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#51 2013-02-21 00:04:27

nomorewindows
Member
Registered: 2010-04-03
Posts: 3,362

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

Who wants to hunt and peck text in their 1000 page essay from their iSomething and turn it in?
If it weren't for the security concerns, I'd figure M$ next software validation system is: Select major credit card, enter credit card numbers. 
I've heard people complain of the ribbon interface.  What was wrong with a simple toolbar at the top and bottom?  But then some didn't like that Office tried to second guess everything you were trying to do.


I may have to CONSOLE you about your usage of ridiculously easy graphical interfaces...
Look ma, no mouse.

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#52 2013-03-05 20:57:46

deanp
Member
Registered: 2013-01-15
Posts: 9

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

ConnorBehan wrote:

In my mind MS Office is in the same category as Internet Explorer... I don't get why so many people still use it. Granted, not everyone wants to learn TeX. But even for a Windows user, Libre Office does the job just as well and saves hundreds of dollars. It's well known enough that if some Office user gets email_attachment.doc and says "oh shit, Word won't open this properly" it's a safe bet to just try Libre Office.

People use it because saying "oh hey, can you send me that document in a format that won't end up like a dog's breakfast once I open a .docx in LO and then save it back to a Word format" is not going to cut it in a professional environments.  Word is used as the collaboration standard in just about every work environment I have been a part of.  I don't know about this 'well-known' emal_attachement.doc scenario, but my attempts at LO and Word interoperability have ended in _complete and utter failure_ each and every time. 

So what is to be done?  Will I make everyone convert to LO because that's what I'd like to be used (besides, I do think Word is a fair bit more polished than LO). Will everyone start using LaTeX because I say so?  I'd love that, but it won't happen. Besides Office is more than Word.  Calc, I'm afraid, isn't really in the same league as Excel. So, the only reason I have a Windows license on my computer (thankfully, I didn't have to pay a dime for it) is to be able to use it with VirtualBox and RemoteApp in order to seamlessly run Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. It works fine (minus the lack of clipboard functionality with the current version of FreeRDP), but I'd obviously still prefer a native implementation.  It would make my life much easier.

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#53 2013-03-05 22:54:39

fukawi2
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From: .vic.au
Registered: 2007-09-28
Posts: 6,217
Website

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

deanp wrote:

....but my attempts at LO and Word interoperability have ended in _complete and utter failure_ each and every time.

Interop has moved forwards in leaps and bounds in LO 4.0 apparently. I look forward to checking it out (I use LO in an otherwise MS Office environment, with minimal problems currently)

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#54 2013-03-07 00:00:51

usr_bran
Member
Registered: 2013-03-06
Posts: 2

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

I would love to see a lot more proprietary software be available in linux. CAD, Adobe and et cetera. Giving the person the option to choose is better than not.

fukawi2 wrote:
deanp wrote:

....but my attempts at LO and Word interoperability have ended in _complete and utter failure_ each and every time.

Interop has moved forwards in leaps and bounds in LO 4.0 apparently. I look forward to checking it out (I use LO in an otherwise MS Office environment, with minimal problems currently)

I did a search here for LibreOffice 4.0.1 hoping that it might be right around the corner. I am anxious to try it out too.

Last edited by usr_bran (2013-03-07 00:08:11)

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#55 2013-03-07 00:28:54

thesystematic
Member
Registered: 2013-02-08
Posts: 44

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

It would be interesting to see that even if Microsoft does release for Office for Linux, what the reception by the community would be - I for one probably wouldn't use it unless I absolutely had to. Not so much because it's Microsoft but becuase it would be proprietary - and I think there are probably a lot of Linux users that wouldn't use it on the basis that it isn't open source.

If I had to use it for work, I think I would still prefer to use a VM or dual boot with Windows so that Microsoft didn't clutter up my system - even if it was a good, Unix-like port (unlikely) it wouldn't feel to right to run it off an Arch installation, say.

