[RedRat]

Evildave
You either are purposefully or intentionally misreading both of our previous comments. I go back to my point that paid for commercial software has one advantage over free open source software: there is an incentive to produce software exactly as the customer wants and to do it quickly. Whether you like MS Office (and I was a user since it first came out in DOS) or Open Office, if there are things that in the program (bugs or otherwise) they tend to be fixed quicker by MS than Open Office.
I go back to my point, that if you want a successful product that actually sells and makes money for its creator, that product will be fashioned with user in mind. Now if the creator of the software is smart, they will fashion the product so that it appeals to the widest market as possible, that is just simple business sense. Will MS Office appeal to everyone, no way! But it will appeal to a large number of people.
It has often been said about MS Office that 90% of the people use only 10% of its resources, indeed a bloated piece of software. But considering its success over other highly used word processors (remember WordPerfect) MS must be doing something right. Now this is not a defense of MS or MS Office, since I am now no longer in and office environment, Open Office does everything I want it do and now use it exclusively on my Linux Machine.
Now for some programmers, at least in the old days, making money was not the object of their work. They wanted to make a useful product for themselves and perhaps a small coterie of friends or associates. For many programmers, once they finished their project they went on to other work and did not have time or inclination to go back and tweak their earlier creations. My point is that once it is released they have no more obligation to that program.
Do businesses go out of business in the Windows world, of course they do. Right now, there is a chance that GM will go out of business making cars, same can be said for MS, Adobe, or Apple. Sure there is a lot of orphan software out there, but what is the difference if a software company goes out of business and the open sources equivalent where the programmer walks away or is indifferent to tweaking? In the end nothing. Sure you can go out and try to find another equivalent program and start the process all over again, but that is true in both open source and commercial software circles.

[CharlesB]

rgreen4 said:

If it is so great, why does Sun offer a paid office suite? What does it have that Open Office does not? Why would they offer both a paid commercial office suite and an open source one as well?

You are confusing open-source software meaning of the word "free" to mean free as in price. Open-source software is free as in free to edit the program yourself (if you have such programming powers), and not necessarily free as in cost. It can be both -- free as in free beer and free as in the right to edit the source code and make it how you like it, but there are times when you have to pay for open-source software. OpenOffice.org is both kinds of free, while i think Sun's paid for Office suite is proprietary.


So, in other words, all the features and/or bugs with OpenOffice.org that you have cited, you (if you had the knowledge and the time) could edit it and fix it yourself. While you could not do that with Sun's paid-for Office suite, or especially Microsoft's Office. :_| Open-source software means that anybody could write a bug fix, you do not have to wait on the vendor to make such edits. If there is a feature missing, add it yourself, and stop complaining about it. You have the freedom to do so, whether or not you have the ability and time is up to you.

[Evildave]

RedRat said:

Evildave
You either are purposefully or intentionally misreading both of our previous comments. I go back to my point that paid for commercial software has one advantage over free open source software: there is an incentive to produce software exactly as the customer wants and to do it quickly. Whether you like MS Office (and I was a user since it first came out in DOS) or Open Office, if there are things that in the program (bugs or otherwise) they tend to be fixed quicker by MS than Open Office.

There is no such incentive to make the 'best'. Only an incentive for PROFIT. Microsoft does things neither quickly, nor right. Like many software companies, they are as prone to disband or lay off a team for success as for failure. After all, they don't need ALL those bodies to keep chairs warm when they haven't decided what the next version will be. Just a couple of 'maintainers'.

There are MANY people working on and submitting changes to OpenOffice all the time. Anyone who is capable of fixing and is annoyed by a bug can FIX IT. What works best gets adopted. Oh, and BTW OpenOffice changes feed upstream to their StarOffice commercial product, so it's not just abandoned out there. Sun occasionally PAYS for changes. So do some commercial distributions of Linux.

At Microsoft, they have a nine-figure marketing budget to make up for the shortfalls in their software. They can sell it with bugs and just PROMISE to fix the bugs with the next version, and people fall for it.

Quote

I go back to my point, that if you want a successful product that actually sells and makes money for its creator, that product will be fashioned with user in mind. Now if the creator of the software is smart, they will fashion the product so that it appeals to the widest market as possible, that is just simple business sense. Will MS Office appeal to everyone, no way! But it will appeal to a large number of people.

The same 'user oriented' goal for successful products is applicable no matter what channel the software is delivered through. Someone who cares CARES, whether or not there's a profit motive. There is actually a profit motive behind open source software. You can (for instance) charge for support, as Sun does, or take money to add features. Donations are relatively weak, but they're real.

Quote

It has often been said about MS Office that 90% of the people use only 10% of its resources, indeed a bloated piece of software. But considering its success over other highly used word processors (remember WordPerfect) MS must be doing something right. Now this is not a defense of MS or MS Office, since I am now no longer in and office environment, Open Office does everything I want it do and now use it exclusively on my Linux Machine.

