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I don’t get why people keep using desktop office apps. Google docs is more than enough for everything I’ve ever thrown at it.

by juancn 6y ago

DaiPlusPlus 6y ago
> Google docs is more than enough for everything I’ve ever thrown at it. Please correct for your sampling bias.
mdifrgechd 6y ago
I went from MS word to Google Docs for writing professional reports, and there is no comparison. For basic stuff, Google docs is fine, and they definitely have a better model for collaborating on a document. But docs feels 90% done - it is missing advanced formatting, copy paste integration with other Google products, and many other little things like that that make it challenging to use as a professional tool. I could go on at length about all the stuff I didnt like about Word (especially collaborative editing on sharepoint, there have been some disasters), but at least it feels like a professional tool vs. the proof-of-concept feel of Google docs
swiley 6y ago
Google docs requires a google account. Getting one of those has become very difficult and I’m not convinced having one is a net benifit. For individual developers I’m also not convinced a spreadsheet is an improvement over sql + maybe some python scripts where you would use macros/charts.
- edoceo 6y ago
  Wait, getting a google account is difficult? One of my testers routinely creates a new one in like 5-15 minutes. We've got a new one at least weekly.
  - opan 6y ago
    I've heard new Google accounts have to be tied to a phone number now.
    - floatboth 6y ago
      It probably decided whether to require a phone dynamically based on various things.. but that seems to never be required for non-gmail (custom email) accounts
johnisgood 6y ago
Because I do not want to create a Google account just to make documents. I do not want to store them on anyone else's server either, but on my own hard drive. What if Google stops supporting it? The list goes on and on. I do not get why people think cloud is good. I am pro-privacy, and cloud is not exactly the embodiment of it. I do not want my documents to leave my hard drive, especially not in plain-text. If I want that, I just upload it somewhere or something. So yeah, no way will I ever use Google Docs. Offline only. LibreOffice is more than enough for everything I have ever thrown at it. :)
- DaiPlusPlus 6y ago
  > I do not want to store them on anyone else's server either, but on my own hard drive. To be fair, when you install the Google Drive client on your computer you get copies of your files on your computer.
  - johnisgood 6y ago
    Yeah, I am sure. What happens if I modify them using the client though? Do not they get synced (i.e. uploaded to their server)?
  - bad_user 6y ago
    No, if you’re referring to GDocs, web links is all you get.
avhon1 6y ago
My 3 cents: I trust my hard drive availability a lot more than I trust my internet availability. I don't trust Google to maintain Docs, or my Google account, for the rest of my life. I dislike when applications unexpectedly change. Cloud apps are both more likely to do this, and don't have the option of reverting to a previous version.
- dheera 6y ago
  The one biggest thing going for Google Docs IMO is that a document usually displays exactly the same way regardless of the OS and font DPI setup of the user, at least as long as they are using Chrome on their OS. Fonts are loaded from the cloud, so you never run into issues with those, and you can even pick some awesome fonts from Google Fonts and not have to worry about whether the destination system has them installed. There are very few, if any, system fonts that are common to Linux, Mac, and Windows, and most system fonts are typographically terrible. Usually documents created in Word and imported into OpenOffice inevitably have to push the last 1 line onto the next page and mangle all the alignments. Often because someone created the doc in Arial and it loads it as Ubuntu Sans for me and Helvetica for a Mac user or some such.
- arp242 6y ago
  It depends on your usage; I don't really like using this kind of software in general, but on the rare occasions I need to use it (usually to fill in some document for some organisation or government) I just use Google Docs. Almost all of these documents are fairly ephemeral so long-term storage isn't really an issue (actually, lack of it is a feature, since it often contains sensitive personal information). Google Docs works "good enough" for this and doesn't require installing a lot of software for a 10-minute task. For more serious usage, I'd probably look for a desktop solution, since that's just so much quicker (Google Docs is really slow), but for casual usage it's pretty good.
edoceo 6y ago
I think you're catching downvotes due to a classic N=1 bug
vidarh 6y ago
Google Docs kneels for me once documents get large enough. It works, sort of, but it gets ridiculously sluggish. I haven't figured out what a reasonable cutoff is, but trying to work with a 60k words manuscript that Libre Office has no problem with was too painful. Which was annoying, as I do prefer Google Docs for most uses.
Silhouette 6y ago
Maybe your requirements include privacy, security, reliability, UI stability, indefinite access to your own data, high performance or some of the missing features? Can't guarantee any of those things with Google Docs.
GlennS 6y ago
Google Docs is OK, but it's still missing a lot of very useful features from Excel. Most important for me is being able to define tables. Also, a lot of the keyboard shortcuts missing if you want to work fast. And if I'm in Excel then I do want to work fast, otherwise I'd fire up R or Python.
bartvk 6y ago
I don't think it's possible to back up Google Docs, and restore them. That could be a dealbreaker for some professions. You can of course export and import them in other formats. But that's not the same.