As for intercompatibility - to be honest the .doc and .docx formats are horrible in the first place. Office <-> Office compatability isn't very good, and I find LibreOffice and MS Office even less so. Leaps and bounds it may be, but I think the problem is with the format itself. If you want universal well formatted documents use LaTeX. Obviously this could be a problem in a workplace where they all use doc - and in that case I still think it's preferable to get them to pay for your VM licence...

In any case, my first reaction will always be 'where are the vi keybindings...?'

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#56 2013-03-07 03:58:13

deanp
Member
Registered: 2013-01-15
Posts: 9

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

thesystematic wrote:

It would be interesting to see that even if Microsoft does release for Office for Linux, what the reception by the community would be - I for one probably wouldn't use it unless I absolutely had to. Not so much because it's Microsoft but becuase it would be proprietary - and I think there are probably a lot of Linux users that wouldn't use it on the basis that it isn't open source.

There are probably a lot; but there are many, many users who don't see proprietary software as immoral, or evil. I use Linux because I find it easier to administer/maintain once it is set up and more productive for most things.  The fact that there is a lot of great free software on Linux sure doesn't hurt; but, I for one welcome the Steam proprietary overlords and would welcome any other company that wants to throw its hat into the Linux ring without releasing code.  I don't have particular hate-on for Windows in general, though -- but I'd like to avoid using it on my machine where its function is to be a bulky server for an Office suite.

thesystematic wrote:

If I had to use it for work, I think I would still prefer to use a VM or dual boot with Windows so that Microsoft didn't clutter up my system - even if it was a good, Unix-like port (unlikely) it wouldn't feel to right to run it off an Arch installation, say.

Well, it is what I did initially.  It's a giant PITA _precisely_ because every time I want to use an Office application, not only do I have to boot up, but I have to run and enter an entire 'alien' environment just to run a damn program. Seamless doesn't help because it treats everything as a single window in my KDE task bar and that is just plain annoying.  I don't know what's worse: just using fullscreen and dealing with Windows as a separate activity or having dueling taskbars on my screen.  It _sucks_.  And dual booting would be just TERRIBLE.  I'm SSHed into two machines, coding in vi, and have a bunch of other processes open, but I gotta forget everything because I have to go dual boot into my Windows partition to tinker with an Excel sheet a colleague just sent me.  Not practical.  How much easier would it be to just click an icon or set a shortcut to a native implementation, and there it is?!  I set up RemoteApp to provide an almost seamless solution for precisely this reason, but the VM still sits there and eats memory (I can spare it, I guess) and I have to now worry about overall Windows security because of the damn MS Office (and there's still some missing functionality with FreeRDP and RemoteApp -- the biggie being no clipboard!).  It's just frustrating. 

thesystematic wrote:

As for intercompatibility - to be honest the .doc and .docx formats are horrible in the first place. Office <-> Office compatability isn't very good, and I find LibreOffice and MS Office even less so. Leaps and bounds it may be, but I think the problem is with the format itself. If you want universal well formatted documents use LaTeX. Obviously this could be a problem in a workplace where they all use doc - and in that case I still think it's preferable to get them to pay for your VM licence...

In any case, my first reaction will always be 'where are the vi keybindings...?'

I do hear about the Office <-> Office compatibility problems but this has yet to hit me. As I have mentioned, I've had pretty bad luck with LO -- I wish it were otherwise; and I would love to do LaTeX in place of Word with git for version control.  But again, I'm not going to make everyone change for me. And I don't even know what I'd recommend in place of Excel... So yes: I have a VM license which I didn't pay for. But I'm not sure how that could *possibly* be preferable to having a Linux version of Office.

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#57 2013-03-07 08:48:56

ConnorBehan
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From: Long Island NY
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Posts: 1,359
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Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

Have you tried Gnumeric instead of MS Excel?

Oh and you'd still have to worry about security by installing a proprietary MS Office, but I guess not as much as with a whole OS.


