“Microsoft plans to release on Monday the first significant update to the Mac OS X version of Office and will also introduce a version of its instant messaging program designed for the latest Mac operating system.” Read the report at ZDNews. On other Mac news, both DigiTimes and TheRegister are reporting that new iMacs, with larger LCD monitors will debut on the 3rd quarter this year.
Microsoft Remodels MacOSX Office
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Maybe the office department should be separated from the rest of Microsoft. I have always been against it, but hey, they might even make a version for Linux if they were on their own.
It wouldn’t make economic sense on the other hand, but it’s good that they are really supporting MacOS X.
I’m not really sure how well they are supporting OS X. When MS releases a Carbonized version of Outlook, or a version of WMP that doesn’t totally suck, maybe I’ll believe.
“Maybe the office department should be separated from the rest of Microsoft. I have always been against it, but hey, they might even make a version for Linux if they were on their own.”
It wouldn’t make sense for two reasons:
#1: The typical person using Linux on the desktop is an anti-Microsoft zealot, and wouldn’t buy MS Office for Linux.
#2: The few that would buy it would not even make up for the cost of doing a Linux port. Microsoft would lose money on the deal.
Stereotype me as “an anti-Microsoft zealot” if you like, but I personally believe that the public needs to be weaned from the whole “office” paradigm.
The promise of the computer in the office was to replace the piles and piles of paper in the workplace; to move toward a “paperless office”. Instead, the laser printer has caused a flood of paper! We really don’t need to produce so much paper, especially when you consider that a paper document today is typically used for a couple of minutes, then thrown away. There is too much waste!
It’s the 21st century, folks! We have e-mail to send letters with — why not use it instead of Word? We have HTML and Acrobat to make things look nice, although websites full of porky PDF documents that must be downloaded in full to be read is a step in the wrong direction IMHO. Excel can go as well, since 99% of the time it is used to print tables, and not to do calculations. Both Excel and Access could be replaced by an XML-driven program that manages all sorts of data. And PowerPoint just plain needs to go. Every PowerPoint presentation that I’ve seen revolved around using PowerPoint, not the subject. Slideshows suck!
Before anyone starts using inductive reasoning to say that we shouldn’t try to improve the office document structure, just because the software to do so isn’t here yet, let me say that we are already off to a good start. Modern desktop environments like KDE 3 are already set up to work without the “dead tree sneakernet”. All that has to be done is to change the emphasis in UI design away from 80s-think to the networked way of doing things. The e-mail client application can easily grow into being a general interface for producing text-based content. The spreadsheet program would need to grow up into a more generalized data interface. The real innovation would need to be applied to creating an all-new interface for photographic images, music files and other things for which there are no metaphors to 1800s’ technology.
Another thing that needs to be done is the elimination of proprietary document formats in specific, and document file formats in general. The 21st century home for user data is the database, not the filesystem. SOHO and mobile users can use one of the many excellent free database engines on the back end, while corporate offices could use a “big” database engine like Oracle. The modularity between the data stores and the data interfaces allows for easy transitions from the economy-minded home computing to security-minded business environments. The corporate data store would be the mainframe of the future, and users would be allowed far more flexibility that environments like Citrix provide.
In summary, it’s time that we started using our networks to do things. It’s time that we start cutting down on our consumption of all that paper, and the mechanical monstrosities that spit out all that paper. It’s time for the office suite to become obsolete, like the inkwell and blotter. It’s not about hatred, it’s about progress.
This might be an historic moment… I totally agree with all above said!
I don’t mean to offend you Speed, because I too agree with you that the world needs to be rid of Office. But if you work in an office environment long enough, you will see how dependent people are of MS’s Office package. I do not know what your work experience is like, so I’m holding off judgement of you, but I want you to understand that it’s not an easy task to simply “not use MS Office.”
Here’s why my coworkers use Word instead of any other text othre, as you suggested email, HTMl, or XML for simple text messages:
* – Version tracking. One person writes a document, puts it on our server for other people to view and edit. Word automatically archieves and tracks changes. It includes the name of the person that made the edit, and users can insert comments in the document that do not obscure the document itself. In a work environment where people treat these files as just data that anyone can access and use, it is important to know who has touched the data and what they did with it.
Here is why we use Access as our database back bone:
Reports. We collect data in 2 forms: textual data that fit nicely in a table, and pictures taken with digital cameras. The Report feature is a perfect way of synchronizing the textual data with the graphical data, and it makes everything easier to quickly create a presentation that’s dynamic because it grabs the content from a database that changes and grows.
As far as Excel goes, it’s useful for entering data in a non-linear fashion, this can be a plus, but it can also be a nightmare. I haven’t seen it used much in my office.
Outlook has an interesting way of sharing Calendar and Task items, allowing users to edit and add items to each other’s calendars, and see each others schedules to plan meetings and so forth. There are a number of stand alone products available to accomplish the task of collaboration. Outlook’s approach is cheap and likely to fail (it sends the updates via email with a binary attachment that only Outlook understands) but it’s there and so people use it.
Like I said, I don’t like the Office package. Outlook wrecked havok on my network because of the viri and security holes. The Calendar sharing this works about 33% of the time and is just a big pain. Access breaks backwards compatibility with each new release, and that is hell for me as a programmer having to update my software to work with a new version of Access.
In Microsoft’s eyes, the open source community does not exist. They only care about themselves and do not acknowledge the competition. That said, it’s not likely that MS will agree to any universal standard of data representation. Look at what they did with Javascript. They didn’t get the honor of inventing it, so they reinvented it and called it “JScript” and now webmasters have to do extra work in making their javascript cross browser compatible.
Where we stand right now, one of two things can happen. Microsoft may finally achieve total domination and their standard will be the standard. Or the DoJ or someone else will finally knock MS off the throne and force them to comply with standards that work across multiple platforms. Their is a diversity between platforms in the way that data is represented. The Internet is doing a good job in bridging the gaps. I think that proprietary technologies like .Net, and to some extremes even Java, will disturb the stability of the platform neutrality that is the idea behind the Internet.
It’s easy to sit down and brain storm ideas of how to unite all the computer platforms to a common scheme so that each can share data. After all, data is just data. But it’s not so easy to get those ideas into action. I’ve grown to accept the fact that I will have to work in heterogenous computer environments, and even at home, I have to have multiple computers of different hardware/operating systems to get a full comuting experience. My solution is to change the way I use computers, not wish that everything would just work nicely together.