I don’t get why people keep using desktop office apps. Google docs is more than enough for everything I’ve ever thrown at it.

by juancn 6y ago

I don’t get why people keep using desktop office apps. Google docs is more than enough for everything I’ve ever thrown at it.

DaiPlusPlus 6y ago

> Google docs is more than enough for everything I’ve ever thrown at it. Please correct for your sampling bias.

mdifrgechd 6y ago

I went from MS word to Google Docs for writing professional reports, and there is no comparison. For basic stuff, Google docs is fine, and they definitely have a better model for collaborating on a document. But docs feels 90% done - it is missing advanced formatting, copy paste integration with other Google products, and many other little things like that that make it challenging to use as a professional tool. I could go on at length about all the stuff I didnt like about Word (especially collaborative editing on sharepoint, there have been some disasters), but at least it feels like a professional tool vs. the proof-of-concept feel of Google docs

swiley 6y ago

Google docs requires a google account. Getting one of those has become very difficult and I’m not convinced having one is a net benifit. For individual developers I’m also not convinced a spreadsheet is an improvement over sql + maybe some python scripts where you would use macros/charts.

edoceo 6y ago
Wait, getting a google account is difficult? One of my testers routinely creates a new one in like 5-15 minutes. We've got a new one at least weekly.
- opan 6y ago
  I've heard new Google accounts have to be tied to a phone number now.
  - floatboth 6y ago
    It probably decided whether to require a phone dynamically based on various things.. but that seems to never be required for non-gmail (custom email) accounts

johnisgood 6y ago

Because I do not want to create a Google account just to make documents. I do not want to store them on anyone else's server either, but on my own hard drive. What if Google stops supporting it? The list goes on and on. I do not get why people think cloud is good. I am pro-privacy, and cloud is not exactly the embodiment of it. I do not want my documents to leave my hard drive, especially not in plain-text. If I want that, I just upload it somewhere or something. So yeah, no way will I ever use Google Docs. Offline only. LibreOffice is more than enough for everything I have ever thrown at it. :)

DaiPlusPlus 6y ago
> I do not want to store them on anyone else's server either, but on my own hard drive. To be fair, when you install the Google Drive client on your computer you get copies of your files on your computer.
- johnisgood 6y ago
  Yeah, I am sure. What happens if I modify them using the client though? Do not they get synced (i.e. uploaded to their server)?
- bad_user 6y ago
  No, if you’re referring to GDocs, web links is all you get.

avhon1 6y ago

My 3 cents: I trust my hard drive availability a lot more than I trust my internet availability. I don't trust Google to maintain Docs, or my Google account, for the rest of my life. I dislike when applications unexpectedly change. Cloud apps are both more likely to do this, and don't have the option of reverting to a previous version.

dheera 6y ago
The one biggest thing going for Google Docs IMO is that a document usually displays exactly the same way regardless of the OS and font DPI setup of the user, at least as long as they are using Chrome on their OS. Fonts are loaded from the cloud, so you never run into issues with those, and you can even pick some awesome fonts from Google Fonts and not have to worry about whether the destination system has them installed. There are very few, if any, system fonts that are common to Linux, Mac, and Windows, and most system fonts are typographically terrible. Usually documents created in Word and imported into OpenOffice inevitably have to push the last 1 line onto the next page and mangle all the alignments. Often because someone created the doc in Arial and it loads it as Ubuntu Sans for me and Helvetica for a Mac user or some such.
arp242 6y ago
It depends on your usage; I don't really like using this kind of software in general, but on the rare occasions I need to use it (usually to fill in some document for some organisation or government) I just use Google Docs. Almost all of these documents are fairly ephemeral so long-term storage isn't really an issue (actually, lack of it is a feature, since it often contains sensitive personal information). Google Docs works "good enough" for this and doesn't require installing a lot of software for a 10-minute task. For more serious usage, I'd probably look for a desktop solution, since that's just so much quicker (Google Docs is really slow), but for casual usage it's pretty good.

edoceo 6y ago

I think you're catching downvotes due to a classic N=1 bug

vidarh 6y ago

Google Docs kneels for me once documents get large enough. It works, sort of, but it gets ridiculously sluggish. I haven't figured out what a reasonable cutoff is, but trying to work with a 60k words manuscript that Libre Office has no problem with was too painful. Which was annoying, as I do prefer Google Docs for most uses.

Silhouette 6y ago

Maybe your requirements include privacy, security, reliability, UI stability, indefinite access to your own data, high performance or some of the missing features? Can't guarantee any of those things with Google Docs.

GlennS 6y ago

Google Docs is OK, but it's still missing a lot of very useful features from Excel. Most important for me is being able to define tables. Also, a lot of the keyboard shortcuts missing if you want to work fast. And if I'm in Excel then I do want to work fast, otherwise I'd fire up R or Python.

bartvk 6y ago

I don't think it's possible to back up Google Docs, and restore them. That could be a dealbreaker for some professions. You can of course export and import them in other formats. But that's not the same.