Considering Microsoft's history of hobbling competitions through the OS, and of course, a nine-figure marketing budget that nobody can match, there's no way for anyone to possibly compete against Microsoft. They have a de-facto monopoly. A lot of superior products died by Microsoft's hands.

Quote

Now for some programmers, at least in the old days, making money was not the object of their work. They wanted to make a useful product for themselves and perhaps a small coterie of friends or associates. For many programmers, once they finished their project they went on to other work and did not have time or inclination to go back and tweak their earlier creations. My point is that once it is released they have no more obligation to that program.

True, they have no more obligation. Microsoft has no obligation to support ANYTHING that they ship, either. How many very successful PC products have vanished over time? A LOT. Most of them get bought out, and the new owning corporation doesn't know what to do with it after they get it, so they kill it. A sad, long history of such products being killed.

In open source, if you stop maintaining it, someone else will grab it up and begin, if there's any demand for it. Most copyright for-sale products die when the copyright owner decides not to make a new version (or goes out of business, or sells out).

Netscape's Navigator was an exception. They went open source, and it survived past their destruction.

Quote

Do businesses go out of business in the Windows world, of course they do. Right now, there is a chance that GM will go out of business making cars, same can be said for MS, Adobe, or Apple. Sure there is a lot of orphan software out there, but what is the difference if a software company goes out of business and the open sources equivalent where the programmer walks away or is indifferent to tweaking? In the end nothing. Sure you can go out and try to find another equivalent program and start the process all over again, but that is true in both open source and commercial software circles.As I said, when popular open source products are orphaned, someone else can easily pick it up and continue a new branch. Such as SeaMonkey. Mozilla doesn't run that show anymore, but SOMEONE ELSE does.It's a simple matter to pick up where someone left off, especially if there were other individuals involved in the project who already understand it. Sure they work 'after hours' on it, but so what? They love it.

You leave a job at Microsoft or Adobe, do you continue to contribute? Nope. That's it unless you freelance for them.

There have been a LOT of copyright software products where the team would have loved to carry on working on it, but they couldn't. They would be sued by the owner, even if the owner's plans were to abandon it and switch the servers off. Hell, I've witnessed this particular kind of drama from the INSIDE.

In open source, if you want to pick up the torch after the original project creator loses interest or dies, it's ALL YOURS. Just do it. Nobody OWNS it. The software belongs to EVERYONE.

That's the difference. YOU CAN NOT KILL IT. Strike off one of the hydra's heads, another one grows back. As long as there is demand for it, people will work on it, and it will carry on evolving. If the people who run the project turn into dicks, someone will BRANCH it, and then there is competition for which version of the project will continue to be bundled and have support. How many versions of Linux are there?

Some people even PAY for changes to be made to important projects. And it's a lot cheaper than establishing a corporation and hiring a team to do it. Wave $500 around for a freelancer to snap up, and it gets done. You may have a hundred seats running that product, so it just cost you $5 a seat for the upgrade. What's it take to get a brand new feature written into a Microsoft product? If you only have a hundred licenses, you're small potatoes. NOBODY. Microsoft won't give you the time of day.

[BAMT]

"...But considering its success over other highly used word processors (remember WordPerfect) MS must be doing something right."
Brainwash? Not what I'd call right, but close enough for them...

The only reason that OpenOffice has compatibility problems with Microsoft formats is because they obfuscate them with every release in an attempt to thwart free software developers' attempts to write compatible software. If Microsoft were to adopt the OpenDocument format instead, that would help many consumers of their software, as well as of others.
Also, OpenOffice does have a save as PDF option. I have 2.3, and there is an Export to PDF button a few places right of the New, Open, and Save buttons.

[Evildave]

Yes, OpenOffice had that PDF export thing for years. Of course, in Linux it's redundant, because everything can print to ps or PDF, because that driver is there by default.

M$ Office finally added that PDF printing, too? Well, Microsoft is at war with Adobe at the moment. Trying to make 'Silverlight' take the place of Flash, too. Gotta 'add to the OS' every kind of Adobe product, extension and technology that they can, because Microsoft not owning everything is a crime against nature.

So if they eventually succeed, then the people who complain about 'Flash ads' can complain about 'Silverlight ads'. Except the Silverlight stuff will carry malware payloads, like EVERY Microsoft product that touches the web.

[rgreen4]

Evildave said:

Every example you both cite about 'old and new' and software that 'does and doesn't' has comparable Windows examples.

If you send an Office 2007 document to someone with Office 2000, GUESS WHAT? They won't be able to open it.

