Linked by Thom Holwerda on Sat 29th Mar 2008 23:02 UTC
Version 2.4 of the OpenOffice productivity suite was released on Thursday, boasting enhancements to all its core components. Possibly the most significant alteration in the new version of the free suite is in the description of file types. The 'OpenDocument' description has been replaced by 'ODF', which stands for 'OpenDocument Format' and is becoming a well-known acronym thanks to rivalry with Microsoft's controversial OOXML format.
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RE: How many features uses the average user
by evangs on Sun 30th Mar 2008 17:35
in reply to "How many features uses the average user"
Member since:2005-07-07
I think the average user does not use over 50% of all the features in MS-Office. Even if they have OOo they will not use all of his features.
See, the premise of such arguments are based on pure speculation. The "average user" does not use over "50%" of all the features? Calc is fairly annoying for me in that I work with people who use DATEDIF a lot. OO has no support for such a function and I guess most people have no need of a function to find the difference (i.e. time elapsed) between dates ... There are ways of solving it (http://www.openofficetips.com/2007/07/18/who-needs-datedif/) but that is no where near as elegant as a simple DATEDIF function. I guess not "enough" users need it to warrant such a simple fix.
OO is not there yet. Sure, it might be there for some people, but do not chastise them if OO truly isn't suitable for them.
RE: How many features uses the average user
by Innova on Sun 30th Mar 2008 20:06
in reply to "How many features uses the average user"
Member since:2005-09-30
I think the average user does not use over 50% of all the features in MS-Office. Even if they have OOo they will not use all of his features.
the trouble with these arguments is that, even if true, every user likely uses a different subset of 50% of the features. Hence, having 100% of the features to please everyone, or 50% of the features and pleasing no one.
RE[2]: How many features uses the average user
by sbergman27 on Sun 30th Mar 2008 20:12
in reply to "RE: How many features uses the average user"
Member since:2005-07-24
Hence, having 100% of the features to please everyone, or 50% of the features and pleasing no one.
Or having 80% and pleasing most people.
Then again, a fair question might be "What percentage of OO.o's features does MSO support?". Depending upon which way you ask the question, one or the other side is always put at a disadvantage.
RE: How many features uses the average user
by pjafrombbay on Mon 31st Mar 2008 06:01
in reply to "How many features uses the average user"
Member since:2005-07-31
I think the average user does not use over 50% of all the features in MS-Office. Even if they have OOo they will not use all of his features...
I agree! I'm retired and my 'Office' requirements are significantly reduced (although I still need a good quality word processor). MS Office is out on cost grounds. I tried OOo for several years but find it over-kill so have recently switched to Atlantis Word Processor (http://www.atlantiswordprocessor.com/en/) and while I have to pay for it I find it has all the features I need and is very lean and uses few resources. I have also acquired copies of GS Calc and GS Base from JPS Developments (http://www.jps-development.com/) and for the limited amount of spreadsheeting and databaseing that I do these are good enough.
Regards,
Peter
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 23:02 UTC, submitted by M.Onty
"Microsoft has sensationally abandoned its controversial plans to restrict the sharing of XBox One games, and has also removed daily online authentication requirements for its forthcoming console", reports The Guardian. They had no choice. Still a good move.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 22:28 UTC
"A snippet of code in the Steam digital distribution platform has revealed that Valve may be planning to let users easily share their games with friends in the future. The Verge has verified the code's authenticity, which was originally spotted by a member of the NeoGAF gaming forum; the code references a 'shared game library' and a notification that would alert a user when their games are currently in use by a borrower." This would change the, uh, game.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 21:03 UTC
Jon Rubinstein, former CEO of Palm: "Well, I'm not sure I would have sold the company to HP. That's for sure. Talk about a waste. Not that I had any choice because when you sell a company you don't get to decide that. Obviously, the board and shareholders decide that. If we had known they were just going to shut it down and never really give it a chance to flourish, what would have been the point of selling the company? I think the deal we had with Verizon really hurt us, but who knew that at the time? These things are all hindsight."More News »
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2007-02-20
Hi,
I think the average user does not use over 50% of all the features in MS-Office. Even if they have OOo they will not use all of his features.
So OOo will do for the majority. If you manage a business it should be the manager to decide, not his employees what office-software is used. There are loads of arguments not to use MS-Office, so a smart manager choses OOo and, only those that can actually show that a feature they cannot work without is only available in Ms-office might get a licence. This will save a lot of money for every business.
Some here seem to think that managing a business is just to give employees everything the demand, sorry to say so but the world is not like that.