Overheard at work: Open Office becoming more mainstream

[ftmichael]

In the fencing waiting room last night, a teenager came out of his lesson and chatted to his mother while waiting for her to finish what she was doing on her laptop.

Son: We should buy Microsoft Office for [someone]. He doesn't have it.
Mother [slightly disbelieving]: He doesn't have Microsoft Office?
Son: No. We should get it for him.
Mother: Well you're the big programming genius ...
Son: Yeah, I know ...

I'm not entirely sure with how that's relevant unless she expects him to pirate Office for this person or write all new Office-esque software or something, but I'm thinking about here that no 'programming genius' - I think she meant computer genius, really - would get Microsoft Office for anyone. They'd get an alternative.

Mother: What about Open Office? You know ... [Son is not responding; I am getting a distinct 'I don't know what that is, which means my mother knows more about this than I do, but she just called me a programming genius and I do not want to look like an idiot so I'm going to keep my mouth shut' vibe from him] It's like Microsoft Office, but it's ... free? You know? [Still no response. Vibe from the mother says, 'I think I know what I'm talking about, but I'm not entirely sure, and my son is not responding, so maybe I'm making an idiot of myself here, but he's not being derisive or contradicting me, and I think I know what I'm talking about, so I shall plough on.'] Or Google Documents. We use that at work sometimes now ... you know?
Son: [coming to a bit, with a distinct 'Thank god, I can contribute something I know, however small' vibe] Google Documents is good 'cause you can access it anywhere.
Mother: Yeah. But maybe something like that?

They packed up and left about then. I was so blown away and pleased to hear this middle-aged woman talking about Open Office to her son. I'm glad her workplace has a clue, even if her 'programming genius' kid doesn't. Yet. I hope he figures things out.

Michael

[Iceni]

I'm also under the impression that many people are aware of openoffice, and use it. It's great:)

[happysmileman]

Son: We should buy Microsoft Office for [someone]. He doesn't have it.
Mother [slightly disbelieving]: He doesn't have Microsoft Office?
Son: No. We should get it for him.

Why would you buy an office suite for someone? What possible reason would they have to just randomly give an expensive office suite to someone?

Other than that it's a nice story

[MonkeyBoy]

Why would you buy an office suite for someone? What possible reason would they have to just randomly give an expensive office suite to someone?

Other than that it's a nice story

I would like someone to buy MS Office for me because when I put hot drinks on my coffee table they can leave a ring.

[lswest]

yep^^ i use OpenOffice most of the time, and a version of office from my school on windows XD but no, i wouldn't pay anything for a fancy notepad;)

[Ultra Magnus]

Thats pretty cool - the other day my girlfriend said that the people at her work (shes a youth worker so nothing to do with computers) started discussing whether its worth trying linux. My gf said that I use it and that its suppose to be good but then she went on to say that i was a geek and you have to be a geek to use it.

[bruce89]

It's a shame OO.o is crap on anything but Windows.

[Insomniac20k]

It's a shame OO.o is crap on anything but Windows.

Yeah I loved OO.o when I was using windows but it's slow as hell for me on Ubuntu. Maybe I'm just used to everything else being faster? I dunno.

I still use it though because of the document restore feature. I suck at remembering to save things before shuttin down the lappy.

[Vitamin-Carrot]

I like OO on ubuntu :(

they sell it here in NZ for like 5-10 dollars in some stores :(
the same chain of stores sells ubuntu 7.04 for 10

the companies name is **** Smith Electronics
http://www.dse.co.nz/

Alot of people here seem to use OO because its available in the store and its cheaper

[LaRoza]

I overheard two old ladies (probably over 60) talking about how Firefox was better for web browsing.

[Insomniac20k]

Ugh I'm stuck at work on Internet Explorer.

I heart Firefox very much.

[FuturePilot]

Lol. Good, humorous story.
OO loads super fast for me. 3 seconds, and that's on the first run too. It's even faster after the first time.

[bruce89]

I overheard two old ladies (probably over 60) talking about how Firefox was better for web browsing.

Alright, it's a shame that the best known examples of OSS (Firefox isn't free) are both crap on non-Windows platforms.

[sethvath]

Everything is just more expensive in NZ, even the free ones :D

[cmf04]

I use OO on all of my home PC's. I also load it on all new PC's I build & refurbish. And if someone asks me for a copy of MS Office I tell them to download OO from the web.

[Insomniac20k]

I wonder why OO.o is super fast for some people and slow for me and some others.

Is it because I only have 512 meg of RAM?

[LaRoza]

Alright, it's a shame that the best known examples of OSS (Firefox isn't free) are both crap on non-Windows platforms.