Funny you should use that example. When I first installed MS Office 2007, the corporate standard where I worked was still MS Office 2000. Yet I was able to prepare Excell spreadsheets and Word documents at home in Office 2007 and open them just fine at work in Office 2000. You simply set the file to save in the Office 97-2003 file format. Of course you give up a few of the advantages of Office 2007. My change was predicated on three items 1) a volunteer organization I work with had shifted all their national training presentations to PowerPoint 2007 and was in the PPSX file format. 2) I knew that Office 2007 was the future, and 3) by purchased MS Office 2007 in the Home and Student version, I could install the software legally on three machines for a total cost of $120.

Evildave said:

So you believe that FREE Open Source software should have absolute feature-for-feature parity with Microsoft's trash, down to the dancing paperclip?

You really need to get more current if you are going to use a feature as a slam. Clippy has been gone for at least the last two and maybe the last three versions of MS Office. Besides, he never did really dance. And if a program is going to be touted as an XYZ replacement, it should have the major features of XYZ, and when touted as XYZ compatible, it should open and write all the XYZ file formats. Now, this is not the fauld of Sun who push OO as an alternative, but the over zealous promoters who push OO as an MS Office replacement.

Evildave said:

Super, I can say with certainty that Open Source software will never satisfy you. It will always be different, even though packages like OpenOffice have features that M$ Office will never have. If you approached this from OpenOffice versus M$ Office, it's exactly the same 'M$ Office Sucks' because of missing features arguments, as well as PAYING MONEY for M$ Office.

There will FOREVER be something that works the way you want it to in one package, and not another. Whether it's Open Source versus Microsoft, or even Microsoft vs. Microsoft. You can't claim that everything Microsoft has ever changed between two versions of a piece of software have been to your liking. After all, XP versus Vista and 2000 versus XP. I bet some borderline-retarded people even missed that stupid paperclip animation when they removed it from Office.

So absolutely nothing that either of you has cited has any particular merit as points against Linux/Open Source. The exact same problems exist between different for-pay software on the same Windows platform. You can always cherry-pick weak projects and compare them to very strong products, and find your 'strong product' wins. Duh. Failing that, you can always whine about 'differences', as if being different from a MICROSOFT product is a crime.

Well, actually the web brower I use the most is Firefox 2 because it works the best with the PCW community website. For those who want to use OO, that's fine. Just don't tout it as 100% compatible when it's not. At best it's about 95%. Now for most people who do not use any of the advanced features, that's fine. The lack of the ability of OO Calc to save a file with a password is, for me, a major flaw. The lack of the ability of OO Write to do mail merge is, to me a major flaw. The lack of support in the Linux OS for Broadcom wireless chips is a major flaw. You keep hearing that Linux is superior because it will run on all machines, but what is left of is the fact that it may not run all features on those machines.

Yes, you say that you can modify open source software to your liking. This is probably true if 1) you had the source code, 2) were a programmer familiar with the language used and 3) had a compiler. This only excludes 99+% of the computing public, which may explain why most open source software has such a poor user penetration. Then there is the fact that if you have 10 different open source products doing similar jobs, you run into problems if you try to exchange files with someone else using a different open source program for the same function. Then there is the problem trying to find information on how to use the 10 different open source programs.

While you obviously are no fan of MS Office, and in truth, I am not either, but you do have to admit that if you want information on how to do something, you have a wide variety of training aids, classes, and how to books available. My personal favorite was WordPerfect, but as no one I know uses it, I am forced to use MS Office to exchange files. As I sit here, I am looking up on the shelf at David Pogue's excellent books on Windows 2000 Pro, Windows XP Pro and Vista. Absolutely nothing like them is available for Linux. Then, if you want to exchange files with your company's office, with only a few exceptions, it will be with MS Office. If you want to exchange files with other, most of the time it will be with MS Office. I do volunteer work with a youth organization and the vast majority of the youth have MS Office on their machines at home. This is because it is available in the schools, and in order to exchange files, they use MS Office. Now, if it is the older version of Office and they just want to write papers, they can use OO, but they generally don't. Most don't even know it exists.

While most people may have heard of Linux, it has the reputation of being a geeky programmers OS. Until it sheds that mode of operating, it will always be considered thus. And in marketing as in much of life, perception is reality. Most new machines come with Windows for a reason, and that reason is that is what is acceptable to the vast majority of computer users. It does the job for them, and they are happy. I was in my Doctor's office yesterday for my routine physical, and noticed that the OS on all the machines was Vista. It did not matter to the nurses and administrative workers using the machines, because each had a module of the medical package up, and it doesn't really matter to them what the OS is, because they never really see it except when they boot the machines. All they are worried about is the information on the screen.