I read an article a while back that discussed how computers have made people lazy. We rely on calculators to do simple math computations, and that weakens our mental power. Business men with electronic organizers will develop poor short term memory because they’re not exercising their brain to remember things. I don’t mean to offend anyone, but it’s just typical to hear people asking for the easy way out. I’m the kind of person who will do anything at any cost to complete a task with no regard to harm done to self. This may be harmful to me, but it makes me more efficient. Sometimes that means I have to do things the long way, but in the end the work gets done and that’s what matters.
Here we are at the end of this rant. I think that before we get into establishing standards and making computers easier to use, we need to educate people. We need smarted users, not smarter software. Technology is only as good as the people using it. Not everything is super easy “one-click-solutions.” Sure it would be great if everything got done with just a click of a button, but nuclear weapons are launched with just a button press, and we all know how useful nukes are.
“Stereotype me as “an anti-Microsoft zealot” if you like, but I personally believe that the public needs to be weaned from the whole “office” paradigm.”
I don’t stereotype you as an anti-Microsoft zealot. I stereotype you as a troll based on discussions with you in other posts.
“We have HTML…”
Yeah. HTML does a real good job of producing production quality documents for printing.
“Excel can go as well, since 99% of the time it is used to print tables, and not to do calculations.”
This is simply wrong. 99% of the time it is used to generate graphs which can then be pasted into word documents.
“Acrobat”
In case you haven’t noticed, Acrobat is not a document creator. It is a software printer that takes existing documents created in other software and and converts it into a platform / software independant format.
“Both Excel and Access could be replaced by an XML-driven program that manages all sorts of data.”
Um… XML doesn’t have any data management capabilities. There are however, databases that can manage XML documents. However, XML documents cannot replace databases.
“And PowerPoint just plain needs to go. Every PowerPoint presentation that I’ve seen revolved around using PowerPoint, not the subject. Slideshows suck!”
Don’t blame PowerPoint for the fact that most people don’t know how to put together a decent presentation. Sure most presentations suck becuse most people don’t use PowerPoint the way it was intended to be used. Most people use PowerPoint to created bulleted lists that just parrot what they are saying during their presentation. PowerPoint is great for graphics, visuals, etc. (As is StarPresent if you don’t like MS Office. There are decent alternatives from OpenOffice for example).
“In summary, it’s time that we started using our networks to do things.”
The problem is that people don’t like to sit in front of their computer and read. This is why e-zines have not replaced printed magazines to any major degree. It’s you still get daily newspapers in print. It’s why e-books have not made printed books obsolete. People want to sit in their favorite chair and read, or go to the coffee shop and read, or read while curled up in bed. They don’t want to get eyestrain by reading poorly formatted HTML on their computer screens.
>>People want to sit in their favorite chair and read, or go to the coffee shop and read, or read while curled up in bed. They don’t want to get eyestrain by reading poorly formatted HTML on their computer screens.<<
It looks like the Tablet PC might have some use afterall, though there is nothing finer than relaxing and enjoying your favorite paperback!
Paper isn’t going anyplace. Many people myself included hate reading long things on computers. Its just not comfortable. Plus I also like tpo be able to flip trough pages and have notes and such. Computers just don’t do it. Just use an online dictonary and you will see how much better real books are.
I’m far from offended, TLy! In fact I’m thrilled to see people putting down their clubs of dogma, and discussing a topic. Bravo!
You seem to think that going Office-free is an insurmountable task, but have you ever tried? I mean, really really given it your best effort? Sure, offices are filled with people dependant on MS Office. Crack houses are filled with people who are dependant on drugs, and people do something about that!
I’ve been through some paradigm shifts in my corporate life, so I know first hand that if management says so, that people will change. When the old e-mail system goes dead, even the most stubborn hold-out will finally start using the new one. All it takes is management with a spine to make the policies, then stick to them. Right now, the people who drive the Office status quo are the users. But the users aren’t qualified or responsible for it! But that’s a management problem; I want to stick with the technical issues if I can.
TLy, I used to work in a law firm, so I’m all too familiar with document versioning systems. What Word provides is rudimentary, and there’s no reason why something like that can’t be implemented in another program. Or you could use a third-party solution.
What you do with Access and Excel can also be done with non-Microsoft programs, and there’s no reason why you couldn’t continue to do things like that in my scheme. In fact, my scheme just might lead you to a better way of doing it!
There are hundreds if not thousands of groupware products out there, so there’s no reason whatsoever to put up with Outlook. My scheme (remember that’s just a pre-alpha idea; it can always grow) has an interface similar to Outlook’s, but would be even more comprehensive.
I still do mathematical calculations by hand, and don’t use a PIM to schedule my day — it’s all in my head. I don’t know if I would have much success if I tried to force my discipline on others, though. Lazy people will always find ways to be lazy. My vision isn’t about being easy anyway! I simply believe that you get paid to produce, not to consume. People who buy office suites, then find ways to use them are consumers. People who make business rules, then cooperate with other people to execute them (leveraging technology to do so inexpensively) are producers. Those who produce are the ones who I want to help.
Firstly, thank you again Eugenia for your great site. I still haven’t figured out how to make italics and bold tags work, but that is more my fault that yours.
Anyway, I agree with both the poster that suggests that we do away with the office concept and the poster that suggests that office is a great tool, and that word, excel and access have fundematal uses in nearly every office. Word is a great way to write documents that are viewable anywhere on the network and also include document control and author control, which text and html do not. Excel is a great way to make graphs and to format data for lists and for mathematical calculations. and Access is a great way to get a quick and dirty database for anyone who doesn’t want to learn a full database, oracle, sybase, et cetera. Outlook+Exchange is a great way to setup corporate email.
However, 90% of the time, these tools are used for task that either could be done with another tool much better, or with a free, portable, standard tool that would make it much easier on the office user, server admins, and basically everyone involved. Word is used for simple text messages that can easily be written in text. Word is used for static documents that could be displayed better in PDF. Excel is used not for lists or equations, but just a way to format data in columns, which could be done much easier using a different tool, can’t really think of any offhand, but, I am sure several exist. Access is a good tool for what it does, but it really doesn’t do much, and that is why it isn’t used very much (least of all the other part of office I imagine). Outlook+exchange is really good at what it does, and there really isn’t anything decent that it could be replaced with, which is sad considering it’s price, horrible security, pain to administer, hidden costs (thinking exchange here), low functionality, confusing interface, and proprietary nature.
