Hi :)
In 10 years of OpenOffice being just 1 product under Sun i only bumped into 2
people in daily life ("word on the streets" or "word of mouth") that used it.
Both were considered "somewhat strange" and "difficult". I never saw any
articles about it in the press, not even in obscure magazines focussing on IT
issues (also difficult to find anything about Gnu&Linux tbh). In 10 years of
using other people's public access machines i found OpenOffice just 1 time and
even then it was only downloaded, not installed (so the managers thought it was
rubbish and didn't work so they bought MSO to replace it (note they didn't
bother to find out why it wasn't working)).
Nowadays i see articles about either LO or AOO (or both) almost every month,
sometimes every week, in various magazines in my local supermarket. I bump
into people every few weeks that have heard of it. Users are not considered in
such derogatory ways anymore, or at least not so often. In IT training it's
more common to hear the tutor mention "and other office suites". On public
access machines it is more normal to find OpenOffice fully installed.
Also it seems that we have more devs in LO than contributed to OpenOffice in an
equivalent time-frame. I thought someone said more in LO in 2 years than had
contributed to OOo in 10years.
So, do i think we should amalgamate and return to just one product? Lol!!
To me i think the idea of re-combining makes sense initially. The old argument
about a "fragmented market". However this argument is only applied in IT
circles. Do people say that there should Not be so many flavours of
ice-cream? or that there should only be 1 company allowed to produce
ice-cream? Outside of IT "fragmentation" is considered a driving force and
it's seen as good when companies compete with each other.
Regards from
Tom :)
>________________________________
> From: rost52 <bugquestcon...@online.de>
>To: users@global.libreoffice.org
>Sent: Wednesday, 12 December 2012, 1:43
>Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] A Tale of Two Office Suites
>
>Virgil,
>
>Thanks! It can't be said better!
>
>Isn't the statement that competition helps to improve not simply an excuse to
>not being force to work on an attempt that both (LibO & AOO) teams can work
>together again?
>
>Isn't MSO a good competitor, which helps improve an OpenSource Office (the
>combination of LibO and AOO) suit being available for those who just cannot
>afford MSO?
>
>I really would like to understand what attempts have been made to get both
>teams together and why the attempts failed? And when will the next attempt be
>made?
>
>I German is a phrase which I found being translated at LEO into English as:
>"Constant dripping wears away the stone". The Japanese say: "Until the ears
>hurt".
>
>I hope the responsible persons of LibO and AOO keep talking to each other
>until they find a way to cooperate again as one team to create the best Office
>Suit available.... and affordable for those with less financial resources.
>That is the real challenge and worthwhile to go for it.
>
>ROSt52
>
>
>On 2012-12-11 07:28, VA wrote:
>> I may be way out of line here, but I’m sending this post to the user lists
>> for both LibreOffice and Apache OpenOffice. I have both programs on my
>> computer and regularly use both. Like many of you out there, I have
>> subscribed to both user lists.
>>
>> I don’t know the full history behind the Libre/Oracle split, but from what I
>> have read on various forums and lists, there is considerable emotional pain
>> resulting from the split. The result is two different FOSS office suites.
>>
>> Some have pleaded for the two to combine forces. Others have noted that the
>> competition is good for the end user as it results in more rapid development
>> of improvements to both suites.
>>
>> I see both sides, but I’d like to point out one thing I have noticed in my
>> own use of the two programs. Some computer programs are what I would call
>> “load and use.” Programs like web browsers and mail clients, etc., require
>> little to no configuration or customization. One can simply do productive
>> use without much thought. I can easily bounce back and forth between
>> Internet Explorer and Firefox, Live Mail and Thunderbird.
>>
>> Not so with office suites. To get the most out of my office suites, I create
>> and edit templates, page, character and paragraph styles. I have to set the
>> autocorrect functions of each program to my liking to prevent a (c) from
>> turning into a ©. While it’s not essential, I tend to customize my toolbars
>> and have created helpful macros. Effectively using an office suite requires
>> a commitment akin to a marriage.
>>
>> For this reason, bouncing back and forth between two suites is
>> counterproductive. I find myself importing and exporting settings, styles,
>> and templates between the two programs rather than simply doing my work.
>>
>> Why do I put up with this inconvenience? Because each program has essential
>> virtues over the other.
>>
>> For example, if I need to properly hyphenate my US English, I use
>> LibreOffice as (to date), OpenOffice fails to properly hyphenate US English.
>>
>> But, if I need to create mailing lists, as I just did for Christmas cards, I
>> use OpenOffice as its Avery 5160 template is more properly aligned than that
>> found in LibreOffice.
>>
>> LibreOffice remembers my hierarchical stylelist setting, whereas OpenOffice
>> does not, but OpenOffice more effectively supports the advanced Graphite
>> features of the Linux Libertine font.
>>
>> So, depending on my specific needs, I bounce back and forth. I’m sure many
>> would suggest that I help out by reporting bugs. I have done so, but even I
>> get lost keeping track of the bugs of each program that I am most interested
>> in following.
>>
>> I suspect this situation will only get worse as each program develops
>> features that will be lacking in the other. And, while I’m not a developer,
>> my guess is that both programs are so complex that keeping up with each
>> other will become an increasingly elusive effort. And, the time will come
>> when decisions will be made NOT to implement features found in the other
>> program.
>>
>> I truly like the motivation generated with competition, and sometimes having
>> multiple programs on my computer to meet specialized needs can be helpful.
>> But, in the world of office suites, where user commitment is essential to
>> effective use, it would be very helpful to us end users if TDF and Apache
>> could somehow overcome their differences and join forces to give us one
>> glorious office suites rather than two almost glorious office suites.
>>
>> These are just my thoughts.
>>
>> I’d be curious as to how many others are using both programs because of
>> advantages of each over the other.
>>
>> Virgil
>>
>
>
>
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