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#58 2013-03-07 14:51:47

I am Gianluca
Member
From: London, UK
Registered: 2011-05-22
Posts: 195

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

deanp wrote:

I do hear about the Office <-> Office compatibility problems but this has yet to hit me. As I have mentioned, I've had pretty bad luck with LO -- I wish it were otherwise; and I would love to do LaTeX in place of Word with git for version control.  But again, I'm not going to make everyone change for me. And I don't even know what I'd recommend in place of Excel... So yes: I have a VM license which I didn't pay for. But I'm not sure how that could *possibly* be preferable to having a Linux version of Office.

LaTeX is well over-technical if you want to produce a simple plain letter or document. If your scope is to produce a book, thesis, or big document it`s for sure much better than MS Word or any other word processor out there. Anyway, for small documents word processors are the easier way to go, and perhaps the most time-efficient.
I wrote several stuffs on LaTeX, and used it also to produce simple documents as my CV, Cover Letter and other simple documents. Although, at the end of the day is over-complicated for this genre of documents.


Laptop: Acer Aspire S3 | Linux Mint Cinnamon 64-bit

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#59 2013-03-07 14:58:01

deanp
Member
Registered: 2013-01-15
Posts: 9

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

I am Gianluca wrote:
deanp wrote:

I do hear about the Office <-> Office compatibility problems but this has yet to hit me. As I have mentioned, I've had pretty bad luck with LO -- I wish it were otherwise; and I would love to do LaTeX in place of Word with git for version control.  But again, I'm not going to make everyone change for me. And I don't even know what I'd recommend in place of Excel... So yes: I have a VM license which I didn't pay for. But I'm not sure how that could *possibly* be preferable to having a Linux version of Office.

LaTeX is well over-technical if you want to produce a simple plain letter or document. If your scope is to produce a book, thesis, or big document it`s for sure much better than MS Word or any other word processor out there. Anyway, for small documents word processors are the easier way to go, and perhaps the most time-efficient.
I wrote several stuffs on LaTeX, and used it also to produce simple documents as my CV, Cover Letter and other simple documents. Although, at the end of the day is over-complicated for this genre of documents.

It's true LaTeX is a bit complicated; but, I find that for simple documents I prefer Markdown to a WP.

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#60 2013-03-07 15:05:38

deanp
Member
Registered: 2013-01-15
Posts: 9

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

ConnorBehan wrote:

Have you tried Gnumeric instead of MS Excel?

Oh and you'd still have to worry about security by installing a proprietary MS Office, but I guess not as much as with a whole OS.

No -- it's hard to find a decent Excel replacement because we have waaaaay too many macros we depend on.  Looking at the Gnumeric list of things to do, they have a wish-list which includes VBA compatibility.  That would be quite something.  And yea, security definitely still would be something to think about with a native MS Office, but definitely less than having to deal with Windows as a whole.

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#61 2013-03-08 00:51:16

ngoonee
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From: Between Thailand and Singapore
Registered: 2009-03-17
Posts: 7,354

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

Libreoffice Calc does a fairly good job as an Excel replacement for my use-case, actually. Gnumeric chokes on quite a few things more, but is just nicer to use (less bloated) so it's my go-to with Calc as the backup plan for when things don't work.

Then again, I don't know anyone using VBA or macros.


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#62 2013-03-08 06:31:21

ewaller
Administrator
From: Pasadena, CA
Registered: 2009-07-13
Posts: 19,739

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

ngoonee wrote:

Libreoffice Calc does a fairly good job as an Excel replacement for my use-case, ...
Then again, I don't know anyone using VBA or macros.

Here, here !!  Anything beyond the basic spreadsheet, It is probably better to be using maxima or octave anyway.


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#63 2013-03-08 10:34:36

jakobcreutzfeldt
Member
Registered: 2011-05-12
Posts: 1,041

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

ewaller wrote:
ngoonee wrote:

Libreoffice Calc does a fairly good job as an Excel replacement for my use-case, ...
Then again, I don't know anyone using VBA or macros.

Here, here !!  Anything beyond the basic spreadsheet, It is probably better to be using maxima or octave anyway.

Actually, I would say R is more appropriate given its statistical inclinations and its wonderful data.frame object. I only use Maxima for symbolic manipulation and Octave for linear algebra and ODEs and the sort.

To keep the post on topic, there are ways to load XLS files in R (probably ignoring macros, though).