For the average person, the best OS is the one that has the greatest functionality for the job they want to do with the least hassle. For 90% of the people that is some form of Windows. For about 5-6% it is OS/X, for less than 2% it is some form of Linux. For those 2%, they are the geeky programers who talk about all the things you can do with the OS. For 80% of the world, all they want to do is run an application and the OS should be transparent in the background. When they want to install a program, they either want to insert an autorun CD/DVD and let it do it's thing, or down load a program and double click on the download and watch it install itself. Neither feature is available in the Ubuntu 7.04 that I tried, so that automatically excludes the vast majority of users. The typical response that is seen in forums is "well, all you need to do is..." and gives a laundry list of steps to install the application. People are not going to put up with that. I won't, and I'm far more into various setups and aspects of a PC. Shoot, even the old DOS programs installed simpler than that, you just had to copy them over, and create a small batch file to run the program.

If the Linux programming community ever wants Linux to become something other than a geeky programmers OS, they need to make it far far more user friendly, and the installation of an application all but automatic. The fact that with all the volunteer programming power available, they have not done so, tells me they are perfectly satisfied with the perception and reality that it is in fact a geeky programmers language. I think they are perfectly satisfied with the 1.6% market share.

[CharlesB]

rgreen4 said:

Well, actually the web brower I use the most is Firefox 2 because it works the best with the PCW community website. For those who want to use OO, that's fine. Just don't tout it as 100% compatible when it's not. At best it's about 95%. Now for most people who do not use any of the advanced features, that's fine. The lack of the ability of OO Calc to save a file with a password is, for me, a major flaw. The lack of the ability of OO Write to do mail merge is, to me a major flaw. The lack of support in the Linux OS for Broadcom wireless chips is a major flaw. You keep hearing that Linux is superior because it will run on all machines, but what is left of is the fact that it may not run all features on those machines.

OpenOffice.org can do mail merge with Thunderbird (get it from Mozilla - it replaces Outlook)... look here for that how-to. Also about password protecting any file in OpenOffice.org, I found this out in a forum:

Quote

When you first save a file or use File >Save As, there is an option in the bottom left corner of the dialogue to 'Save with password'.

The thing I keep hearing from people, is the fact that they do not know how to do something that they want to do, or that a solution is already been made for their problem. The function is already there -- you are just too lazy to go look for you answer.

Quote

Yes, you say that you can modify open source software to your liking. This is probably true if 1) you had the source code, 2) were a programmer familiar with the language used and 3) had a compiler. This only excludes 99+% of the computing public, which may explain why most open source software has such a poor user penetration. Then there is the fact that if you have 10 different open source products doing similar jobs, you run into problems if you try to exchange files with someone else using a different open source program for the same function. Then there is the problem trying to find information on how to use the 10 different open source programs.

Well, if you are a) too lazy to go get the OPEN-SOURCE CODE, b) too lazy to open up your package downloader app and get yourself a gcc compiler, and c) incapable of growing as a person to learn new things and go down different roads, then I guess you will never see the full benefit of open-source software. If 99% of the computing public were to believe themselves to be as stupid and incapable as you make them, maybe they should stick to the playground they call Microsoft Windows, and leave the really good stuff to us intelligent few. I do not know about the rest of the computing public, but I am not afraid to 'grab the bull by the horns' so to speak. Maybe after putting up with so much crap from M$, people will grow a backbone and make the switch.

Quote

While you obviously are no fan of MS Office, and in truth, I am not either, but you do have to admit that if you want information on how to do something, you have a wide variety of training aids, classes, and how to books available. My personal favorite was WordPerfect, but as no one I know uses it, I am forced to use MS Office to exchange files. As I sit here, I am looking up on the shelf at David Pogue's excellent books on Windows 2000 Pro, Windows XP Pro and Vista. Absolutely nothing like them is available for Linux. Then, if you want to exchange files with your company's office, with only a few exceptions, it will be with MS Office. If you want to exchange files with other, most of the time it will be with MS Office. I do volunteer work with a youth organization and the vast majority of the youth have MS Office on their machines at home. This is because it is available in the schools, and in order to exchange files, they use MS Office. Now, if it is the older version of Office and they just want to write papers, they can use OO, but they generally don't. Most don't even know it exists.

No books for Linux???!?! What pipe have you been smoking? I found over 3,000 at Amazon.com. If you want to exchange office documents with your co-workers,family and/or friends, why not tell them about OpenOffice.org (or make a OpenOffice.org CD and pass it to everybody). Be brave enough to be to stand out, and stand up for Open-Source Software.

Quote

While most people may have heard of Linux, it has the reputation of being a geeky programmers OS. Until it sheds that mode of operating, it will always be considered thus. And in marketing as in much of life, perception is reality. Most new machines come with Windows for a reason, and that reason is that is what is acceptable to the vast majority of computer users. It does the job for them, and they are happy. I was in my Doctor's office yesterday for my routine physical, and noticed that the OS on all the machines was Vista. It did not matter to the nurses and administrative workers using the machines, because each had a module of the medical package up, and it doesn't really matter to them what the OS is, because they never really see it except when they boot the machines. All they are worried about is the information on the screen.