Speaking of which, one of the real reasons MS office should be replaced is the reason it is so popular, it uses proprietary file formats that cannot be read on anything but MS office. The cost of office is entirely too much and the costs can be quite a burden for small companies, but they have to pay it for operability with larger companies. The industry has created an artificially high barrier of entry by its dependence on Office.
As far as a paperless office, I don’t think it is really feasable. Even if tools existed to make collaberation and portability needed to make this work, it still wouldn’t happen for phsichological reasons, unless computers become really really integrated into our everyday lives, meaning that computers are something we can carry around like a notepad. Remeber, if you print out something at work, you can read it on the train home, or anywhere that there are no computers handy (which is still a lot).
–The author is this post is not reponcible for any spelling, grammer, or logic mistakes that may be present in this post.
Paperless office has mostly to do with the way documents are stored, retrieved, searched and circulated. The technology to do all these things is affordable and widely used.
Even when a corporation has become 100% paperless by this definition, there will still be a ton of wasted paper by the printer, just because people are more comfortable reading hard copies rather than soft copies.
This waste will stop only when electronic paper becomes as cheap as traditional paper.
I’m not a huge Anti-MS zealot, but why bother with Office unless you need powerpoint? There are plenty of alternatives on pretty much every OS. Abiword, StarOffice/OpenOffice, Gobe Productive, kOffice, hell my iMac came with AppleWorks which has been just fine for me. Why fork out the $200+ for Office?
CattBeMac writes “It looks like the Tablet PC might have some use afterall, though there is nothing finer than relaxing and enjoying your favorite paperback!”
And brad writes “Paper isn’t going anyplace. Many people myself included hate reading long things on computers. Its just not comfortable. Plus I also like tpo be able to flip trough pages and have notes and such. Computers just don’t do it. Just use an online dictonary and you will see how much better real books are.”
I’m with CattBeMac on this. While I’m not about to give up book novels, or other “timeless” books, I am sick and tired of buying $50 books that aren’t current, or messy newspapers with a dearth of content. The WWW is a far better source for current events and technical material.
But sitting up at my desk does get tiring.
I thought about rigging up a PC with NTSC outputs to my TV, but a WebTV box changed my mind about that — too fuzzy. Data grade monitors that are large enough to use as a TV are still a tad bit too expensive. I like to have the TV available at the same time anyway. In the end I decided that tablet PCs had the most promise. Now all that’s left to do is wait for there to be enough of them for prices to be competitive.
I used to think that I could never read a lot of material using a computer. I printed a lot of stuff out, read it once or twice, then threw it away after the clutter got out of control. Books are one thing — they’re bound, and they’re typically smaller than a sheet of regular paper, so they’re easier to store and use. Laser printed documents are messy and wasteful in comparison. If you try, using a computer to read stuff becomes every bit as natural as it was to read off of dead trees.
I think that online dictionaries are great! They’re right where I need them, and I can copy ‘n’ paste into the documents I’m working on. I can’t imagine buying another paper dictionary… I don’t scribble either. Like TLy, I keep my mind sharp by remembering that stuff!
Word is a great way to write documents that are viewable anywhere on the network… Word is used for simple text messages that can easily be written in text. Word is used for static documents that could be displayed better in PDF.
The first part is only true if you have Word installed on each and every node on the network. What’s so great about that? If you’re the one paying for it, that requirement really, really sucks. Yeah, there are viewers. Then you have to devote resources to deciding who gets Word and who gets the viewer, and explaining it to people who just want Word but don’t know why.
As an experiment, I tried educating users about WordPad instead of giving them Word. WordPad turned out to be good enough for at least half. What that proves to me is that people can be happy and productive without Office, but that IS has to do their part by communicating. How hard is that?
Excel is a great way to make graphs and to format data for lists and for mathematical calculations. … Excel is used not for lists or equations, but just a way to format data in columns, which could be done much easier using a different tool, can’t really think of any offhand, but, I am sure several exist.
Word. Word has everything you need to create columns, charts and most everything that people use Excel for. The Calculator applet does the rest.
I don’t mean to insult, but it’s a very important point — you didn’t know that much about Office, and therefore you can’t use Office effectively. Buying Word and Excel for situations where Word alone would do is a big waste of money.
Access is a great way to get a quick and dirty database for anyone who doesn’t want to learn a full database, oracle, sybase, et cetera. … Access is a good tool for what it does, but it really doesn’t do much, and that is why it isn’t used very much.
So what is the lesson here? That you can’t do much with a DBMS if you don’t know how to use a DBMS? You betcha!
Access can do a lot of things, but not unless someone knows how to do them. The GUI can’t replace the know-how. So in many respects, Access is just as hard as Oracle, Sybase etc. And as with Excel, paying a lot of money for a program that nobody really knows how to use is a waste of money.
Outlook+Exchange is a great way to setup corporate email. … Outlook+exchange is really good at what it does, and there really isn’t anything decent that it could be replaced with, which is sad considering it’s price, horrible security, pain to administer, hidden costs (thinking exchange here), low functionality, confusing interface, and proprietary nature.
Remnd me, exactly what “great way” are you talking about??? ‘Nuff said there, LOL!
Bottom line: Office is of little use without trained users. If a business isn’t willing to train their employees, then they needn’t bother spending the money on Office. If a business is willing to train, it’s just as easy to teach them some other suite.
In fact many businesses are afraid to train their employees for fear that they will take their new found knowledge and get a better job with it. So if a business picks something other than MS Office, they can train their users to be more productive without the fear of losing them.
The reason why businesses keep MS Office is not because they think it’s a good idea, rather because the do not think about it.
Not a day goes by that I dream of being free from the shackles of MS Office. I’m a programmer, and a hobbyist 3d modeler/animator. I have absolutely no need for anything MS Office has to offer. My text editor of choice is Notepad, I dreaded the day my boss made me take up an email accout at the office, I litterly kicked and screamed when they gave me a phone and an extension. So yes I can get by without MS Office, and if the need arised, I’m sure I can find alternatives. But unfortunately, I am 1 of 4 people that make up the technical staff at the non-profit org I work at. It would be a terrible waste of my time to support users and get them to learn a new office package when most already know MS Office. It is bad enough that I have to fix the mess MS Office makes on its own, I can’t afford to force everyone to learn something else, while having to learn it myself.
BTW, have you considered getting a digital projector? We use them at my office and they are great. Even with the florescent lights on, it’s still pretty easy to see. They’re pretty expensive, but not as much as digital TVs. But can you imagine play games or watching DVDs with this?