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#64 2013-03-11 05:52:00

lmello
Member
From: Brazil
Registered: 2012-11-06
Posts: 300

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

That's great. A proprietary software that we *need* to see videos online is being dropped by Adobe and a proprietary software we *don't need* for daily office use is going to be supported by Microsoft.

And other great software for engineers like me such as Oracle's PSpice or AutoCAD will *never* get a Linux port.

I hate software companies and their 'brilliant' marketing decisions.

Last edited by lmello (2013-03-11 05:55:59)


Fundamental Axiom of the Universe (aka Murphy's Law): Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.
First Digital Deduction: Nothing obeys Murphy's Law so well as computers.
Second Digital Deduction: Everything go wrong at least once.
Third Digital Deduction: Things go wrong even when there's absolutely no possibility of anything go wrong.

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#65 2013-03-11 07:03:50

ngoonee
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From: Between Thailand and Singapore
Registered: 2009-03-17
Posts: 7,354

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

lmello wrote:

That's great. A proprietary software that we *need* to see videos online is being dropped by Adobe and a proprietary software we *don't need* for daily office use is going to be supported by Microsoft.

And other great software for engineers like me such as Oracle's PSpice or AutoCAD will *never* get a Linux port.

I hate software companies and their 'brilliant' marketing decisions.

You should replace all instances of 'we' there with 'you'. I'd put money on there being more Linux users who 'need' Microsoft Office than PSpice or AutoCAD (as an engineer myself).

Companies follow the money and market share. Linux is not significant (enough, yet) for there to be much motivation for companies to invest the resources into ports. The fault does not lie with the companies, and their marketing decisions are sound.


Allan-Volunteer on the (topic being discussed) mailn lists. You never get the people who matters attention on the forums.
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#66 2013-03-11 09:19:07

zzaw
Member
Registered: 2012-08-15
Posts: 11

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

lmello wrote:

That's great. A proprietary software that we *need* to see videos online is being dropped by Adobe and a proprietary software we *don't need* for daily office use is going to be supported by Microsoft.

And other great software for engineers like me such as Oracle's PSpice or AutoCAD will *never* get a Linux port.

I hate software companies and their 'brilliant' marketing decisions.

Flash is such a mess on linux that the sooner it dies the better.

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#67 2013-03-16 08:13:30

lmello
Member
From: Brazil
Registered: 2012-11-06
Posts: 300

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

ngoonee wrote:
lmello wrote:

That's great. A proprietary software that we *need* to see videos online is being dropped by Adobe and a proprietary software we *don't need* for daily office use is going to be supported by Microsoft.

And other great software for engineers like me such as Oracle's PSpice or AutoCAD will *never* get a Linux port.

I hate software companies and their 'brilliant' marketing decisions.

You should replace all instances of 'we' there with 'you'. I'd put money on there being more Linux users who 'need' Microsoft Office than PSpice or AutoCAD (as an engineer myself).

Companies follow the money and market share. Linux is not significant (enough, yet) for there to be much motivation for companies to invest the resources into ports. The fault does not lie with the companies, and their marketing decisions are sound.

So how do you explain commercial Matlab, Mathematica, Simetrix, QCAD and LabVIEW versions being available for Linux?

Last edited by lmello (2013-03-16 08:14:00)


Fundamental Axiom of the Universe (aka Murphy's Law): Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.
First Digital Deduction: Nothing obeys Murphy's Law so well as computers.
Second Digital Deduction: Everything go wrong at least once.
Third Digital Deduction: Things go wrong even when there's absolutely no possibility of anything go wrong.

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#68 2013-03-16 19:56:57

ConnorBehan
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From: Long Island NY
Registered: 2007-07-05
Posts: 1,359
Website

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

Those target academics as well and not just people in industry? Besides, sometimes it just comes down to whether employees of Wolfram or National Instruments or whatever happen to have an interest in Linux and the willingness to write a port. And Linux ports can be easy or hard depending on random decisions that went into how they wrote the code.

