Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

zdnet.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 333 posts

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#231

Post by skissane »

Shorel wrote: post #221
csdreamer7 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Very hard for me to understand why, in a world of Google docs, anyone would want to deal with the bloated mess that is ms office. My mom had to buy a copy of MS Office. Her university provided free ms office online, but there were certain features missing from it she needed for her papers. I am remembering wrong, but it was annotations? Citations? I do not remember. Libreoffice kinda could do it, but I could not fi…

Annotations, citations, bibliography management I can understand, even if I use LaTeX for that and consider it a far superior tool. But video recording and streaming? Why would anyone prefer to use MS Office for that when OBS exists? Is it as obnoxious as having to use Teams for chat? That's certainly a case of having a hammer and thinking all problems are nails xD

> But video recording and streaming? Why would anyone prefer to use MS Office for that when OBS exists?

OBS is very powerful, but the complexity of its UI can scare non-technical newbies away. MS Office gives you a lot less power, but is much more welcoming when you aren’t technical and this is the first time in your life you’ve ever done it

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#232

Post by doctor_eval »

antod wrote: post #185
qwerty456127 wrote: post #164

I can remember the same or very similar news from Germany appearing every now and then for over a decade. This time I almost believe them as there seems to be no alternative to LibreOffice given the changes Microsoft introduced during the recent years - forcing everyone to log-in with their Microsoft account at best, also moving from a classic desktop app to a web app. Conservative users like me and probably German s…

> I can remember the same or very similar news from Germany appearing every now and then for over a decade. Yup I can remember (mainly via Slashdot) this being a thing going backwards and forwards for two decade or more. Back to the days of it being called StarOffice if I remember correctly. Sometimes it seemed the city or state was just doing some elaborate license negotiation.

I remember using the original StarOffice to write up some consulting work that I’d done, it just have been the early 00s at the time, and I thought it was excellent - a worthy competitor to MS office of the time.

And then over time it felt more and more bloated and slow, to the point where I started to think I maybe misremembered how good it was when I’d first used it.

Is it just me? Or did it fall deeply into a hole? My recollection is that it hitched its wagon to Java for no good reason that I could see.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#234

Post by Shorel »

sega_sai wrote: post #35

I have been using Libreoffice/OpenOffice continuously pretty much for last 20 years (mostly Impress/presentation part for teaching/presentations). And the number of bugs, crashes, issues with video etc occasionally gets very annoying. I was hoping over the years things would improve, but I don't quite see that unfortunately. If I could get something to replace LibreOffice that is not online and works on Linux I would…

Serious question: Why don't you use LaTeX to prepare the presentations?

A few things I could think of: the templates for presentations are less varied, less diverse, could look repetitive. With Office, you can make the most crazy designs.

That's it. LaTeX generates PDF presentations that work everywhere and look very nice, they even have navigation buttons on the corner.

I wonder if we could teach ChatGPT to create LaTeX presentation designs.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#235

Post by Shorel »

tredre3 wrote: post #110

Frankly I am shocked that they went with LibreOffice over OnlyOffice. OnlyOffice supports online collaboration already, works online and offline, and has a much more familiar interface. Compatibility is also better with MS Office documents. OnlyOffice is developed online-first but they provide an electron app that works fully offline on all OSes: https://www.onlyoffice.com/download-desktop.aspx?from=deskto... Yep, an…

That means LibreOffice is not native but Java?

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#236

Post by BLKNSLVR »

unsignedint wrote: post #143
BLKNSLVR wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The pros you mention above are true for the desktop versions, but most definitely not the browser versions, in my experience. The browser versions feel squishy and feature incomplete and the interface is different enough to be annoying enough for me to avoid it like the donut with a hair on it. Mine is a very Excel-centric view. I wouldn't miss anything else in the office suite.

I’m keen to understand what features you found lacking in the web version of Office. My initial impressions aligned with yours; however, upon recent usage, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by its extensive feature set. While advanced data extraction capabilities in Excel are notably absent, the web version otherwise provides a comprehensive array of functionalities.

Might depend on how recent. As a result of past annoyances I haven't revisited it in the last 12 months, except accidentally. The memory of the annoyance remains, whilst the specifics have been lost to time.

I'll give 'er another shot. I'm aware of my tendency to happily burn big tech for the slightest sleight.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#238

Post by Shorel »

wolverine876 wrote: post #31

Can LibreOffice on Linux deliver management solutions? Think of 1,000 workstations, a small to mid-sized network: you need software that automates installation, configuration, security, etc. It's not like at home: Even if everyone is in the same building, you can't manually install, configure, change configuration, upgrade, etc. 1,000 times (think about it; not only the time and quality issues, but you'd spend a tota…

I would say that's more a Windows feature than something tied to MS Office.

But yes, Active Directory is unmatched for administration of a big number of computers and local networks.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#239

Post by Dylan16807 »

bruce511 wrote: post #201
dmbche wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been using libreoffice for maybe 10 years now? I don't remember what I'm missing, could you name one or two killer features of ms office?

You're happy with what you are using, so that's great, and I'm not knocking that. But the difference is not 'killer features". The difference is in the million small details and polish. The integrations, formats, UI, workflow, things it just "gets right" that I don't even know its doing. I try Libre Office every once in a while. But each time I try it just feels old and clunky. It's all in the tiny details that add u…

A lot of things are just different. In a way that makes it hard to switch, but isn't because microsoft office is a better/premium experience.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#240

Post by Shorel »

tichiian wrote: post #132
wolverine876 wrote: post #31

Can LibreOffice on Linux deliver management solutions? Think of 1,000 workstations, a small to mid-sized network: you need software that automates installation, configuration, security, etc. It's not like at home: Even if everyone is in the same building, you can't manually install, configure, change configuration, upgrade, etc. 1,000 times (think about it; not only the time and quality issues, but you'd spend a tota…

Linux has far superior management solutions when compared to anything Microsoft has. First, start with software packaging: In Microsoft-land, there is MSI, but there is also stuff delivered as .zip, .exe (generated from tons of different install builders, so completely inconsistent) and a handful of half-assed package non-solutions like chocolatey, nuget and others. When you want to install something, and there is an…

> If I want libreoffice

Yeah, but no one wants LibreOffice xD

(And I am writing this comment on Ubuntu)

Post reply on HN