TLy, I had midsize to large businesses in mind with what I said, and IME NPOs have quite similar needs as for-profit businesses do. NPOs are responsible for being good stewards of benefactors’ money, just as profit making businesses are responsible for being good stewards of investors’ money.
I am starting to do work for small NPOs, so I’m seeing a lot of what you’re going through. When there are a lot of volunteers (or turnover) you can’t afford to do all that training. I don’t have a lot of answers right now, but one thing that shows promise is NPOs for NPOs. Organizatons like the California Technology Enabling Group (CalTEG) in Santa Cruz are helping small NPOs with no IT staffs, and doing consulting projects for those who do have people, but not enough to do all they want to do.
It seems that all kinds of groups offer training — that’s the #1 service that I see offered. Two others that are almost always mentioned are “creating an Access database” and “design a simple website”, so don’t count on any major paradigm shift from most of these groups. CalTEG is not one of those “lightweight” groups, BTW. They do some pretty major projects.
TLy, my “not an office suite” is still nascent, so a lot of this discussion is moot. But maybe one day I’ll have something to show. In the meantime, remember that MS Office emerged as the unchallenged leader only 5 years ago. Before then there were other “de facto standards” that fell by the wayside. MS Office is not inevitable! So much of the Office phenomenon is only in people’s minds. If you will believe that there can be a better way, you are taking the first step toward finding a better way.
As for projectors, I have been impressed by some at parties. They were used with DVD movies, PS/2 and computers. But my current decor makes it hard to use one myself. Thanks for the tip though!
Speed:
What you do with Access and Excel can also be done with non-Microsoft programs, and there’s no reason why you couldn’t continue to do things like that in my scheme. In fact, my scheme just might lead you to a better way of doing it!
I’d like to know what programs you’re referring to (really, I would, I’m not being sarcastic). I realize you can set up databases with MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc, but can you think of anything to replace Access’ built-in form editor? Report generator? That’s easy to use (the main catch)? Etc, etc… Unfortunately, there isn’t anything equivalent in Open Office. Rats.
I am interested if you know of any software equivalents of some of Access’ GUI functionality (or, really RAD interface development). As a back-end database (especially with many [10+] simultaneous connections), Access is, well, less than ideal. OK, it sucks. Access 2000 has a nice feature where you can create “Projects”… and actually house the backend data on another server (SQL Server 2000, possibly MySQL through ODBC, but I don’t know) but develop forms, reports, etc in Access. Short of writing in VB, or something else… but I don’t think VB database access functionality comes cheaply, the Enterprise version is very expensive. I think maybe using a scripting language as a frontend to a database would be ok (python, etc), but it will be hard to replace Access’ functionality and ease of creating forms.
PS sorry if I screwed up the tags.
Maybe the office department should be separated from the rest of Microsoft. I have always been against it, but hey, they might even make a version for Linux if they were on their own.
Though I doubt the Linux version would rack in money
– Most of them are anti-capitalism, anti-non-free software. FSF’s fault. Most of them wouldn’t even consider Opera because it is non-free. MS Office for Linux would just suffer the same way Aplixware and Corel WP Office, and there is more victims coming up (mainly StarOffice, and Gobe Productive).
– Most of them are anti-MS. In fact, probably they are using Linux because they hate Microsoft (I know I use Linux, but I’m not anti-MS). What can I say? MS is anti-Linux, it’s mutual hate.
I’m not really sure how well they are supporting OS X. When MS releases a Carbonized version of Outlook, or a version of WMP that doesn’t totally suck, maybe I’ll believe.
For Java fans, Mac OS X version of WMP is written in Java (so much for MS hating Java). Maybe that’s why it is slow…
It’s the 21st century, folks! We have e-mail to send letters with — why not use it instead of Word? We have HTML and Acrobat to make things look nice, although websites full of porky PDF documents that must be downloaded in full to be read is a step in the wrong direction IMHO. Excel can go as well, since 99% of the time it is used to print tables, and not to do calculations. Both Excel and Access could be replaced by an XML-driven program that manages all sorts of data. And PowerPoint just plain needs to go. Every PowerPoint presentation that I’ve seen revolved around using PowerPoint, not the subject. Slideshows suck!
In case you didn’t know, Word can be used to send emails via Outlook, and all MS apps can be saved in HTML (or their version of it). Buy Acrobat, you can save in PDF. As for Excel and printing tables, I never use Excel or OpenOffice.org Calc unless in table needs formulas (otherwise, why not just use Word or Write?).
–The author is this post is not reponcible for any spelling, grammer, or logic mistakes that may be present in this post.
Talk about politcally correct…
Don’t blame PowerPoint for the fact that most people don’t know how to put together a decent presentation. Sure most presentations suck becuse most people don’t use PowerPoint the way it was intended to be used. Most people use PowerPoint to created bulleted lists that just parrot what they are saying during their presentation. PowerPoint is great for graphics, visuals, etc. (As is StarPresent if you don’t like MS Office. There are decent alternatives from OpenOffice for example).
It’s Impress, not StarPresent.
And no, it doesn’t come close to MS Office PowerPoint’s features, which is why my church still uses it.
I’m not a huge Anti-MS zealot, but why bother with Office unless you need powerpoint? There are plenty of alternatives on pretty much every OS. Abiword, StarOffice/OpenOffice, Gobe Productive, kOffice, hell my iMac came with AppleWorks which has been just fine for me. Why fork out the $200+ for Office?
Since you are using AppleWorks, Office is a over kill for you. But then:
– StarOffice/ OpenOffice: Even through Wine, CrossOver Office +MS Office 2000 still is much faster than OpenOffice.org 1.0 on Linux (on my friends workstation, at least). Sure, Office 2k isn’t the latest release, MS Office 2k has almost all the features OpenOffice.org has, plus more. It’s illegal BTW to use Office XP on CrossOver Office.
– Abiword: They don’t even have table support. And they also don’t have footnote, endnote and hypenation support.
– KOffice: I really like the product. For the amount of developers behind it, it kick serious butt. But just like AbiWord, is it severely underfeatured.
– Gobe Productive: It is only right to compare this with MS Works. It seems that is the market they are after anyway.
Oh, and unless you are buying individual apps, MS Office isn’t $200.
Bottom line: Office is of little use without trained users. If a business isn’t willing to train their employees, then they needn’t bother spending the money on Office. If a business is willing to train, it’s just as easy to teach them some other suite.
