[libreoffice-users] Re: Suggestions to PTB

Le 26/08/11 18:55, Twayne a écrit :

Hi Twayne,

> Thanks for the comeback. Please try to read this with the understanding that 
> every word is meant to be positive and assstive to the LO project. I 
> apprecate your come-back and don't expect a reply but if you wish to, feel 
> free. I'm simply tryng to indicate the other side of the coin and I don't 
> believe I'm alone in this. LO is in danger of going the same route as OOo 
> did.

I'm at times a very open critic of the project myself.


>  My comments are in no way to denigrate any one in the development area 
> specifically but one of the high hopes I had for LO was a very early-on 
> promise from TDF/the LO grroup that such things wouldn't be tolerated in LO. 

Yes, I think initial marketing spin when the project started made users
of OOo who switched to LO have very high expectations - some of which
have clearly not been met IMO.


>    I like that the envelope issues were sort of taken care of by including 
> templates for the most popular envelope sizes, but it's still several trips 
> around Hogan's Barn if the templates one needs don't exist and if the 
> center/left/right position of text for the addressee doesn't match what the 
> prnter wants, it's still using oddball dimensonal references instead of 
> simply a dimension from the top & left side of the envelope.


Agreed, it is worse on Mac OSX, where within LO certain printer options
are crippled, making printing envelopes and anything bar a normal letter
like jumping through rings of fire.


>    And though I haven't looked on 3.4, having to set BOTH printer AND 
> program paper sizes shouldn't be a requirement, ever. I only know of a few 
> different hi-end processors, but none of them require touchng the printer 
> paper size Settings. But I have learned to work out the how-to for envelopes 
> should  I need to, so t's not a huge issue to me personally, more like a big 
> annoyance and time-waster. Others though ...


Agreed.


>    The above and at least 6 more have been in OOo and continued on into LO 
> without beiing fixed. Do you REALLY feel it's unfair to expect those things 
> to have been fixed?


Not at all. I started going through the envelope bug issues the other
day checking to see what I could or could not reproduce. Like I said
above, print options within LO on Mac are somewhat limited compared to
other platforms it seems, so that makes testing/reproducing for me nigh
on impossible.


>    Has there ever been a CALL for anyone to the dev masses  to dig into 
> these things? LO is an excellent program but it's stuck in the 80-20% rule; 
> and that 20% makes it impossible for me to drop Word for the large files. 
> Not good: I lose not only the ability to do away with Word or WP but I can't 
> make LO a production-use app because of those things.


Which I perfectly understand, and as a pragmatic business user myself, I
still recommend OOo 3.2.1 for many things because the "progress" that
has been made in LO does not yet outweigh in my eyes the perceived or
real disadvantages and bugs that existed in OOo 3.2.1 (mailmerge being
one of them).


> I think I understand how the project "functions" but of course have no 
> experience in same. The real problem is, LO does not do what it 
> says/implies/menus it can do and still has OOo bugs in it.


Yes, I would agree partially - but then, with a truly free, open source
project, you can not make anyone do anything. Ultimately, as you say, it
will be a law of the jungle thing. If too many "niche circumstance"
users drop the product, then LO will shrink to be just another "close
runner up" to Word/Excel/Powerpoint, along with KOffice, Calligra and
all the other wannabes.


> But again, has a CALL ever gone out for people to work on the "old" bugs? 

Of course and some of them do get fixed, eventually.


> Like the ones that carried over from OOo? Doesn't anyone realize that the 
> project cannot actually become a leader in the processor industry while it 
> has those and other bugs?

There is a tendency within the developer community to admit the
phenomenon known as "bit-rot" over time (which personally I find rather
worrying), and that the effort fixing an old bug may not be worth it
when a whole new module of code could be developed that would also deal
with the underlying problems having caused the old bug in the first
place. However, the new code development will only take place in the
future as and when resources can be made available. Catch 22 :-/


>    You seem to be saying that volunteers will write the original code but 
> then won't stand behind it when parts of it don't function properly or at 
> all. I WANT LO to succeed, but it cannot while such bugs are ignored and 
> figured instead to be "good enough for government work".

