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How much have RH been contributing to LO? They warn that it's a lot of work. It would have been interesting to know how much ... is this a sign that RH can't a

How much have RH been contributing to LO? They warn that it's a lot of work. It would have been interesting to know how much ... is this a sign that RH can't afford to run their business? People are saying 'well, easy enough to install it from elsewhere' but surely the point is a major Linux company are no longer willing/able to support a principle business application. I'm assuming that support also included bug-fixes, packaging fixes, and such.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
davidgerard 3y ago
They're one of the larger contributors in number of commits, about equal to Collabora.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
inefficient 3y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if the reason has more to do with the number of users. I haven't used LO in some time, but back when I only used linux, I never found it to be a particularly pleasant experience. It definitely looks better now that I'm looking at it, but I switched to using google docs back at university. If RH find it to be a lot of work that is supporting very few users, then it doesn't have to say anything about their solvency. Just a spreadsheet cost calculation.
- phkahler 3y ago
  >> If RH find it to be a lot of work that is supporting very few users, then it doesn't have to say anything about their solvency. Just a spreadsheet cost calculation. A Linux distribution is more than the sum of its parts. Having out-of-the-box ability to read MS office docs is a huge deal. Nobody wants to fuck around installing something extra to read a defacto standard document format.
  - microtonal 3y ago
    It's pretty much two or three clicks away with Flatpak and LibreOffice get to control the experience. People also install Microsoft Office or Apple Pages/Keynote/Sheets through the app store, and however Office is installed on Windows.
  - tssva 3y ago
    Even the creator of the defacto standard document format doesn't ship the ability to read it out of the box. Neither does the other major desktop operating system vendor.
    - glowingly 3y ago
      Wordpad has read docx files for a while now. edit: I just checked my Win11 VM, and Wordpad is included by default. It also reads and writes docx and odt.
      - tssva 3y ago
        WordPad only supports limited capabilities of the docx format.
  - LeFantome 3y ago
    Having to install a Flatpak does not make Linux any less “out of the box” than MacOS or Windows. They are all going to require installing something. If you are not going to buy Microsoft Office, LibreOffice may be your best bet on all platforms. These days, if you ARE going to buy Office, it is likely to be a subscription to Office 365. If you are a subscriber, you can your documents in a web browser in Linux as well as you can on Windows. You can even use Edge.
    - einpoklum 3y ago
      Indeed, Windows has no out-of-the-box office productivity suite. But - at large companies, and most organizations with IT services setting up a machine for you, the default image installed for new users does have it. For independent individual users, if we could somehow arrange it so that LO were installed by PC builders / laptop vendors - that would increase its user base from ~200M to 2 Billion within a few years. It would trounce MS Office.
- LeFantome 3y ago
  Frankly, LibreOffice is amazing these days.
microtonal 3y ago
is this a sign that RH can't afford to run their business I think the desktop team probably has limited resources. Many of their business customers don't use LibreOffice, but Google Docs etc. So they'd rather invest resources in parts of the ecosystem that benefits their customers, like bringing Wayland on par with macOS and Windows when it comes to HDR support, etc. Seems like a very sensible decision to me. People who want LibreOffice can always install the Flatpak.
blihp 3y ago
> is this a sign that RH can't afford to run their business? Afford has nothing to do with it... IBM will continue tightening things up with/at RH to get their ROI.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

davidgerard 3y ago

They're one of the larger contributors in number of commits, about equal to Collabora.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

inefficient 3y ago

I wouldn't be surprised if the reason has more to do with the number of users. I haven't used LO in some time, but back when I only used linux, I never found it to be a particularly pleasant experience. It definitely looks better now that I'm looking at it, but I switched to using google docs back at university. If RH find it to be a lot of work that is supporting very few users, then it doesn't have to say anything about their solvency. Just a spreadsheet cost calculation.

phkahler 3y ago
>> If RH find it to be a lot of work that is supporting very few users, then it doesn't have to say anything about their solvency. Just a spreadsheet cost calculation. A Linux distribution is more than the sum of its parts. Having out-of-the-box ability to read MS office docs is a huge deal. Nobody wants to fuck around installing something extra to read a defacto standard document format.
- microtonal 3y ago
  It's pretty much two or three clicks away with Flatpak and LibreOffice get to control the experience. People also install Microsoft Office or Apple Pages/Keynote/Sheets through the app store, and however Office is installed on Windows.
- tssva 3y ago
  Even the creator of the defacto standard document format doesn't ship the ability to read it out of the box. Neither does the other major desktop operating system vendor.
  - glowingly 3y ago
    Wordpad has read docx files for a while now. edit: I just checked my Win11 VM, and Wordpad is included by default. It also reads and writes docx and odt.
    - tssva 3y ago
      WordPad only supports limited capabilities of the docx format.
- LeFantome 3y ago
  Having to install a Flatpak does not make Linux any less “out of the box” than MacOS or Windows. They are all going to require installing something. If you are not going to buy Microsoft Office, LibreOffice may be your best bet on all platforms. These days, if you ARE going to buy Office, it is likely to be a subscription to Office 365. If you are a subscriber, you can your documents in a web browser in Linux as well as you can on Windows. You can even use Edge.
  - einpoklum 3y ago
    Indeed, Windows has no out-of-the-box office productivity suite. But - at large companies, and most organizations with IT services setting up a machine for you, the default image installed for new users does have it. For independent individual users, if we could somehow arrange it so that LO were installed by PC builders / laptop vendors - that would increase its user base from ~200M to 2 Billion within a few years. It would trounce MS Office.
LeFantome 3y ago
Frankly, LibreOffice is amazing these days.

microtonal 3y ago

is this a sign that RH can't afford to run their business I think the desktop team probably has limited resources. Many of their business customers don't use LibreOffice, but Google Docs etc. So they'd rather invest resources in parts of the ecosystem that benefits their customers, like bringing Wayland on par with macOS and Windows when it comes to HDR support, etc. Seems like a very sensible decision to me. People who want LibreOffice can always install the Flatpak.

blihp 3y ago

> is this a sign that RH can't afford to run their business? Afford has nothing to do with it... IBM will continue tightening things up with/at RH to get their ROI.