Only recently, there wasn’t really any other choice. Also, MS Office beats other productivity applications in terms of features. But sometimes, it is an overkill. It is up to the IT managers to pick what is right for their needs. Sometimes they can be productive with Office, and not productive with other altenatives. Sometimes they can be just as productive in Office and in any other app. Really, it depends on the office needs.
For example, for offices you use macros for content and layout, the only other altenative that is close to Office’s macro support is StarOffice 6.0. But it isn’t as good as MS Office. Though the features in those Office macros can be used in viruses, there is always a drawback to a feature.
BTW, have you considered getting a digital projector? We use them at my office and they are great. Even with the florescent lights on, it’s still pretty easy to see. They’re pretty expensive, but not as much as digital TVs. But can you imagine play games or watching DVDs with this?
Playing games on a high end CRT monitor sounds like a better idea.
Right off the bat I can think of Paradox and Lotus Approach. They’re in the same genre as Access, and do similar things. ODBC lets you connect to SQL databases over a network (or locally if you like). You don’t need Access to use ODBC.
I’ve used WinBatch as a RAD tool to create forms, move data to/from SQL stores and dump out data to text files. It’s simpler, thus not as intimidating as the “big” RAD tools, although the compiler is a bit pricey. You still need to know how to code, of course. But IME, WinBatch syntax lends itself to quick code generation quite well. Python may also be an excellent choice.
I personally like using web interfaces if I can. Forms are very easy to build using ASP or PHP. I’ve seen a couple of visual tools, but prefer to use a plain old text editor myself. But you do have the option. You can probably guess that I don’t care for the Access report generator, since it is designed to use paper, and lots of it. A web report can be read on any machine with a browser, plus hyperlinks can be used to drill down and change views. And the report is always fresh. Try doing that with paper!
There’s no doubt that the OSS office lacks good database UI tools. I have a hunch that the “killer app” that could put KDE (for example) over the top would be one that managed access to disparate data stores, so that your calendar, addresses and phone numbers etc. could be kept on the big corporate database while you’re at work, while keeping your laptop’s individual database up to date. And then some. It’s more than that, but hard to describe.
You don’t need Access to use ODBC.
I realize this 🙂 I meant using an ODBC layer to access a MySQL database (to store data/tables) through MS Access (to write VBA code, etc). I don’t know how well it works though, I heard it has kinks and doesn’t work as well as ADO.
I’ve used WinBatch as a RAD tool to create forms, move data to/from SQL stores and dump out data to text files. It’s simpler, thus not as intimidating as the “big” RAD tools, although the compiler is a bit pricey.
Therein lies the problem… it’s a bit pricey. However, compared to licensing MS Office for several clients, I’m sure in the long run using a compilable language/a compiled program would be cheaper.
You still need to know how to code
Yes, I don’t think this will be much of a problem ;-). I think a decent knowledge of programming is essential for any person designing (or maintaining) databases. Not to mention a firm grasp of SQL and relations.
I personally like using web interfaces if I can.
Web interfaces are great. It is insanely easy to connect to a data source using ADO in ASP/ASP.Net, and writing HTML forms can be very straighforward, even with a little bit of HTML training. However, sometimes you really need to be able to print something out. In this case, HTML falls a bit short. You also have the added concern of securing the web server, and having access to a web server in the first place 🙂 You could always generate postscript or PDF files, but that may require 3rd party software and/or lots of extra programming effor.
There’s no doubt that the OSS office lacks good database UI tools.
I agree. It would be nice to have a tool for creating front end GUI apps to database backends. There seem to be a plethora of Too bad I don’t have the skill to write one… *sigh*. Maybe it’s time to learn a few new languages. I am particularly interested in Python, it seems like a good cross-platform OO scripting language.
I realize this 🙂 I meant using an ODBC layer to access a MySQL database (to store data/tables) through MS Access (to write VBA code, etc). I don’t know how well it works though, I heard it has kinks and doesn’t work as well as ADO.
Oh, I see… Didn’t mean to talk down to you; just trying to speak to the biggest possible audience. If you want to use Access as a front end, you sure can use other RDBMS systems! I’ve used Access with MySQL, PostgreSQL, Ingres, Sybase, MS SQL Server and even DB3 files, all through ODBC. It’s a sweet way to fiddle with tables as a DBA!
I wouldn’t want to put Access/ODBC on users’ desktops though. My real world experiences had me running all over the place, putting things back that users somehow managed to break or remove. If your users are using NT-based desktops, then you may be able to lock stuff down. I didn’t have that option back then, so I went the way that had the least things to break in userland. That way, all I had to deal with was broken IP stacks after the help desk guys “fixed” Windows by removing Winsock 2…
Therein lies the problem… it’s a bit pricey. However, compared to licensing MS Office for several clients, I’m sure in the long run using a compilable language/a compiled program would be cheaper.
Yes…that and the reasons I touched on above. Also, getting interpreters on every last machine in a large shop can be a pain. OTOH Python, Tcl/Tk, Ruby, Perl etc. are all free. The WinBatch interpreter was $99 the last time I checked, and it has a 30 day demo.
Yes, I don’t think this will be much of a problem ;-). I think a decent knowledge of programming is essential for any person designing (or maintaining) databases. Not to mention a firm grasp of SQL and relations.
Excellent! I couldn’t agree more.
Web interfaces are great. It is insanely easy to connect to a data source using ADO in ASP/ASP.Net, and writing HTML forms can be very straighforward, even with a little bit of HTML training. However, sometimes you really need to be able to print something out. In this case, HTML falls a bit short.
If you’re talking page formatting, there are some things that you can do, and still keep it HTML. I used to print out tables straight from IE for meetings.
You also have the added concern of securing the web server, and having access to a web server in the first place 🙂
If it’s sensitive data and you’re using IIS, you can always key that page to domain accounts. And free HTTP servers are like beads at Mardi Gras.
I agree. It would be nice to have a tool for creating front end GUI apps to database backends. There seem to be a plethora of Too bad I don’t have the skill to write one… *sigh*. Maybe it’s time to learn a few new languages. I am particularly interested in Python, it seems like a good cross-platform OO scripting language.
I hear great things about Python. If I decide to take some action about my idea, I would probably try to do it with Kylix. C/C++ are just too tedious for me. I might not have the skill either, but if I start it off and do a lousy job, then maybe someone good will come along and try to save the project from me 😉
“I’m not a huge Anti-MS zealot, but why bother with Office unless you need powerpoint? There are plenty of alternatives on pretty much every OS.”