No that is not what I said, or at least not what I meant. Within the
framework of LibreOffice, most developers who create bugs through their
own coding efforts take pride in fixing the bugs they cause too. Bear in
mind however, that the LibreOffice project is not yet even a year old,
which brings us back to the promises made in the initial mission
statement of "preserving a 10 year investment in the OpenOffice.org
project" - which turned out not to be true, I'm afraid - and I'm the
first to admit that I too was disappointed by this). Once again,
LibreOffice is not OpenOffice.org - it is an easy cop out, in view of
the marketing hype, but that's how it is - the bugs made in a separate
project, i.e. OpenOffice.org, will not necessarily get fixed in
preference to ones created in the current LibreOffice project since it
was created last September.

> Door - ass. Have they been ASKED to work on their bugs? How can they not be 
> expected to keep the code accurate if they simply develop, move on, and no 
> one will fix the bugs? Aren't they ever given a LIST of the most serious 
> bugs and the importance of working on them so LO can do what it says it can 
> do without surprises.

As already pointed out by others, there is a list of the "most annoying
bugs" nominated as blocking for each release. ANYONE can nominate their
pet LibreOffice bug (i.e. one in the LibreOffice bugzilla database) as a
blocker, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it will be fixed or even
ultimately considered a blocker (I have personally had several "blocker"
bug reports requalified as "can not block the release" or "affects only
a small group of users", etc, etc. This is where I would agree that the
boundaries between who decides what gets done and in which order are
still IMO undefined, or subjective, to say the least.


> "50,000 miles away" is irrelevant, really. Digitally that's no further away 
> than the bldg next door these days. Much of my career was working with the 
> Pacific Rim so I'm familiar with how far away places are not these days.

I was referring more metaphorically to holistic thoery than actual
distance ;-)


> Jeez! Re-read what you said!
> That's what I'm trying to tell you: I cannot live with the way the project 
> functions because LO does not do what it says it can do menu wise and 
> documentation-wise, which is a mis-mosh of OOo and LO when you get to 
> reading it.

I know perfectly well what I wrote. I participate in this project
because I want to, for reasons which are my own. I do not develop or
write code. I currently do bug triaging, occasionally write
documentation, and help out on the user mailing lists. I hold no
administrative office, elected or directorial position within the
project, nor do I have any desire to as yet, despite having been
propositioned to become a community member. Much as this project likes
to wears its "freedom" on its shoulder, so do I value my own freedom
with regard to my commitment to the project (indeed as with any other
open source project).

I like open source projects as a principle, but I'm not an extremist
with regard to any one in particular, and ultimately have a business to
run, with tough decisions to make like in any other business enterprise.
If the software I would like to use isn't fit for my purpose for
whatever reason, then I will change to one that is. That might even be
MS Office in the future, who knows, but I've managed to stay away from
it for nearly 20 years now, so currently I feel that would be unlikely
(but not impossible). Some might call that cynical - fine by me,
"whatever floats your boat" as they say, I prefer to see that as pragmatic.

> Right back at ya! Since you (LO) are providing the goods, then it's you 
> should be doing those things. Facetious/rhetorical comments such as that 
> show you're developing an ire over something I suspect has been purposely 
> allowed to drop to the floor, same as OOo did. The only "direction" I want 
> is for LO to do what it says/implies it can do.

On the contrary, I consider myself to be far more of a consumer of the
"goods" as you put it than a provider. The comments I have made to you
here and previously reflect my own experience and understanding of the
project so far, in its short existence. I can only add what I have been
told by those on the steering or engineering committees : "If you want
to influence the direction that the LibreOffice project takes, become a
"member". "Membership" allows you to participate in board elections and
other administrative aspects of the project. You can become a member by
showing how you have helped the project to move forward. I believe there
is even a page on the wiki that explains how to do that :

http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/CommunityBylaws#Membership


I think you will understand from the above that I'm being neither
rhetorical or facetious - I am merely a user of the product, I help out
when I can to the extent of my capabilities, that is all, my sphere of
influence is close to zero, but that has not stopped me from voicing my
dissatisfaction when I thought it was appropriate.


Alex




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