Re: [libreoffice-users] Re: MS raised prices so people will now start renting their office products instead

Hi :)
On the contrary. MS do not fix their problems quickly at all.  Even known malware threats remain 
for months and even years.  Their strategy is to blame the users.  A typical one being to tell 
users they shouldn't be using macros because of the likelihood of getting an infected or corrupted 
one.  Read "The Emperor’s New Clothes".  People are told that MS Office is the best and so when 
they find problems with it they tend to blame themselves rather than the software.  

For example when using non-MS software someone would quite happily slate the product with this sort 
of thing "I opened my document and deleted tons of stuff and saved it using the same name.  now 
when i open the document it has all that stuff missing!  The stupid program can't even find the 
stuff that i deleted.  No, of course i don't have a back-up of the file before my deletions"

One problem that has never been solved is that when creating an MS document the style keeps 
randomly changing without the user doing anything noticeable.  So, the language keeps switching to 
US.  Bullet-points and numbering styles keep changing.  So in a bulleted list the points keep 
changing shape, size and amount they are indented by.  Numbered lists may well miss a few numbers 
or repeat a few or suddenly change from i), ii) to c), d) or other weirdness.  

People have learned to accept all this shoddiness from Word because it happens to so many people.  
Really advanced users have learned to re-impose formatting after completing a document or just 
accept it.  

Spelling has gone out the window not just because of the MTV generation but also because MS's 
spell-checker keeps switching languages back into American (US) so things that are correct are 
sometimes given a red-wriggle and sometimes blatantly incorrect spellings are not found.  


LibreOffice tends to stick to the same style throughout, unless the user has deliberately changed 
styles and is aware of having done so.  So, bullet-points line-up and retain the same size.  
Likewise with numbered lists.  


Another problem is the way Word can't handle images with much sophistication.  MS produce a 
different product for people to buy.  Publisher.  Most of the functionality of publisher wouldn't 
be needed if Word wasn't such a Pos.  Writer handles most things that Publisher does with more 
elegance and sophistication.  


Another problem is the limited choices when exporting to Pdf.  I often get posters and stuff from 
Word users that probably looked quite good at their end but the jpg compression has made a mad 
swirly mess of it.  LibreOffice allows you to set the type of compression and even allows people to 
create uncompressed Pdfs.  Pdfs can be created with various levels of integration with 
screen-readers for blind-users.  MS Word has limited options.  

So, LO already is a far better product in many, many ways but people have learned to accept 
problems with MS stuff and are even happy when their machine is heavily infected with malware that 
results from using MS junk.  

Just my opinion and doubtless many people, especially the BoD disagree.  
Regards from
Tom :)






> ________________________________
> From: Pertti Rönnberg <ptjr@elisanet.fi>
> To: users@global.libreoffice.org 
> Sent: Thursday, 27 September 2012, 14:04
> Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] Re: MS raised prices so people will now start renting their 
> office products instead
>
> All the best LibO folks,
> This discussion about calendars etc. may be interesting perhaps also useful -- but back to the 
> basic question!
> Microsoft is going to change their behavior.
>
> Let us remember that MS is the absolute market leader -- they can't be totally wrong when having 
> 95% and people accept paying.
> It is no use blaming MS for success -- it is only waste of energy and expresses your foolishness.  
> LibO only have to accept it.
>
> Whether you like it or not MS's programs use to work without remarkable problems - and if such 
> happens MS fixes them rather quickly.
> That is why people and especially companies seem to be prepaired to pay what ever the cost.
>
> What I have tried to say is that if LibO wants to get a reasonable share oh this cake -- free of 
> charge or not -- then LibO must offer and also deliver something better than the MS's Office suit 
> it's Access included -- equal is far away from enough.
>
> Some of you said that ordinary users -- and even more experienced - seldom use more than a 2-5%  
> of the LibO's (MSO's) features.
> Why not then identify the 30% of all most used features and make sure that at least these work 
> properly -- Base included.
>
> If LibO cannot be made at least as stable, free of bugs and easy to use -- and especially it's 
> help function understandable for every new user -- then there is no larger future for LibO except 
> for a small group of idealists and enthusiasts in their own little kindergarten.
> I see this as a question of defining priorities - and a strategy.
> If the goal seems clear and clever then then the resources will at least not disappear.
> Pertti Rönnberg
>
>
>
> On 27.9.2012 10:08, Gordon Burgess-Parker wrote:
> > On 26/09/12 12:01, webmaster-Kracked_P_P wrote:
> > > I have seen listings on Mozilla's archive system for an extension to help with the syncing to a 
> > > Google account.
> > Don't need any of those for Google Calendar - you can use Caldav which doesn't require any 
> > extension at all.
> > http://support.google.com/calendar/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=99358#sunbird 
>
>
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