I used to curse these commercial software companies for not porting. Then I realized it makes more sense to blame the crowds of people who are complacent with using non-free software. You could write an open source 3D CAD program if you want. There's no magical secret.


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#69 2013-03-18 00:27:18

ngoonee
Forum Fellow
From: Between Thailand and Singapore
Registered: 2009-03-17
Posts: 7,354

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

lmello wrote:
ngoonee wrote:
lmello wrote:

That's great. A proprietary software that we *need* to see videos online is being dropped by Adobe and a proprietary software we *don't need* for daily office use is going to be supported by Microsoft.

And other great software for engineers like me such as Oracle's PSpice or AutoCAD will *never* get a Linux port.

I hate software companies and their 'brilliant' marketing decisions.

You should replace all instances of 'we' there with 'you'. I'd put money on there being more Linux users who 'need' Microsoft Office than PSpice or AutoCAD (as an engineer myself).

Companies follow the money and market share. Linux is not significant (enough, yet) for there to be much motivation for companies to invest the resources into ports. The fault does not lie with the companies, and their marketing decisions are sound.

So how do you explain commercial Matlab, Mathematica, Simetrix, QCAD and LabVIEW versions being available for Linux?

Different crowds. I use Matlab and LabVIEW myself (both are reasonably popular with academics). Academic institutions tend to have higher proportions of Linux usage (especially with the research crowd, for example most control systems research uses Linux due to the requirement for hard real time), which results in more willingness to spend real hard dollars to pay for these softwares (my university just sent out the annual budget update, we're spending the equivalent of 1 staff's annual salary just to keep our Matlab license updated).

Companies follow the money. If there's money for Microsoft to make releasing office for Linux they'll do it.


Allan-Volunteer on the (topic being discussed) mailn lists. You never get the people who matters attention on the forums.
jasonwryan-Installing Arch is a measure of your literacy. Maintaining Arch is a measure of your diligence. Contributing to Arch is a measure of your competence.
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#70 2013-03-20 17:10:43

nomorewindows
Member
Registered: 2010-04-03
Posts: 3,362

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

I tried using LibreOffice for a document that had fill-in-the-blanks and checkboxes.  The checkboxes worked, but when I tried to do fill in the blanks, LO was asking me for a password to modify the document.  I actually had to use Microsoft Office to edit a fill out document.


I may have to CONSOLE you about your usage of ridiculously easy graphical interfaces...
Look ma, no mouse.

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#71 2013-03-20 18:11:57

chord
Member
Registered: 2012-11-07
Posts: 121

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

If this news is not a rumor, it is a good news for linux.
I know a lot of people that wish to migrate from Windows but they haven't a good software to work with documents. LibreOffice is really sucks. Especially with regard to documents formatting and built-in scenarios (macros)
MS Office would be a good reason to migrate to linux.

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#72 2013-03-23 21:35:21

GI Jack
Member
Registered: 2010-12-29
Posts: 92

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

why would they?

Give users more of a reason to ditch windows?

nah....

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#73 2013-03-25 00:27:29

ngoonee
Forum Fellow
From: Between Thailand and Singapore
Registered: 2009-03-17
Posts: 7,354

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

GI Jack wrote:

why would they?

Give users more of a reason to ditch windows?

nah....

This is a discussion thread, more uninformed posts of this nature would make it TGN. If you want to +1 or make a single-liner with no content, facebook is that way.

Hint: Office exists for Mac.


Allan-Volunteer on the (topic being discussed) mailn lists. You never get the people who matters attention on the forums.
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#74 2013-03-26 13:40:37

bohoomil
Member
Registered: 2010-09-04
Posts: 2,376
Website

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

I'm afraid that the direction of the Office suite development may eventually shake its position on the market: this and that. ClearType was one of the best technologies devised in Redmond, after all...


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#75 2013-03-26 21:13:52

Unia
Member
From: Stockholm, Sweden
Registered: 2010-03-30
Posts: 2,486
Website

Re: Rumor: Microsoft Office for Linux!

I guess that until MS confirms or denies this rumor, this will come close: http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2013/03/wps- … e-but-isnt big_smile


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