Apache OO vs Libre Office

What have I learned from this thread?

It's pretty obvious that Daveski17 hates LibreOffice. OK fine, you don't have to like it but come on, after only five minutes plus of use.... the above is a bit ridiculous.

I switched to LibreOffice not to long after they started up. I switched, not because of the "politics" of it, I switched because I wanted something that had a future, at the time OpenOffice's future was an unknown, so the switch to LibreOffice seemed the logical way to go.

I have been very happy with LibreOffice. I have had zero problems with power point presentations, many of them in pptx format. I receive many of the documents I need to process from others via email in MS formats (mostly Word and Excel), I work them, save them and send them back in the same MS format I received them in. I have never received a complaint back. They do not know I use LibreOffice.

The last problem I had was a with a docx file, as it turns out this was not a LibreOffice problem. The same problems I had in LibreOffice also manifested themselves in MS Office. In this case it was the docx file that had the problem, or more pointedly the document creator that caused the problem.

I have not tried Apache OpenOffice yet, I cannot see any compelling reason to do so. In fact Apache OpenOffice would not work for me since it does not save to the MS "x" formats, something I must have.

 

Well, if you have to save in docx, it's pretty much compulsory to use Libre. A point of Apache over Libre, at least some versions back, is that it's quicker in loading things. I found it googling yesterday. Don't know if Libre improved in the meantime. In large files in the test presented, the difference was big.


Anyway, Libre for now has feature advantage, no question about it, but the most preoccupying issue is that if Apache doesn't change license, we ll end up with 2 competing Offices, that will no longer have common roots. In time, Libre, being able to use Apache code but not the opposite, will become a "new species", which can only be bad for the war against MS proprietary formats, since one will have to "learn" 2 different Offices if he wants to work between the two (in business for example).

There will be the "distro-office" plague. While on the other hand, you will have MS saying "don't bother with open Offices, they 're crazy, you learn MS Office and you 're good to go forever".

EDIT: Ah, here's the link to the speed test:

http://www.hostcult.com/2012/05/apache-openoffice-34-vs-libreoffice-353.html

I also read that in Libre they killed old code found in Open Office. I think, together with the aggressive development, it's natural to have "childhood diseases". In time it will mature. I just hope it doesn't become bloatware, because already the installer is double the size of Apache. Many years ago, the reason i had ditched Open Office for AbiWord, was the Open Office was becoming bigger and bigger and even launching it was a slow process. Anything in it was feeling heavy. So i thought "what the heck, i ll use AbiWord".

 

Ah, found updated test too:

http://www.hostcult.com/2012/08/libreoffice-36-vs-openoffice34-vs-msoffice-vs-iworks.html

Now seems Libre is faster in docs, while slower in the rest, but Libre has a tendency to "hang" and becoming less responsive.

So, big potential, needs ironing out.

 

Microsoft doesn't use proprietary formats (like doc) by default anymore with latest versions of MS Office. Support for those are there only for backwards compatibility. Microsofts uses OOXML (like docx) which is open and standardized by ECMA, ISO and IEC. In the future, when other office suites finally manage to keep up with latest versions of OOXML implemented by latest versions of MS Office (nowadays their support is sometimes too incomplete, sometimes too late which is nothing but expected - as they continue to develop their alternative to OOXML - the OpenDocument - with constrained resources), the battle will be focused on other aspects: the overall quality, features, aesthetics, performance. And many will still prefer to pay for Microsoft Office, as, besides superiority on the mentioned aspects, Microsoft is implementing so many cloud-based features to integrate with the next version of their Office suite and things like these are expensive and add value to the product.

 

Thanks for the info. Cloud based, eh? Nice to know, i hate the cloud, i will b e sure to save setups of both cloudless Open Office and Libre Office in a CD, at least for my personal home use.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_2013

I find its development direction very interesting and much more exciting (actually infinitely more exciting, lol) than the development of other office suites. For example, the default save location of Microsoft Office 2013 is the SkyDrive when you're logged to the cloud service. Some may hate things like these, but I absolutely love SkyDrive and I will surely welcome such improvements.

 

The office suite itself is still very much proprietary indeed. Microsoft has a well-documented track record of trying to sabotage open standards whenever and wherever possible.

Define 'expensive'? Define 'value'? I don't think you are going to impress anyone using the paradigms of capitalism. It is well beyond the scope of this thread, which is about two competing free and open office suites.

 

[OFFTOPIC]

SkyDrive! How nice! A bit like Skynet, only in the more big-brotheresque version. I am sure it won't be long before we get offered "Windows Cloud", where the OS will be in the cloud too. It's the boiled frog theory. If you boil the frog slowly, he won't be screaming when he will arrive to boiling temperature. First you get accustomed to put you life on the cloud (Facebook), then your documents, then your OS, then why not, any other personal data you have... The trick is that you mustn't make persons feel forced, but enticed to do it for "fun" or "features". Like in 1984 is written, you must love the Big Brother and ask for it yourself! Oh, so many dictatorships around the world and throughout history would have killed in order to have people doing what they are now willingly doing. Instead, they had to use brute force and this causes reaction.

