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I know lot of people use excel, and can't live without it. Anyway, the point is that we can blame Linux for kernel or driver issues, its thousands of desktop en

I know lot of people use excel, and can't live without it. Anyway, the point is that we can blame Linux for kernel or driver issues, its thousands of desktop environments for its bugs, etc, but I don't think it's fair to say that Linux "doesn't work" just because Microsoft will never release Linux versions of their desktop software. I have a working Linux desktop and I also use spreadsheets in my day to day work.

nicoburns 6y ago
No, but if you are a developer choosing a system to use then this can never-the-less be a good reason for not choosing linux and preferring either macOS or windows with a unix layer.
- severino 6y ago
  Yes, it's true, but it depends on what your needs are. For example, in my case, as a developer, I prefer not to spend any money on Office software and instead get a higher end CPU.
moomin 6y ago
Not to be funny, but OP didn't say it "doesn't work". OP said it wasn't workable, which is a synonym for practical. Something can be 100% fit for one purpose but not for another.
- severino 6y ago
  Well, he said "it-just-works", but it will never get to that point by its own merits, as it depends on one rival company releasing software for you.
  - wyattpeak 6y ago
    Merits don't come into it. It's not an issue of intention or willingness to address problems. People who need Excel don't refuse to use Linux because they take issue with its stance of not-having-Excel, they don't use Linux because it doesn't have Excel.
larrik 6y ago
I can barely tell the difference between Excel and LibreOffice Calc with both of them open on the same computer...
- larrik 6y ago
  I'm getting downvoted, but the fact is that up until like 10 years ago I vastly preferred Calc over Excel. It had a lot less stupid built in causing me to lose my work. Excel would clear my undo history on save, or close ALL worksheets when I tried to close one (completely different behavior than Word) and I would miss which file it was warning me about.
- dogma1138 6y ago
  Then you haven’t really used excel beyond loading a CSV into a table.
- MegaDeKay 6y ago
  "Then you haven’t really used excel beyond loading a CSV into a table." Bad example. I've brought LibreOffice to its knees after importing a CSV file: went to adjust a column width and it became non-responsive. And this was within the last year. They have done a lot of performance work on LibreOffice and I appreciate that, but it is a long way away from Excel for serious work. My favorite snag was on a plot with the X-axis labeled with date text at an angle. I could have horribly aliased ugly fast text, or I could have nicely anti-aliased text that slowed moving around in the sheet to a crawl. But I couldn't have nice text on a spreadsheet I could still work in.
  - vetinari 6y ago
    Also bad example. I've crashed Excel (2016 for Mac) trying to preview CSV I was about to import. To Microsoft's credit, they eventually fixed it. What still doesn't work (in Mac version) is ODBC driver for Postgresql (and maybe for other databases; it is shipped with MSSQL driver only). It will also crash Excel. So to work with psql data I have to export them into file and then import into Excel. I cannot have a query saved in the spreadsheet and just refresh it.
  - 6y ago
ghshephard 6y ago
What's odd - is that nobody ever decided to build a reasonable spreadsheet package, or imaging package, or heck, any of a hundred decent packages that are available on OS X and Windows. My day-day job is on Linux (And has so been for the last three years) - but that's because I live on a CLI, and my needs for spreadsheets/presentations are (A) Both very rudimentary, and (B) more often then not done with google docs anyways. Anybody who had, as their day job, working with spreadsheets would never do it with Libre Office unless they weren't really using them with a lot of data and complexity, or (B) had a bit of a masochistic streak. (Or, I guess (C), were completely dedicated to open software - which is a fair reason I guess). The two things that will permanently hold back Linux on the desktop (And, remember, I say this as someone who has only worked on Linux for 3+ years now) - is (A) The amazing number of inconsistencies on the desktop environment (Depending on the application, I have 3 separate ways I need to initiate a "copy" - Ctrl+C, Ctrl+Shift+C, Ctrl+Right-Click+Select copy.) and (B) The lack of most decent desktop software (Chrome, Slack excepted - they are pretty much flawless on Linux). Bringing this back to the original thread - what I would love from Microsoft, is to make Linux a first-rate citizen on Windows. Right now it's 80% of the way their with WSL. Still missing a bunch of networking stuff, and still doesn't run cron/init and friends. But It's getting closer. Then, we have the best of both worlds - I can do all my work in Linux, and still have access to the rich desktop environment of Windows. So - count me as one person who is really happy that Microsoft is putting effort into advancing their Linux offerings by submitting these Hyper-V support patches into the Linux Kernel.
- severino 6y ago
  Yes, I understand your position. I tend to disagree, because for me, the Windows world is not a better world: I don't specially like the Windows UI, I don't like how updates are done, I value using open-source software and I don't like my vendor to be constantly trying to make me use its software, be it Internet Explorer, Edge or Bing. But if that is the best of both worlds for you, that's great. However, I feel WSL means using Linux to enhance a product (Windows) while at the same time preventing the growth of that same system in its standalone fashion. Because WSL means you won't be using a lot of the usual Linux desktop stuff, you'll be a pure Windows user in a lot of statistical data, and you won't be helping to make Linux a better OS. Not to say that it can get worse once Microsoft starts releasing Windows-only Linux components for WSL, as (I think) started happening already.