I don't use FF myself, I use Opera. Both are better than IE in my experience.

[LaRoza]

Ugh I'm stuck at work on Internet Explorer.


No you are not, http://portableapps.com/ for FF (and OpenOffice, Abiword, Pidgin, etc) and http://www.kejut.com/operaportable for Opera.

[bruce89]

I don't use FF myself, I use Opera. Both are better than IE in my experience.

Anything is.


Lol. Good, humorous story.
OO loads super fast for me. 3 seconds, and that's on the first run too. It's even faster after the first time.

Funny, Gnumeric must be a hare there.

[Insomniac20k]

No you are not, http://portableapps.com/ for FF (and OpenOffice, Abiword, Pidgin, etc) and http://www.kejut.com/operaportable for Opera.

lol I'm pretty sure that would get me in trouble. I don't mind too much.

Thanks for the link though, I will deff use that at school.

[LookTJ]

I loaded OO.o in 4 seconds. Hmm, love Arch! lol

[EmilyRose]

I love OO... I used it to help convince my mom she should get an apple laptop (wouldnt even consider linux... to many memories of me screwing up our computers trying ti get it to work in teh lat 90s, me thinks...), and it worked! now she loves her macbook:D

[igknighted]

I like OO on ubuntu :(

they sell it here in NZ for like 5-10 dollars in some stores :(
the same chain of stores sells ubuntu 7.04 for 10

the companies name is **** Smith Electronics
http://www.dse.co.nz/

Alot of people here seem to use OO because its available in the store and its cheaper

Thats a really good idea... I wish more stores would carry it. It can help prove that (a) FOSS development can be profitable, and (b) it spreads FOSS software. Same with Ubuntu and other distro's. Offering people a fully featured OS for an extremely reasonable price is a great idea.

Sure they could download these things, but that would require time, effort, bandwidth and know-how.. which is something many don't want to invest. Providing boxed versions for a small fee is the perfect way to overcome many of those barriers (and lets be honest, many would rather spend $5/$10 rather than do the work or waste bandwidth).

[Tipo]

I'm pretty happy about it becoming more mainstream. The school my dad works for is pretty tight on money, and they've begun to replace all their Microsoft Office suites with OpenOffice on all the macs and PCs

[adam.tropics]

Why would you buy an office suite for someone? What possible reason would they have to just randomly give an expensive office suite to someone?...

Practical Christmas present for student from family with no skill in the sock knitting department!

[NJC]

I don't have much need for a wordprocessor, spreadsheet et al - but any time I've used OpenOffice it appears to be excellent software. I'd recommend it anyone.

[Insomniac20k]

Thats a really good idea... I wish more stores would carry it. It can help prove that (a) FOSS development can be profitable, and (b) it spreads FOSS software. Same with Ubuntu and other distro's. Offering people a fully featured OS for an extremely reasonable price is a great idea.

Sure they could download these things, but that would require time, effort, bandwidth and know-how.. which is something many don't want to invest. Providing boxed versions for a small fee is the perfect way to overcome many of those barriers (and lets be honest, many would rather spend $5/$10 rather than do the work or waste bandwidth).


I would be willing to pay a few bucks to get an already made cd. I just don't want to wait for it to come in the mail. I'm going to talk to my local computer store about this.

Ubuntu sells the discs for like 30ish bucks for a pack of 30 cds. They'd quintuple their money selling it for 5 bucks a piece.

[junior aspirin]

i spotted OO.o on UK terrestrial TV last week, it was on an amazingly awful soap opera called Hollyoaks.

[hanzomon4]

I wonder why OO.o is super fast for some people and slow for me and some others.

Is it because I only have 512 meg of RAM?

Nope, I have 512 megs of ram and it loads in about 4-5 secs.

[jseiser]

I work at a PC repair/ISP office and alot of the time people will want the computer wiped but demand office be installed etc..... without a license for it. Open Office fits in quite nicely and once the people are shown the softwar they forgot about Office all together.

[Paqman]

lol I'm pretty sure that would get me in trouble.


I dunno, I use portable Firefox at work, and nobody's said anything.

I doubt the IT department would have an issue with you using a more secure browser on their network, after all.

[LaRoza]

lol I'm pretty sure that would get me in trouble. I don't mind too much.


They run at your user level, so it isn't like you are doing anything you can't already do.

[Nekiruhs]

I've been noticing the same thing too. My normally Tech-shy, brand-name program following, AOL-using Dad asked me bout OO.o a couple weeks ago. Now he uses it. Its catching on.