Duh. They are a doctor's office, they can afford all the added software to buy, all the added tech support they require to get their apps to work. The solve their problems like anybody else who HAS money -- they throw money at the problem hoping it to go away.

For the average person, the best OS is the one that has the greatest functionality for the job they want to do with the least hassle. For 90% of the people that is some form of Windows. For about 5-6% it is OS/X, for less than 2% it is some form of Linux. For those 2%, they are the geeky programers who talk about all the things you can do with the OS. For 80% of the world, all they want to do is run an application and the OS should be transparent in the background. When they want to install a program, they either want to insert an autorun CD/DVD and let it do it's thing, or down load a program and double click on the download and watch it install itself. Neither feature is available in the Ubuntu 7.04 that I tried, so that automatically excludes the vast majority of users. The typical response that is seen in forums is "well, all you need to do is..." and gives a laundry list of steps to install the application. People are not going to put up with that. I won't, and I'm far more into various setups and aspects of a PC. Shoot, even the old DOS programs installed simpler than that, you just had to copy them over, and create a small batch file to run the program.
If the Linux programming community ever wants Linux to become something other than a geeky programmers OS, they need to make it far far more user friendly, and the installation of an application all but automatic. The fact that with all the volunteer programming power available, they have not done so, tells me they are perfectly satisfied with the perception and reality that it is in fact a geeky programmers language. I think they are perfectly satisfied with the 1.6% market share.

Have you heard of Synaptic or any kind package managers? Obviously not, because if you had then you would know its a snap to download and install hundreds of thousands of programs in Linux (especially Ubuntu). You open this one program, find what you want to install IN Synaptic or a similar package manager (they are listed in categories, or you just type the name and and it finds it for you). That one program that you searched for the program, then can download it also, PLUS it installs it for you too! Now if you can't deal with something that is that easy, you got problems.

People just going off talking about stuff they just do not understand or know anything about -- really pisses me off.

[dragon69]

i agree with evildave on most points but he left out that some suckers like to pay the big bucks just so they can brag to the jones that they paid

big bucks for it ( and then may not tell you about all the bugs in it but whatever it takes to stay ahead of the jones )

oh you say that linux will not (parts of it any ways like the broadcom wireless chipsets) on all machines but guess what all versions of windoze will

not run on all computers either ( pull out the wallet for more upgrades like more ram or a bigger hard drive or a new

computer and see what is cheaper ) so spend ten or twenty bucks and get a wireless card that will

work with ubuntu and it will end up being cheaper then a windoze upgrade that you might need for the next version of

windoze ( yes the system requirements for windoze is always increasing )

well with my limited knowledge i think i wold rather pay 10 or 20 for a new wireless

card or usb dongle then 100 bucks for 2 or 4 gb of ddr2 or 3 but that is just

gl and tc

chuck the under educated with my 2 cents

[rgreen4]

CharlesB said:

OpenOffice.org can do mail merge with Thunderbird (get it from Mozilla - it replaces Outlook)... look here for that how-to. Also about password protecting any file in OpenOffice.org, I found this out in a forum:

Mail Merge is where you merge an address file with a template to print envelopes or labels. It has absolutely nothing to do with e-mails. Now why would Thunderbird, an e-mail program print envelopes?

CharlesB said:

Well, if you are a) too lazy to go get the OPEN-SOURCE CODE, b) too lazy to open up your package downloader app and get yourself a gcc compiler, and c) incapable of growing as a person to learn new things and go down different roads, then I guess you will never see the full benefit of open-source software. If 99% of the computing public were to believe themselves to be as stupid and incapable as you make them, maybe they should stick to the playground they call Microsoft Windows, and leave the really good stuff to us intelligent few. I do not know about the rest of the computing public, but I am not afraid to 'grab the bull by the horns' so to speak. Maybe after putting up with so much crap from M$, people will grow a backbone and make the switch.

It is precisely this attitude from the Linux crowd that turns the other 98% of the world off. Not everyone can be, want's to be or even has the time to be a programmer. This attitude is what will keep Linux and most of the open source world the domain of the geeky programmer. The two main exceptions to that is Open Office and Firefox when run in Windows. They come with an installer. Such a thing that would make Linux so much easier to use, the lack of which at this late date must be on purpose to keep Linux the small community that it is.

[RedRat]

I must agree with rgreen4 in his/her response to CharlesB. Linux right now is on the threshhold of advancing from the geek corner out to the world at large. In order to do this, the majority of potential users want an OS that just plain works, has useful programs that do what they want and DO NOT WANT to become programmers. Ease of use of the OS is first and foremost. The reason the Mac succeeded in making inroads on the Windows PC is that it marketed itself as the computer for non-geek types. It sells itself on ease of use and transparency.