I’m not suggesting you have to rely on MS Office. If you don’t like Office, don’t use it. If you don’t like Access, use MySQL or PostgreSQL. What I am suggesting is that Speed’s suggestion that we can get rid of office software and rely on HTML and XML is absurd. Like I said, XML can’t replace databases. It can only suplement them by making the data that they contain more useful.
… what would happen if people would acknowledge that copying Office just gets you a bad copy. I am thankful for all the work people go through to get OpenOffice, StarOffice, etc working so good, but I can’t help shake the feeling we are going down the wrong path. I know Macs need Office to get into business, but shouldn’t competitors start looking at doing something different.
This word processor / spreadsheet / database / e-mail paradigm is starting to get annoying. Can’t we start looking at some other way of structuring how we get data into the machine.
just a grumpy thought……
“Right off the bat I can think of Paradox and Lotus Approach. They’re in the same genre as Access, and do similar things. ODBC lets you connect to SQL databases over a network (or locally if you like). You don’t need Access to use ODBC.”
Speed,
Approach doesn’t have nearly the capabilities that Access does. And this doesn’t get you out of having to pay for it anyway. The specific claim is that there is no open source software that is equivalent. And this is true.
“I personally like using web interfaces if I can. Forms are very easy to build using ASP or PHP. I’ve seen a couple of visual tools, but prefer to use a plain old text editor myself. But you do have the option.”
Web interfaces only work for the most simple databases. For example, design a form that allows me to easily cut and paste from and to Excel? Design me a form that allows me to easily enter tabular data in a column without having to use the mouse to switch fields? The arrow keys for example, don’t work in web forms.
And there is another drawback as well. Web forms require a web server. For a standalone database, that makes for an overly complicated setup with a lot of unneccesary overhead. It also creates a security problem unless you are running a decent firewall.
And as far as Word being able to create graphs, it can’t. Word uses OLE to generate graphs. Which means it relies on Excel to do the actual work of creating the graph.
This word processor / spreadsheet / database / e-mail paradigm is starting to get annoying. Can’t we start looking at some other way of structuring how we get data into the machine.
Sure. And there are people who do. That sentence encapsulates a lot of what Jef Raskin’s The Humane Interface is about–to someone who’s really trying to explore ways to improve the way we relate to computers, “UI” isn’t about the widgets on your GUI and whether your windows are skinnable, it’s about how information on a computer is organized and presented. In some concepts, the very idea of applications goes away (from a user’s standpoint, at least), and both the classifications of “document types” and even the boundaries between documents are arbitrary, entirely under the user’s control.
The problem is that when people start talking about ideas like that, they get dismissed as cranks. Just check any OSNews (or Slashdot) discussion about user interface paradigms.
“It would be nice to have a tool for creating front end GUI apps to database backends. There seem to be a plethora of Too bad I don’t have the skill to write one… *sigh*.”
There is. It’s called Java and one of any number of IDEs that include GUI designers that are available for it. And JDBC works very much like ODBC.
“I am particularly interested in Python, it seems like a good cross-platform OO scripting language.”
It is and it isn’t. On one hand, you can develop apps fast in Python. On the other hand, Python has some drawbacks, including the fact that its default GUI toolkit is the fairly anemic TK. Of course, you don’t have to use Tk. There are other toolkits available. But the standard python distribution doesn’t include them, so if you want to distribute your app, that means more work for the end user because they have to instlal additional GUI tookits for their Python interpreter before they can use your application. Of course, you might be able to write an isntall script that can automate that process of checking for the toolkit and installing it if it isn’t already there.
The main benefit I see in Python is that it is so damn moduler and that C / C++ modules are accessed the same way as Python modules. So in theory, if you are very careful with your design, you can implement and deploy a pure Python version fairly rapidly, find out which modules are bottlenecks because of the interpreted nature of Python, and then gradually replace those modules with C versions. The C versions can virtally be dropin replacements that don’t require modifying the script that is calling the module because they are accessed in the same way. So the only thing your users will notice is an increase in performance as you replace bottleneck python modules with C modules.
Well said, Matt! When you imitate a product, that product is the focus. So what people really want is the product being copied, not the copy. My position is that MS Office is passe. In this internetworked age, we have almost limitless capabilities for communication and data manipulation. But we’re being held back by the old-fashioned software from an age when data went in through keyboards and out through printers, and that was that. It’s time to move past this ancient paradigm!
One sure way to make sure that Microsoft remains the leader in the Office market, and that MS Office sets the pace is to answer MS Office one-to-one with “me too” apps. But if someone started with a clean sheet of p… OK, strike that. If someone started with a fresh perspective, they might think it made sense to have a communications manager to do e-mail, chat and IM, and also be the place to go for legacy stuff like snail mail, fax and even phone message notification. They might make a time manager interface, putting personal and group calendars, ToDo lists and project management all together, making project meetings part of the project, finally!
In my example, I was linking the old to the new in order to illustrate my point. A really good developer wouldn’t do that though. Instead, this developer would think “what needs to be done?” and try not to think of previous solutions when crafting new ones.
IMHO the key is modularization, following the UNIX paradigm. Separating the UI parts from the data parts is one way of doing this. Another is to write little applets that communicate amongst each other, and build containers to organize them in. A data broker applet could relieve the UI applets from dealing with file formats at all, transferring data to/from file, database or other data stores as needed. An environment applet could tell the data broker about the status of a laptop or other mobile device, so it could switch between local and network data stores. And so on, and so on…
rajan r, you could stereotype all Linux users like that, and make yourself a nice self-fulfilling prophecy, all the while ignoring the Linux users like myself who have money to spend. I would guess that there are a lot more people who have positive, pragmatic reasons for choosing Linux and/or not choosing MS. I buy commercial software to run on Linux, some of it quite expensive.
In case you didn’t know, Word can be used to send emails via Outlook
And I can use a 40′ semi truck and a city bus to run to the grocery store, so what? In case you haven’t noticed, using a howitzer to swat a fly is wasteful, and doesn’t work too well.
I can use Pine to send e-mail, and anybody can read that e-mail, regardless of what mail program they’re using. In addition, I can use Pine with all of my settings from any Internet-connected computer with a Telnet client. And it’s quick! So which is better???
and all MS apps can be saved in HTML (or their version of it). Buy Acrobat, you can save in PDF.
So in other words, companies don’t need to buy Office to be able to exchange documents? That they could save thousands of dollars simply by saying “could you send that as HTML?” Yes, I knew that!