nicoburns 6y ago

No, but if you are a developer choosing a system to use then this can never-the-less be a good reason for not choosing linux and preferring either macOS or windows with a unix layer.

severino 6y ago
Yes, it's true, but it depends on what your needs are. For example, in my case, as a developer, I prefer not to spend any money on Office software and instead get a higher end CPU.

moomin 6y ago

Not to be funny, but OP didn't say it "doesn't work". OP said it wasn't workable, which is a synonym for practical. Something can be 100% fit for one purpose but not for another.

severino 6y ago
Well, he said "it-just-works", but it will never get to that point by its own merits, as it depends on one rival company releasing software for you.
- wyattpeak 6y ago
  Merits don't come into it. It's not an issue of intention or willingness to address problems. People who need Excel don't refuse to use Linux because they take issue with its stance of not-having-Excel, they don't use Linux because it doesn't have Excel.

larrik 6y ago

I can barely tell the difference between Excel and LibreOffice Calc with both of them open on the same computer...

larrik 6y ago
I'm getting downvoted, but the fact is that up until like 10 years ago I vastly preferred Calc over Excel. It had a lot less stupid built in causing me to lose my work. Excel would clear my undo history on save, or close ALL worksheets when I tried to close one (completely different behavior than Word) and I would miss which file it was warning me about.
dogma1138 6y ago
Then you haven’t really used excel beyond loading a CSV into a table.
MegaDeKay 6y ago
"Then you haven’t really used excel beyond loading a CSV into a table." Bad example. I've brought LibreOffice to its knees after importing a CSV file: went to adjust a column width and it became non-responsive. And this was within the last year. They have done a lot of performance work on LibreOffice and I appreciate that, but it is a long way away from Excel for serious work. My favorite snag was on a plot with the X-axis labeled with date text at an angle. I could have horribly aliased ugly fast text, or I could have nicely anti-aliased text that slowed moving around in the sheet to a crawl. But I couldn't have nice text on a spreadsheet I could still work in.
- vetinari 6y ago
  Also bad example. I've crashed Excel (2016 for Mac) trying to preview CSV I was about to import. To Microsoft's credit, they eventually fixed it. What still doesn't work (in Mac version) is ODBC driver for Postgresql (and maybe for other databases; it is shipped with MSSQL driver only). It will also crash Excel. So to work with psql data I have to export them into file and then import into Excel. I cannot have a query saved in the spreadsheet and just refresh it.
- 6y ago

ghshephard 6y ago

What's odd - is that nobody ever decided to build a reasonable spreadsheet package, or imaging package, or heck, any of a hundred decent packages that are available on OS X and Windows. My day-day job is on Linux (And has so been for the last three years) - but that's because I live on a CLI, and my needs for spreadsheets/presentations are (A) Both very rudimentary, and (B) more often then not done with google docs anyways. Anybody who had, as their day job, working with spreadsheets would never do it with Libre Office unless they weren't really using them with a lot of data and complexity, or (B) had a bit of a masochistic streak. (Or, I guess (C), were completely dedicated to open software - which is a fair reason I guess). The two things that will permanently hold back Linux on the desktop (And, remember, I say this as someone who has only worked on Linux for 3+ years now) - is (A) The amazing number of inconsistencies on the desktop environment (Depending on the application, I have 3 separate ways I need to initiate a "copy" - Ctrl+C, Ctrl+Shift+C, Ctrl+Right-Click+Select copy.) and (B) The lack of most decent desktop software (Chrome, Slack excepted - they are pretty much flawless on Linux). Bringing this back to the original thread - what I would love from Microsoft, is to make Linux a first-rate citizen on Windows. Right now it's 80% of the way their with WSL. Still missing a bunch of networking stuff, and still doesn't run cron/init and friends. But It's getting closer. Then, we have the best of both worlds - I can do all my work in Linux, and still have access to the rich desktop environment of Windows. So - count me as one person who is really happy that Microsoft is putting effort into advancing their Linux offerings by submitting these Hyper-V support patches into the Linux Kernel.

severino 6y ago
Yes, I understand your position. I tend to disagree, because for me, the Windows world is not a better world: I don't specially like the Windows UI, I don't like how updates are done, I value using open-source software and I don't like my vendor to be constantly trying to make me use its software, be it Internet Explorer, Edge or Bing. But if that is the best of both worlds for you, that's great. However, I feel WSL means using Linux to enhance a product (Windows) while at the same time preventing the growth of that same system in its standalone fashion. Because WSL means you won't be using a lot of the usual Linux desktop stuff, you'll be a pure Windows user in a lot of statistical data, and you won't be helping to make Linux a better OS. Not to say that it can get worse once Microsoft starts releasing Windows-only Linux components for WSL, as (I think) started happening already.