[haiku] Re: GP
- From: Francis Parsons <franpar@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: haiku@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:24:54 -0400
> Personally, I'd *much* prefer having Gobe than either of the others!
(:-))
GP may be a brilliant piece of software, but it's so different that it's
hard to imagine it ever being able to have good interchangeability with MS
Office. Of opensource alternatives to Office, OpenOffice.org probably has
some of the best handling of MS formats...and because it has some developer
traction, it's probably going to stay around and continue to be improved.
Since it exists on multiple platforms already, it doesn't have a very
small, platform-specific user base that ensures an eventual descent into
obscurity.
Without even some interchangeability with MS Formats, it would be hard to
recommend Haiku to someone who wants to be able to do some work, or just
read attachments. You can object all you want to MS's software quality,
dominance, or "bloatedness", but that's just how things are right now. Of
the office suites available that may eventually take market share away from
MS Office, OpenOffice looks like the best bet. KOffice looks pretty good
but I don't think it has anywhere near the level of features OOO has.
Re: bloat: A lot of people object to OpenOffice's "bloat", but you have to
be fair and admit that it's improved a lot over the last 5 years. I think
it's still possible that the mess people say it is now will get better
simply because a lot of people are using it - there's more motivation to
improve it. A lot of people will say "I don't need half the features that
are in there!"...well, you may not, but others do, particularly business
and gov't . Most people don't need the powers of the full version of
Photoshop, but it's still a leading standard in businesses because of those
features. If you only need a few features, well, there's a lot to choose
from, but the pervasiveness of the file formats from those "bloated"
applications makes it a much more practical thing to have access to a
widely used program than an obscure one.
Even though OOO may be aesthetically objectionable code and design-wise, I
think there would give a much better return for the effort. You also need
to consider how many developers will actually be available to maintain and
improve the code base.
--
Francis
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