Only recently, there wasn’t really any other choice. Also, MS Office beats other productivity applications in terms of features. But sometimes, it is an overkill.
There is always a choice.
I remember once when I mentioned the number of “ridiculous features” that were in Office to a Microsoft insider. He replied to me that each and every one of those “features” had been requested specifically by large corporate buyers. He said it as if it was a Good Thing! I don’t care about features that I’ll never use!
If some guy at Enron can’t live without some widget, then let Enron pay for it. I don’t care if they leave it out of my copy, I just don’t want to buy it. The irony here is that Microsoft might get more paying customers if they offered all that stuff a la carte.
It is up to the IT managers to pick what is right for their needs. Sometimes they can be productive with Office, and not productive with other altenatives. Sometimes they can be just as productive in Office and in any other app. Really, it depends on the office needs.
The problem is that many people don’t bother to do that work. Sometimes unqualified people like office managers are the ones buying office software. Even when the right department is making the choices, IT managers simply pass the buck, and no needs analysis ever gets done. IME most IT management is on the take — they’re whores for free lunches and other kickbacks. They don’t make the tough choices that they’re being paid to make.
Macros? When’s the last time you stopped to ask yourself why you’re still using pre-Windows technology?
“Separating the UI parts from the data parts is one way of doing this.”
What do you mean by “seperating the UI parts from the data parts”? Are you refering to the end user interface? If so, what do you mean by “seperating them”? They are already seperate?
If you refering to this in a programming sense? As in user interface to a class? If so, That is the whole thing that encapuslation tries to avoid. This would be a step backwards. There is a reason that OOP became so popular and procedural languages fell out of favor. The OOP paradigm simply makes more sense and is a better model of how our brains relate things in the real world.
Simba wrote:
The OOP paradigm simply makes more sense and is a better model of how our brains relate things in the real world.
It doesn’t really matter what paradigm you choose, in the end it all comes out as machine code. And OOP has heavier overhead, in fact I have heard some programmers say C++ is harmful to the world.
I think what Speed is trying to say is: by separating the data from the UI, we could achieve true cross platform compatibility. Think of HTML and XML. They are standardized forms of data representation. The concept of web pages has 2 components: the data (HTML) and the UI (web browsers). The inconsistency is where different web browsers draw graphics differently. Example: tables come out looking different in Netscape vs. IE. But in the case of office applications such as database, email, word processing, the data should be represented in a unified format, and the UI is what sets each application apart. The UI you encounter in a Windows application can look and operate differently from a UI of a Linux application. But being office applications, these 2 applications with different origins should be able to read and modify data the same way so that the data can easily be transfer from one platform to the next.
Because of the limitations and differences in every operating system’s GUI, it’s not always an easy task to replicate an application’s GUI across different OSes. That is acceptable. But it’s not impossible (look at Lightwave). I think Speed wants to see Microsoft settle with a common data format that would treat data just as data, and by common I mean one that other OSes and platforms can use as well. Once that is established, the UI can be tailored however the developer wants. And that’s how we separate the data from the UI.
“I think what Speed is trying to say is: by separating the data from the UI, we could achieve true cross platform compatibility.”
Well, ok… But in sense, aren’t Word documents sort of in this cateogry? I mean virtually every word processor can read a word document. Some just do it better than others. OpenOffice actually does it extremely well, and even supports the group colaboration and revision tracking features.
HTML of course, is not entirely cross platform unless you avoid thngs that really are neceesary in a lot of documents. For example, I can set the font in HTML document, but if the user on the other end doesn’t have that font installed on their system, the web browser will take a guess and try to substitute another font. The results could range from anywhere to acceptable to disasterous.
I think my argument here is that HTML just isn’t flexible enough for the kind of document formatting that has to be done in the typical business setting. XML is flexible enough, but there are a lot of misconceptions out there about what XML can and can’t do. For example, there are those who think XML can replace databases. It can’t. XML documents however, can be stored in a database for retreval.
But also, I think it would be difficult to implement revision tracking and such in XML, and it would also be difficult to embed macros. So I’m not sure XML is the ideal solution to this problem.
“There is. It’s called Java and one of any number of IDEs that include GUI designers that are available for it. And JDBC works very much like ODBC.”
BTW, might I recommend Sun’s Forte for Java CE? It’s free and runs on Solaris, Windows, and Linux. Includes a GUI form designer, and also includes a JDBC designer that helps you write the necessary code for using the database backend.
Forte is a Java application itself, so I think it should run on any OS with a JVM. The distribution package may be different for each platform though.
Regarding XML, I don’t think it’s a good choice either, you can’t embed binary data into XML, or can you? My understanding is XML tags are plain text like HTML, therefore XML only encapsulates textual data.
“Forte is a Java application itself, so I think it should run on any OS with a JVM. The distribution package may be different for each platform though.”
It’s a Java application, but on my Windows XP system, the Forte shortcut is actually link to an .EXE file. So I am not exactly sure how it loads itself. I’ve never actually tried to invoke it from the command line using java and I’m not sure which class I would actually invoke to start it that way.
“Regarding XML, I don’t think it’s a good choice either, you can’t embed binary data into XML, or can you? My understanding is XML tags are plain text like HTML, therefore XML only encapsulates textual data.”
You can embed binary data into XML, but it isn’t pretty. For example, Abiword embeds photographs into its XML documents by storing them in MIME format (it uuencodes them basically).
It’s a Java application, but on my Windows XP system, the Forte shortcut is actually link to an .EXE file. So I am not exactly sure how it loads itself. I’ve never actually tried to invoke it from the command line using java and I’m not sure which class I would actually invoke to start it that way.
That makes sense. I think I’ve seen articles that discuss using java from within Win32 apps and vice versa.
TLy, your interpretation is interesting, but not what I was driving at. While cross-platform availability is desirable, it is secondary to my immediate goal. What I’m talking about is a different way of doing things.
The current office paradigm is single purpose applications that were designed to mimic some ancient machine. Functionality has been added, of course, but they’re still bound by that single-purpose paradigm. My idea is to put the technology out there, and allow the user to literally chart their own course.
The old way of thinking says: “This is Word, your word processing application. You type stuff in, and Word renders it for printing — it’s WYSIWYG! If you don’t want to print right away, you can save your work as a Word document.”
What I’m thinking is more like: “If you want to enter text, use this tool. If you want to draw pictures, here is a tool for that. Another tool deals with audio and video.” etc. etc. Instead of a big applicatioon, you would open an applet that does only what you need to do right away.