Without much effort, Linux can do that too. Does this mean every distro of Linux has to be this way--No! It is clear that that the Linux organization is trying to position Ubuntu in that camp. I go way back to the original Red Hat days and Ubuntu has come a very long way since those days in terms of ease of use. Should all of the distros go this way, perhaps but it is not necessary. Some distros lend themselves to corporate/enterprise use, some to scientific computing, develop them for the professional IT people.

Back to a few comments that Evildave made concerning profit incentive. I would agree that some companies want to make as cheap a product as they can get away with, this is the old "how much sawdust can you put in the salami before the buyer rejects it" approach to business that is taught in just about every Business School and MBA program. Yes, it does work for awhile. Eventually, in the competitive market, along comes a guy with the brilliant idea that "hey, maybe salami shouldn't have any sawdust in it!". What a Brilliant Concept and he goes out and makes the NEW and Improved salami. Eventually, in software, if you do not give the customer what he or she wants, your program is going to die on the vine. Customers eventually ask "am I getting my mony's worth buying this program?".

Of course any company wants to be able to make the cheapest product it can. It must compete with the guy next door. A company must get its cost/unit down to as a low as possible because the company is in BUSINESS not CHARITY! The idea behind starting a business is to make money, but doing so by satisfying some kind of consumer demand--be that hamburgers, autos, or software.

Now we all might like to bitch about Microsoft, but it must be doing something right. While I think that Office has become a bloated office software suite, clearly a very, very large number of people and businesses have bought into it. Have they made a good business decision? Some have, some have not. Each business has to evaluate their information technologies. But one thing that has to be kept in mind is that the costs to large enterprises is not just the price of the original software program but most goes into bringing the various users throughout the enterprise in being able to use the software and maintain it. In reality, a the least cost item for corporate users is the initial purchase of the software: $600 to over $1000 for a software package is peanuts in comparison to putting on each and every computer, training the people to use it, and then maintaining it--this runs into 10 to 100 times that original purchase price. Now you can see what the open source community and Linux is up against, even if a company got the software free, implementation and maintainence are where the cost is.

[dragon69]

and Ubuntu has come a very long way since those days in terms of ease of use.

yes redrat this is a good point but we are not quite there yet as you pointed out

and the rest of your comments are right there too but also this is why microsoft

needs a strong competitor or rival so they will have to deliver better software

(and hardware just look at the xbox and xbox 360 both had teething pains) with

less bugs and also listen to us when we have problems with their stuff (hardware or software

but right now they are only major game in town and do not have to listen to us

i know i had problems with both windoze and linux operating system in the past

but ubuntu has picked up the pace and is getting close to making microsoft take notice of ubuntu and also us

well good luck everyone and take care

Chuck

my tag line . . if microsoft had some serious competition then they would have to put out better

software and hardware but as it stand today they are the only game in town ( apple and linux

only have a small share of operating system out their ) so why listen to our complaints ( vista and windoze 7 biggest competition right now is win xp )

[RedRat]

dragon69 I would agree with you. Microsoft needs strong competition and the only company right now in the commercial arena is Apple with the Mac. But the question to ask is whether Apple will continue to do so. Right now Apple makes most of its money from the non-computer part of the company (iPods, iPhones, iTunes, etc). Linux ubuntu certainly has the chance to do that I believe. To show you the inroads Linux is making, this morning I was watching "Live with Regis and Kelly" show on TV and they were showing electronic gadgets and gifts. They actually showed a Dell laptop running Linux!!! Clearly, the potential is there to become something other than just the third runner up. But to live up to the potential, Linux Ubuntu is going to have to be addressed to a much wider audience than just geeky programmers. Updates and installation of programs is going to have to be much easier requiring only the click of a mouse. There are still too many programs that still require de-archiving and copying into certain folder locations, but Debian has made great progress here with its package manager.

As to software bugs, they will always be with us. I doubt that there will be ever a program without bugs except for the classical program "hello world". The more complex the problem you are trying to solve, the more lines of code needed, and the probability for errors goes up exponentially. What you hope for is to have someone quickly respond to those bugs--this was my intent with this original post to begin with and why I suggested that commercial software gets fixed faster--sometimes.

[CharlesB]

[quote name='rgreen4']
>

CharlesB said:

> OpenOffice.org can do mail merge with Thunderbird (get it from Mozilla - it replaces Outlook)... look here for that how-to. Also about password protecting any file in OpenOffice.org, I found this out in a forum:
Mail Merge is where you merge an address file with a template to print envelopes or labels. It has absolutely nothing to do with e-mails. Now why would Thunderbird, an e-mail program print envelopes?>

The reason why you think OpenOffice.org does not have mail merge is because it does not have an Email client built-in to it, like M$ Office does (Outlook -- an Email client -- does the mail merge function). To get the same thing done you need to add Thunderbird, or use the SeaMonkey Suite. It doesn't matter that OpenOffice needs a email client program to get the job done. It just works, so why are you sitting here complaining about -- go try it.

