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LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

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Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#181

Post by ocdtrekkie »

zeveb wrote: post #95
ghaff wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never loved the ribbon and I suspect that Microsoft underestimated how disruptive the change was for a lot of people. However, I saw a presentation by one of the lead designers around the time that it was introduced and he certainly made a good case for how the older interface had accumulated way too much cruft. ADDED: Ah, this is probably it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl9kD693ie4 (That said, MS Office in gen…

> I saw a presentation by one of the lead designers around the time that it was introduced and he certainly made a good case for how the older interface had accumulated way too much cruft. I have also seen well-intentioned arguments for why Clippy was a good idea … but he wasn't. To this day I miss the Word 5.1 on Macintosh System 7. That was more-or-less the Platonic ideal of a word processor; it's been all downhill…

Clippy was literally the precursor of things like Alexa and Siri today. The technology wasn't there to back it, but the idea of an anthropomorphic assistant has literally come around to the mainstream today.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#182

Post by _jal »

Jonnax wrote: post #38
openfuture wrote: post #20

It's weird to me that people complain over "old and ugly" interfaces. Consistency is worth so much more than fad-chasing. Learning something is more worthwhile if you are able to trust that it won't change underneath you. Take MS Office for example, I was made to learn how to use it in elementary school, we had an exam where we got a printed out page and had to reproduce it in an hour. This was supposed to be fundame…

The ribbon interface was adopted in 2007. That's 13 years ago. What is the jank? It's a tabbed interface of buttons instead of menus and sub menus. The most common operations are descriptive buttons. Give someone word 2003 or word 2020 who has never used a word processor before. Which one would be more intuitive? It's bad UI if people just learn where to click. They should be able to think in terms of "I want to do X…

I haven't used Word much at all since the ribbon interface. Like others, for whatever reason the ribbon makes doesn't work for me, neither cognitively or via muscle-memory. The categorization doesn't help me predict where to find something (fails "new user" ease of use), nor does repeated use make it easier or faster. And of course I don't use it (or windows) much, so I don't think in Microsoft(tm) English, adding a minor layer of translation for some jargon.

I have to use Excel enough that I've finally rote-memorized where frequently used things are. But when I have to find some tool I don't know where is, it is faster to google for instructions than hunt around the application itself, so I do that first.

I'm sure it is fine if you live in MS-land. I don't, and it fails for this casual user both for discoverability and streamlined use.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#183

Post by edoloughlin »

ako wrote: post #138
edoloughlin wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ribbon interface was adopted in 2007. That's 13 years ago. What is the jank? It's a tabbed interface of buttons instead of menus and sub menus I've been using Office since the early 90's and the ribbon interface for the last 13 years. I still can't find stuff easily in the ribbon interface. It's like there's some cognitive barrier to me retaining the layout of anything beyond the Home ribbon (or tab?). Any time I…

The key question is: would somebody who learned to use office after 2007 with the ribbon interface appreciate moving back to the pre-2007 interface? My guess is that more people learned to use office after 2007 than before, so the majority of people have no problems using the ribbon. I still yearn for ms-word on dos, and oracle forms on terminal interfaces, once you learned the keyboard shortcuts, nothing was faster.…

My guess is that more people learned to use office after 2007 than before, so the majority of people have no problems using the ribbon.

Or, perhaps they are just used to a lower level of productivity? I've had 13 years to adapt, and I still find it frustrating.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#184

Post by Forge36 »

Jonnax wrote: post #38
openfuture wrote: post #20

It's weird to me that people complain over "old and ugly" interfaces. Consistency is worth so much more than fad-chasing. Learning something is more worthwhile if you are able to trust that it won't change underneath you. Take MS Office for example, I was made to learn how to use it in elementary school, we had an exam where we got a printed out page and had to reproduce it in an hour. This was supposed to be fundame…

The ribbon interface was adopted in 2007. That's 13 years ago. What is the jank? It's a tabbed interface of buttons instead of menus and sub menus. The most common operations are descriptive buttons. Give someone word 2003 or word 2020 who has never used a word processor before. Which one would be more intuitive? It's bad UI if people just learn where to click. They should be able to think in terms of "I want to do X…

The ribbon changed again in office 365.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#185

Post by _jal »

ghaff wrote: post #107
AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're thinking like an SV webdev who's largest concern is to onboard as many new users as possible so you can flip your startup. Office is a professional productivity tool that's been around for decades and is used by millions of people for their entire workday, every day. Learning to use a new tool takes a tiny fraction of the time you're going to be using that tool. One should make the tool best at actually doing…

I'm neither in SV nor a webdev. I just remember how many ordinary users hated the ribbon when it first came out. Presumably they adapted over time; I can't really speak to whether Microsoft would have been better evolving the existing menu system. Personally, I could take it or leave it--and at least intellectually the arguments for the ribbon made sense to me.

Ordinary users hate change. They always do, regardless of how successful (or not) the changes are later judged to be.

This doesn't argue against change so much as argue that the costs need to be worth the disruption - you don't move houses over a carpet stain, and you don't rebuild your UI lightly, either.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#186

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

conception wrote: post #155
Jonnax wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ribbon interface was adopted in 2007. That's 13 years ago. What is the jank? It's a tabbed interface of buttons instead of menus and sub menus. The most common operations are descriptive buttons. Give someone word 2003 or word 2020 who has never used a word processor before. Which one would be more intuitive? It's bad UI if people just learn where to click. They should be able to think in terms of "I want to do X…

Oh it’s bad to learn where just to click, I recently learned that’s how most people do it. You might find this interesting - https://www.truity.com/blog/intuitives-guide-getting-along-s... There was a discussion on HN about this a while back but most people learn computers by “if I want x I do y.” And guards just how they learn. Changing UI for them is catastrophic because they literally have to relearn -everything-.…

> "There was a discussion on HN about this a while back but most people learn computers by “if I want x I do y.” And guards just how they learn. Changing UI for them is catastrophic because they literally have to relearn -everything-."

Yes, but it's surprising to see a large contingent of them on HN and other technical forums. The rapid change of software technologies all but mandates adaptability and willingness to learn.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#187

Post by bzzzt »

ubercow13 wrote: post #23
kungato wrote: post #17

Is there any electron gpl based Word and Excel alternative? I always imagined running on top of electron helped you skip a lot of work and helped the app not look like shit/LibreOffice

Libreoffice looks like a native desktop app. How do electron apps look better than that?

Depends on which desktop. On macOS it stands out like a sore thumb. Icons are almost monochrome and indistinguishable. Also, it does not feel as smooth as a native Mac app since it uses its own toolkit instead of Mac native scrolling etc.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#189

Post by encom »

Jonnax wrote: post #10

I haven't used Libreoffice in years. Did they ever update the UI styling? I remember it had a very "java" look to it. You know that feeling when you open an app, you know it's going to be a bit janky.

>You know that feeling when you open an app, you know it's going to be a bit janky.

I've used Electron apps before, yes.

Re: LibreOffice: The Next Five Years

#190

Post by frosted-flakes »

Forge36 wrote: post #184
Jonnax wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ribbon interface was adopted in 2007. That's 13 years ago. What is the jank? It's a tabbed interface of buttons instead of menus and sub menus. The most common operations are descriptive buttons. Give someone word 2003 or word 2020 who has never used a word processor before. Which one would be more intuitive? It's bad UI if people just learn where to click. They should be able to think in terms of "I want to do X…

The ribbon changed again in office 365.

In looks only. Functionally and layout-wise, it's pretty much identical.
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