit" is the only reliable way I have to auickly open and export csv files from various sources, so I'd like to thank all contributors for this, especially considering that their multi-millions dollars concurrents are unable to read/produce a text file with delimiters.

3131s 10y ago

Do you want to share any constructive criticism of Libre Office, or tell us why you feel that Microsoft Office is better, rather than slander something that people have volunteered thousands of hours of development time to? I have never had any problems with the word processor and spreadsheet in Libre Office (the only two in the suite that I've used). Sincere thanks to the developers.

bwat48 10y ago

libreoffice is ugly, but functional enough. I use it on my windows machines as I really don't feel the need to pay for office for my home usage.