CharlesB said:

> Well, if you are a) too lazy to go get the OPEN-SOURCE CODE, b) too lazy to open up your package downloader app and get yourself a gcc compiler, and c) incapable of growing as a person to learn new things and go down different roads, then I guess you will never see the full benefit of open-source software. If 99% of the computing public were to believe themselves to be as stupid and incapable as you make them, maybe they should stick to the playground they call Microsoft Windows, and leave the really good stuff to us intelligent few. I do not know about the rest of the computing public, but I am not afraid to 'grab the bull by the horns' so to speak. Maybe after putting up with so much crap from M$, people will grow a backbone and make the switch.
It is precisely this attitude from the Linux crowd that turns the other 98% of the world off. Not everyone can be, want's to be or even has the time to be a programmer. This attitude is what will keep Linux and most of the open source world the domain of the geeky programmer. The two main exceptions to that is Open Office and Firefox when run in Windows. They come with an installer. Such a thing that would make Linux so much easier to use, the lack of which at this late date must be on purpose to keep Linux the small community that it is.

Linux has a KICK-ASS Installer!!!!!! IT IS CALLED A PACKAGE MANAGER!!! ARE YOU EVEN TOO LAZY TO CLICK THE LINK I PROVIDED???? Here it is again ===> Click this. This time actually click the link and read the page!!! So freaking lazy! OMG!

BTW, yes, I am one of those people that probably give Linux and the open source commuity a bad name to you typical Window's users. I prefer to use Slackware Linux, because they do NOT have a graphical package manager by default. I prefer to get the source code straight from the organization that wrote the code in the first place. I prefer to 'configure', 'make', and 'sudo make install'. I prefer that open-source software remain exactly that: open-source.

If my preferences keep you from enjoying open-source software, then that's your problem that you let something so trivial get in your way. Excuses, excuses, excuses -- pitiful.

Message was edited by: CharlesB

[RedRat]

CharlyB
Yes Linux does have a good package installer in Synaptic, providing that all you need are in repositories. However, sometimes updates to programs may take months to get to the repository. For example, I use Pan newsreader and the latest, non-buggy is not yet in the repos yet and you get it from the Pan website. You can get a debian package, thankfully, from other sources and quickly install that with the Debian Package installer (merely double click on the *.deb package). Other updated programs come only in tar balls and these are not so straightforward to install for the newbie, I am hesitent to install these.

[edit] I just checked and it appears that Synaptic now has the updated Pan in its repos. But I installed my version way back in June or July.

[CharlesB]

RedRat said:

CharlyB

Yes Linux does have a good package installer in Synaptic, providing that all you need are in repositories. However, sometimes updates to programs may take months to get to the repository. For example, I use Pan newsreader and the latest, non-buggy is not yet in the repos yet and you get it from the Pan website. You can get a debian package, thankfully, from other sources and quickly install that with the Debian Package installer (merely double click on the *.deb package). Other updated programs come only in tar balls and these are not so straightforward to install for the newbie, I am hesitent to install these.

edit] I just checked and it appears that Synaptic now has the updated Pan in its repos. But I installed my version way back in June or July.

1st thing: My name is CharlesB, not 'CharlyB'.

2nd thing: Linux and the software it mostly uses are open-source code. This means that normally the people who construct such open-source software output it to the community at large in that open-source format -- you are getting the actual source code, not a binary or an installer. They have better things to do with their time than make an installer for every different kind of distro out there. It's up to you, the non-lazy user (especially if you want the latest and greatest version), to go get the source code, get the packages that help you to construct packages that your distro uses from that source code that you just downloaded. Do not be so scared of the command line -- its not going to bite you. Do not be so afraid to learn something new. Here is a link to help you with this: [Click me.

It is as i said before your answer is out there, you just have to go look for it.

[CharlesB]

[quote name='rgreen4']
>

CharlesB said:

> OpenOffice.org can do mail merge with Thunderbird (get it from Mozilla - it replaces Outlook)... look here for that how-to. Also about password protecting any file in OpenOffice.org, I found this out in a forum:
Mail Merge is where you merge an address file with a template to print envelopes or labels. It has absolutely nothing to do with e-mails. Now why would Thunderbird, an e-mail program print envelopes?

Here is a better web page describing how to really get mail merge to function:

>Click this link.

It requires you to have Mozilla's Thunderbird (the makers of Firefox) or Mozilla's SeaMonkey Suite.