[stoodleysnow]

Interesting:
I rang up AOL tech support (we still are having to use That ISP) and for once spoke to someone here in the UK (or Ireland, but close enough). And when I mentioned that I use Ubuntu, instead of the usual "we do not support Linux with AOL" rubbish, he replied with "Yeah, I'm giving Ubuntu a try, it takes some getting used to but the forums are helpful":):)

[wrightci]

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=ubuntu+virginmedia

VirginMedia host an Ubuntu mirror - I get my updates from there but
cannot give you a concrete answer as to how good they are at keeping it up to date - works for me using apt like follows:
deb http://ubuntu.virginmedia.com/archive gutsy-updates main restricted universe multiverse

When above is working you should see file entries in
/var/lib/apt/lists
that have virginmedia in their filename.

Virgin hosting ubuntu mirror is great if you are on virgin and want to get the iso of a new release :)

What can I say about Virgin Media Broadband and Ubuntu - well it works fine for me here (over a year now). I rarely have to call the tech support (2 times in past year) but you do have to be somewhat prepared in that the call centre is on the subcontinent which, as some will already know, is pretty barren country for linux as yet.

I work around this just by being on the ball with any network trouble and using traceroute/ping wisely in any diagnosis (after switching off firewall of course).

Don't take it lying down when some headset jock says - but blah blah blah windows - just point out that this is a network issue and they need to check their end thoroughly. They will usually ask you to reboot your modem and they can see the traffic flow down to it from their end anyway - they can physically see when your network card is pulling anything through.

Hope this helps anyone struggling with 'windows blah blah' responses from UK ISPs who really are coming around slowly but surely.
Gary.

PS Do use the ethernet connection rather than usb for computer to cable modem otherwise you might be on a sticky wicket in any cable problem discussion before you start.

[rab4567]

Take a look at whats coming to OO 3.0.
Here: http://marketing.openoffice.org/oooc...nesday_186.pdf.

[popch]

http://marketing.openoffice.org/oooc...nesday_186.pdf.

The link does not appear to work.

[andrewabc]

could be
http://marketing.openoffice.org/ooocon2007/programme/wednesday_186.pdf

[Pethegreat]

OO loads slower than word does, but 3 seconds does not make all the difference the world for me. I have a few issues with the programs. The word processsor gave me 6 pages, but when I opened it with MS word, I had only 5 pages. The paper needed to be 6 pages, so I had to BS a little for it to fit.

I found the presentation maker to be very confusing to use. If I have to import text? Why can't i just type it on the slide like I can with MS powerpoint?

I do like the feature that allows the processor to complete words for you. I like that is supports every thinkable document format that is out there.

[SZF2001]

I wonder why OO.o is super fast for some people and slow for me and some others.

Is it because I only have 512 meg of RAM?

I got a gig or RAM and it's still somewhat slow. Not three seconds fast but not a twenty minute wait... Maybe two or three minutes. Or less. Haven't really timed it.

But I think running a P IV processor isn't exactly helping the situation. Abiword opens in a snap. Also note I'm running Xubuntu and OO.o would probably run faster in something else like Debian with the XCFE or something like Fluxbuntu.

[ShodanjoDM]

I still remember that before OOo v.2 released, the v.1.4 was wayyy slower. So when the first v.2 was released, I was pleasantly surprised.

Ofcourse things can be better, and I hope the upcoming v.3 will be even better.

[andrewabc]

Turn off java in OOo settings.

Takes me about 6 seconds to cold start OOo. Warm start takes 2-3 seconds.

1gb ram, core2duo, intel 965g x3000
Hardy with latest 2.4 version ubuntu has released.

[wrightci]

To: szf2001
"But I think running a P IV processor isn't exactly helping the situation"
A four year old processor running a year old program is not going to get the best. Couple that with your architecture running sdram which is third the speed of anything in a computer shipped in last couple of years and you have your answer - get your wallet out or don't bleat about speed.

[billgoldberg]

A year or 2 ago I was doing an student job at a big international chemical factory.

One day I needed to pitch in the offices (I was working in the lab 99% of the time) and to my surprise they were using open office.

So big companies do use OOo.

:)

[rudihawk]

Well I pretty much converted all my friends to OOo when they needed to type documents and make spreadsheets and the like....so they didnt have to pirate M$ office.

[Teber]

the other day i read something real weird in a dutch computer magazine. it was a review of a cheap alternative for M$ Office. the suggestion was that anything that costs money should be preferred over commercial software. they knew about open office. no mention of staroffice, which is NOT free...

the other omission was obviously the reason why people should part with money for imperfect software (they had found some annoying bugs in the office suite they reviewed)