I have 3x2GB HDDs in my PC, 1x32GB flash drive and 2x8GB flash drives. Thank God now i can save my documents in SkyDrive, i wouldn't know what else to do! Thank you, Big Redmond!

It's much better than resorting to old-fashioned tactics with hardcoded backdoors...

https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=336785&highlight=samsung backdoor

This was so retro-big brother, based on deception. The future is voluntary embracing the brother.

[/OFFTOPIC]

 

I'll be proud if they see enough importance on my files to spy on them. lol

 

The Microsoft Office is proprietary and will probably always be as long as this model is technically viable and generates enough money to please shareholders. But OOXML is an open standard. Microsoft is even introducing with Office 2013 a variant of OOXML called "Strict" that is easier for the resource-constrained devs of other office suites to implement.

Expensive as in expensive to implement. To maintain a cloud service like SkyDrive or Office Web Apps is expensive, requires money, large amounts of money. And value as in more valuable for a larger audience, more useful and nice for those who like cloud integration.

 

The important thing is that everyone must be available and happy for inspection. If everyone is available to review, then the important ones will be also. That's the mentality of big brother. Imagine a totalitarian regime in the past. Poor bastards, in order to find the "important ones", they had to pretty much interrogate, spy with uncomfortable methods and use force on everyone that could provide information or cover. This would cause resentment though. If everyone was available and happy to be so, and voluntarily provided any info he had freely, it would all be much easier and no forced action or adverse feeling would hit the population. That's the ticket to be a successful big brother.

 

http://www.odfalliance.org/resources/TheCaseAgainstOOXML.pdf

http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=20051216153153504

 

Of course the proponents of OpenDocument will try to attack OOXML with baseless FUD. They would prefer to not spend their few resources implementing support for OOXML in their office suites if they could. It's all expected. What matters and really makes OOXML respectable for those who really care and matter (like governments) is that it's open and standardized by ECMA, ISO and IEC.

 

Looks like you are very unhappy with the directions of your government. I'm not.

 

Provocative one-liners alone do not constitute an argument. How old are you?

 

The present is irrelevant, as is my current goverment. Goverments and political systems change throughout history. What is important is the mindset of the population and what is accustomed to do and accept as natural. What has happened before, can happen again. There is nowhere in human history a carved in stone guarantee that all goverments that will come will be "benevolent" or "democratic".

But, anyway, i understand. Each has different views.

 

What they constitute then? My age is irrelevant, lol.

 

Lol, what happened to "live and let live" until they start to be "malevolent"?

 

When they become malevolent, it may be too late... You know, let's take a latin american coup for example. Once the malevolent gentleman is up and has access to a rich info on who are the most likely "not fans of his ideas", it may be too late... Now in the past, you had to do mass phone tap operations, have people in a raincoat at the corners, informers. You had to make files about most citizens you could, based on hard collected information and of dubious trustworthiness. Today you could start with screening social media... Much better, not intrusive, doesn't even feel there's a coup and you get to see what people were thinking before the coup, so they can't now pretend to be loyal just out of fear. Every dictator's dream...

 

People still voluntarily add whatever info they want to social networks, to my knowledge. I prefer to not blame the tools for people's uses of them.

 

I understand. You may want to read "1984", for a different view of how voluntarily many things can be done.

 

Or you just like beleaguering a point. You remind me a bit of someone else who used to post here who was a bit obsessed with Microsoft products.

Your statement was not necessarily accurate. Most of the PortableApps people are volunteers & OO is a big project. I believe Mr Haller when he told me it is in progress.

 

That your reading comprehension skills need improving?

It's pretty obvious that you hate reading entire posts because I actually used Libre Office for around 10 months (this was stated earlier in the thread) on one of my computers & it was nothing but trouble compared to OO. The 5 minutes I used the LibO portable was in convincing it to run after it took ages to install on a flashdrive. After reinstalling it three times on different flashdrives with no success, each time it took a ridiculous amount of time to install, I gave up.

I thought I'd give it a spin on my laptop. I have regretted downloading it ever since.

I hope you & LibO are very happy together. Maybe it works better in Linux. I don't care, I'll certainly never use it again. IMHO LibO are desperately trying to out-do OO but are progressing too rapidly to the detriment of the end user. It may have features that OO doesn't have yet but I ran LibO for at least ten months, maybe closer to a year, I am not sure, & all it ever did was give me problems. Finally it just would not even run a simple Powerpoint presentation & I was forced to use OO on another machine.

I uninstalled it, replaced it with OO & ran the Powerpoint presentation perfectly. I have set up OO now on three computers with extensions & it is working fine.

I rest my case.

 

LibreOffice seems to work quite well on Linux. I'll admit to not having used it on Windows though, as Apache OO is smaller and doesn't drag in Java.

 

I'm finding this thread very interesting because I'm just about to switch from MS Office to either OO or LO. There seem to be pluses on both sides. I am leaning towards LO a little right now because of the docx capability but I also do like something stable and bug free. I hate bugs. So it's still a little hard to decide even after reading this whole thread... But I do want to be able to deal with docx, so I guess that more or less is the deciding point, as silly as it sounds....