There are a great supply of open-source software that are available to Window's users -- that's how i got hooked on open-source software. I used to run Windows, then I started seeing things in these open-source software that worked safer/better for Linux users, than it did in Windows. Since I was using more, and more, and still more open-source software anyway, It wasn't so hard to jump into Linux. The big thing is, you just have to make the decision to do it, or not. I was able to wipe my drive, partition my drive, and install both. I could switch back and forth whenever I wanted to.

[RedRat]

Sorry CharlesB

you wrote:
bq. "2nd thing: Linux and the software it mostly uses are open-source code. This means that normally the people who construct such open-source software output it to the community at large in that open-source format -- you are getting the actual source code, not a binary or an installer. They have better things to do with their time than make an installer for every different kind of distro out there. It's up to you, the non-lazy user (especially if you want the latest and greatest version), to go get the source code, get the packages that help you to construct packages that your distro uses from that source code that you just downloaded. Do not be so scared of the command line -- its not going to bite you. "
You have missed my context point. Your attitude that "the non-lazy user.." is precisely the attitude problem I was complaining about and what I was talking about reaching the 98% Non-geek audience out there if Linux Ubuntu is to move beyond just a small coterie of users. If Linux is to succeed beyond a handful of users, it does have to have applications available to those who have absolutely no interest in programming or maintaining code. This requires simple installation and not a bunch of steps using the command line. The command line will always be there for those who enjoy that, but this does not include that other 98% or so. They want their apps to do things and get on with their work. Their work is NOT maintaining an operating system or an application. The novelist just wants to write his/her book, the office worker just wants to get that report out. They have neither the time or inclination to jump through hoops. This is what I meant in my above posts when I said the cost of maintaining software is not just the purchase price, it is the time of the IT people and the users in getting up to speed in running apps and getting useful work done.



This is why I said that there are Linux distros out there that can be as complex as your heart desires and you can continue to lord it over and snigger at the hapless workers in your shop (i.e,, "you are too lazy....."). I would hope that your attitude is not that of the Ubuntu community because for once I see the strong possibility of Ubuntu being a real competitor to Windows. It can give Microsoft a run for its money.

[CharlesB]

RedRat said:

This is why I said that there are Linux distros out there that can be as complex as your heart desires and you can continue to lord it over and snicker at the hapless workers in your shop (i.e,, "you are too lazy....."). I would hope that your attitude is not that of the Ubuntu community because for once I see the strong possibility of Ubuntu being a real competitor to Windows. It can give Microsoft a run for its money.

No, I welcome Ubuntu in all of its flavors, and any other distro. And I welcome any and all people who jump onto the Linux/BSD/Solaris bandwagon. It doesn't matter which distro you choose, as long as you choose a *nix distro -- with one exception. I really do not like people who try to change Linux to conform to Windows. Just because they do not like how Linux is different, doesn't mean that everybody agrees with them. Forcing your opinion on the alternative way of doing things which makes the open-source community what it is, is just wrong. I am not a cookie-cutter human being, shaped to be like everyone else. I do not like everything you like, and you don't have to like everything that I like, but don't ruin the things that I like. Remember that one of the core things of the open-source software is the fact that there is a great multitude of choices. I like that there are a great many distros. I like that there are many different ways to setup my desktop's GUI. I like the fact that there are many different programs that I could choose to use, or not use. I relish that I can still use the command line to do things. Just remember those things, and welcome to the party. Help yourself.

[dragon69]

Thanks for the good links CharlesB and i will check out your other post as i might
either try the 8.10 ubuntu or fedora core 9 (64 bit version of either i think)

got any tips on envy NG ? will it work with onboard graphics chips? as in the past

i tried to use compviz (on ubuntu 8.04 gutsy gibbons) and stuff but my onboard would not set it up

right (ati x1200 or 1250 depends on which program is reporting it lol )

good luck and take care

Chuck



THANKS FOR ANY HELP (from this noob but i am not lazy or to scared to try out some new stuff)

[CharlesB]

dragon69 said:

>Thanks for the good links CharlesB and i will check out your other post as i might

Quote

either try the 8.10 ubuntu or fedora core 9 (64 bit version of either i think)
got any tips on envy NG ? will it work with onboard graphics chips? as in the past
i tried to use compviz (on ubuntu 8.04 gutsy gibbons) and stuff but my onboard would not set it up
right (ati x1200 or 1250 depends on which program is reporting it lol )
good luck and take care

Chuck

>

Quote

THANKS FOR ANY HELP (from this noob but i am not lazy or to scared to try out some new stuff)

I really don't know about higher graphic cards or onboard graphics. I don't have any high-end graphic cards with very much video RAM in any of my PC's. So I am just able to get Direct Rendering turned on, and that's about it. I cannot use Compviz or any of those eye candy graphics software. Sorry.
If you don't have DRI turned on... i can help with that:
>This link might help.

But that's all the help I can do for you. Good Luck.