Then once you have some text, pictures or whatever, then you decide what you want to do with it. You could save it, but instead of the old-fashioned “Save As (Enter file name and file type here) (pick a location here)”, you would pass it along to the data broker. The data broker would present you with a consistent set of choices that aren’t bound to the input methods. You could choose to send that text using e-mail or IM protocols, or some still undefined method. If the data had something to do with a project at work, you would place it within that project’s data store area, caring not about where that area may be physically. Or if you’re doing something personal, you could send it to your personal data store, which might be at home, on your laptop or somewhere else.
At the other end of the data broker is the old-fashioned filesystem, database, SMTP, IM, HTTP etc. stuff (that we normally deal with through each application), as well as some completely new stuff too. The user can pick and choose different methods (within reason), regardless of the input, output or storage methods. The data broker figures out how to do it best.
If this is implemented correctly, file formats simply cease to exist. Data formats and rulesets would conform to internationally accepted standards, and a language definition language like XML would establish order and ways to get from point A to point B. With the data broker, it wouldn’t matter if your “document” was in one file or a thousand. Computers excel at doing tedious work like sorting tiny objects — let them! And let networks do what they do best too. Now that networks are ubiquitous, we don’t need to always think in terms of files and the file cabinet paradigm. We don’t need to be pack rats with data.
When you look at the ISO OSI networking model, you see a presentation layer, and several layers underneath. Old-fashioned applications typically hog several of those layers. I believe that it makes sense now to break these large, compound applications apart into their basic units. This is what the UNIX paradigm is all about — small components that do their simple job well, and interact with all other components. This is why the UNIX paradigm has succeeded over so many years.
People who buy the big, bloated all-in-one compound products (which dominate the market) have trouble understanding the modular approach, but they don’t need to. To them, the only thing that is happening is what’s on the screen. With my way, they would still only need to concentrate on the screen. I believe that if a good designer looks at the big picture, and away from the eye candy on the screen, that a new design could emerge which would take computers into the 21st century.
If I understand you correctly, what you’re suggesting is that the user would be interacting with the data as simply data. Disregarding how it’s encapsulated. If a user types a document, it is just thoughts put into words, and those words are handed off to the data broker which choses how to store that data.
The direction you’re going in resembles the concept behind Microsoft’s “.NET” and if not that, then perhaps the concept of an Internet based operating system and the next step in distributed computing/grid computing.
I read an article somewhere, perhaps here on OSNews, that discussed the possibility in the future of the elimination of operating systems. Eventually it wouldn’t matter what hardware or OS people used, every piece of software is self sufficient but depends on reusable code and runs on an intermediae language making it compatible with various hardware.
You idea of separating data from presentation sounds like the beginnings of the future I described above. I also read somewhere that in the future, artificial intelligence would be so sophisticated that it would eliminate the need for programmers. The computer would write programs by itself. I dread the day that this becomes true because I myself am a programmer.
I respect your ideas, but I could not live with them. My computer is first and foremost a tool. I use it to do work, it does not do work for me. Think about that last statement, it does make sense trust me. More specifically, I think what I mean to say is, I call the shots and make the decisions, not my computer making decisions for me. This is one of the reasons why I dislike Microsoft so much. Not many people are comfortable having that much control over their computers. Some people perfer simple, easy to use solutions where they don’t have to put too much thought into it.
This is not my best topic for discussion. I guess that’s it for me.
If I understand you correctly, what you’re suggesting is that the user would be interacting with the data as simply data. Disregarding how it’s encapsulated. If a user types a document, it is just thoughts put into words, and those words are handed off to the data broker which choses how to store that data.
No, the user would be interacting with the applications. But instead of a half-dozen bloated all-in-one applications with duplicated functions in each, I’d have dozens of much smaller modular applets, each with a single purpose (within reason, of course). The user applets wouldn’t care about how the data is encapsulated, so there would be no more “Word file” paradigm.
The direction you’re going in resembles the concept behind Microsoft’s “.NET” and if not that, then perhaps the concept of an Internet based operating system and the next step in distributed computing/grid computing.
Hell no! Dot NOT! My idea differs from common ORBs in that ORB vendors want their ORB to be the “center of the universe”. My broker revolves around Internet standards and the host OS. To the user, it’s just a handy applet that allows them to save and retrieve data to/from databases, local filesystems, network filesystems, FTP sites, WebDAV…whatever. It’s user-driven, not vendor-driven.
I read an article somewhere, perhaps here on OSNews, that discussed the possibility in the future of the elimination of operating systems. Eventually it wouldn’t matter what hardware or OS people used, every piece of software is self sufficient but depends on reusable code and runs on an intermediae language making it compatible with various hardware.
You mean a pointless inverse of Internet standards? No thanks! Again, the application-centric approach is great for the application vendors, but not-so-great for users.
You idea of separating data from presentation sounds like the beginnings of the future I described above. I also read somewhere that in the future, artificial intelligence would be so sophisticated that it would eliminate the need for programmers. The computer would write programs by itself. I dread the day that this becomes true because I myself am a programmer.
The data is there in presentation. My idea is to take file read/write away from the application, extend it to something more modern, and put that function into the hands of the desktop environment. So instead of having Word saving Word files, you have a word processor exchanging raw data with the data broker, and the data broker packages the data in a form that’s appropriate for whatever medium the user (or administrator) chooses.
I respect your ideas, but I could not live with them. My computer is first and foremost a tool. I use it to do work, it does not do work for me. Think about that last statement, it does make sense trust me. More specifically, I think what I mean to say is, I call the shots and make the decisions, not my computer making decisions for me. This is one of the reasons why I dislike Microsoft so much. Not many people are comfortable having that much control over their computers. Some people perfer simple, easy to use solutions where they don’t have to put too much thought into it.
Well, it sounds to me like you’re afraid of losing control. If you think that being the master of your own computer is going to protect you from that, then by all means go ahead. Personally I doubt that obsessing over one tiny corner of the universe will protect you from it in any meaningful way. Reactionary thinking cannot halt progress. More often than not, the “simpler, happier” time that reactionaries long for never existed in the first place!
At work you always work for someone else, even if it’s only your customers. So you just might not be the god you thought you were. Living in a society requires you to give as well as take. If you want to be secure from people and their products, then you can go live as a hermit in a cave. Then you can go up against nature all alone. Some trade-off!
OTOH your computer can never eat your lunch as long as you can pull the plug. Personally I like having my computer decide to check mt e-mail every 5 minutes so I don’t have to…