Because Shiny Things Are Fun - The New New Windows v Linux Thread

I don't know if the agencies I have worked for have contracts with Microsoft, I just know during my tenure, I have (unfortunately) never seen any other desktop or office software considered.

Sad really, considering the power of open source and the cost savings. Support is not really an issue since google brings better results typically than a support call...

MS Office has become the de facto standard for business and public sector. Some of it is good, some bad. But it's often difficult for home/hobbyist computer users to see any of it as particularly good.

MS obviously achieved this through their dominance of the desktop/laptop x86 market over decades, by capturing standards, by extending them and creating incompatibilities and then doing all of that again, to squeeze out the competition.

If you open an OpenDocument format file in some MS Office applications, first it will often tell you it's corrupt (when it isn't), then it will offer to recover it, then every time you attempt to save it, it will first ask if you want to save the "recovered" file as an MS format file due to "incompatible features" with the OpenDocument format (those "extensions" which it probably introduced during the needless "recovery"). Another subtle means for MS to push it's own closed standard over an open one.

Could not have said it better myself.

Using m$ for gaming and Linux for everything else and gaming... one runs better; likely, because the world 'makes' it‽ Not some lazy employee!

I don't use Microsoft for anything at home, ever. No need and even if I had a need I would find another way. Absolute garbage. My opinion of course

When using both you'd definitely notice the difference!

If something goes wrong in Linux, there's 10 or more ways to fix it. When something goes wrong in windows, I often use Linux to fix it.

Originally Posted by cynwulf ...every time you attempt to save it, it will first ask if you want to save the "recovered" file as an MS format file due to "incompatible features" with the OpenDocument format (those "extensions" which it probably introduced during the needless "recovery"). Another subtle means for MS to push it's own closed standard over an open one.

That's a bit unfair. LibreOffice asks you exactly the same question when you ask to save a docx document in its original format. I find that irritating, as the documents I write contain nothing fancy that would trigger a misformatting but I can understand why the question gets asked.

I understand what cynwulf means: Microsoft has a history of "embrace, extend, extinguish" when it comes to standards. Not sure the document save is anything other than setting a default format for the save though.

Originally Posted by sevendogsbsd Updates on patch Tuesday force as many as 4 reboots, you know, because apparently a billion dollar software company can't figure out how to apply them all at once like other OS's do.

You mean a trillion dollar company!
That's a shame indeed...

Originally Posted by hazel You can get Linux for free or an all-in-1 software+support contract at low cost. Why fork out a fortune for Windows?

Let's be cautious here, open-source at a company/professional level is rarely low-cost. The face value/price tag is often low indeed, but the total cost of ownership (TCO) can be largely higher!

All I know is one runs slow and hot and the other only if I make it...

Originally Posted by hazel That's a bit unfair. LibreOffice asks you exactly the same question when you ask to save a docx document in its original format. I find that irritating, as the documents I write contain nothing fancy that would trigger a misformatting but I can understand why the question gets asked.

It's matter of unchecking one box and it goes away, but that's largely beside the point.

You're conflating the openoffice/libreoffice projects with opendocument: https://www.oasis-open.org/committee..._abbrev=office

As with OOXML, ODF is an open standard, Microsoft are historically known for avoiding adopting these or in using anti-competitive or the familiar EEE tactics to kill them. In the case of OOXML - it simply registered a competing standard.

libreoffice/openoffice are projects which use the opendocument format as their defaults (for historic reasons).

Office XML is an open standard as well.

OOXML is indeed an open standard, apologies for not making that clear, but it's certainly not an entirely unencumbered one. It comes with the infamous "covenant not to sue":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micros...cation_Promise

It was registered deliberately as a competing standard to opendocument and was controversial at the time for this reason.

There are not many current sources, but this old article has some more detail:

https://www.infoworld.com/article/26...ification.html

And competing standards are a bad thing now?

Here ya go. Worry this bone for a bit....

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/6...oft-to-fix-it/