i don't even know how anybody would trust their documents to such a project
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I want human creations forever and always!
I always think of doing codng by hands but then I am so slow compared to others that it becomes not worth it. What to do about this?
Yes i code very slowly if I do it by myself.
LibreOffice has the ability to use regex in search&replace, MS Office does not. So why should i use a copy of the inferior product?
99% of people using office products daily will die not knowing how to formulate a regular expression.
I'm also upset that a mainstream tool doesn't support a niche feature.
(Mostly because I have to use certain tools at work because corporate bullshit and get annoyed when I'm reminded that the way I'm used to doing things doesn't work here)
But if I was developing a tool for a certain audience, I would also prioritise the needs and habits of that aufience. And if that means leaving out regex because laypeople will only shoot themselves in the foot... I'll bitch and moan and cry but ultimately comply.
Because Calc has the UI and functionality of Excel 97...and an awful name to boot lol
Hate to say it but anyone adept in Excel (or even Sheets, probably) would agree. It gets the job done but there's major features missing for a lot of what I'd use it for.
It's the difference between knowing how to market and knowing how to actually build shit.
Turns out, in our modern society, the former is a far more valuable skill than the latter.
Just bullshit your way until you get enough money and resources to actually hire people who know what they're doing and can build the thing.
It sucks
One guy I used to work with (long before LLMs) built a website for his company and listed a bunch of software there for sale. Except he hadn't built any software product yet. Once someone contacted him about buying one of the products, then he would build it.
Turns out, in our modern society, the former is a far more valuable skill than the latter.
that was knows and loudly displayel by all the apple fanbois and Jobs
until you get enough money and resources to actually hire people who know what they're doing and can build the thing.
Has this ever happened? I though the way to go was enshittification of an already inferior product
I'm 100% all in on Libre Office. I'll use Libre Office until it dies or I die
The clone is perfect though, vibe coded or not: as it doesn't work it's obviously a 1:1 copy that's just accurately mimicking the original...
I thought it was a photoshop clone, not a MS Office clone?
They (multiple parties) are cloning any possible software and games they can.
cloningslopping
edit: fixed
LibreOffice is an awesome piece of kit! On setup, they let you select the "tabbed" UI if you prefer something closer to MS office.
Collabora Office is another one that seems neat, have not used it before though. OnlyOffice has weird Russian ties and GPL incompatible licensing shenanigans, I would avoid them for the most part. WPS Office has the best compatibility with MS Office files on Linux I think, but it's closed-source so not great either. There's always running a VM / dual booting if you must use MS Office.
Honestly, MS office files have worked fine on LibreOffice, the only big issue I've found is that translucent images are a little broken when going from Impress to PowerPoint (all images share the same opacity for some reason?)
In my experience, MS Office files tend to have fewer compatibility problems on LibreOffice than on MS Office after the next update.
It's never that MS Office files don't work on LibreOffice (formatting is a little different but almost never broken), it's always files exported from LibreOffice that MS Office misreads (because Microsoft can't be bothered to follow standards)
Can't be bothered makes them sound lazy. It's a deliberate method of squashing all competitors. If you can't send a document to someone else who usrs MS Office and have it appear the same, then you're going to need to use MS Office. Libre has been calling them out on this for years.
On setup, they let you select the "tabbed" UI
On setup it asks you to select one of four UIs, some of them are missing features. Once I spent almost an hour trying to solve a problem, but it turned out it was unsolvable in my UI. I changed the UI and found a solution in a moment.
Don't get me wrong, I love the fact that OpenOffice exists, but their UI needs a lot of work
LibreOffice, not OpenOffice. I believe LibreOffice was forked from OpenOffice, and the latter hasn't had any updates in ages.
I imagine that the UI you selected was the one of the "compact" or "single toolbar" options? It is a little confusing that some of the one functions disappear with those, it would be helpful if it was listed which ones were missing
The three you mentioned in the second paragraph are slop fests now.
I haven't used any of them in ages, I know Collabora is focused on their online suite. Looking at OnlyOffice's website, they are positioning themselves as an "AI-first" office suite (the LLM tools have been changed to be optional and installed separately since a recent update, but still a bad look)
And WPS Office was always owned by a Chinese company and continues to be closed-source, so no changes there. Again, the same sort of "AI-first" stuff on their homepage, yikes
The only reason we want a clone of ma office is because it's the standard, not because it's good...
Sadly if you need to make ppts regularly, OpenOffice and Libra Office don't come close to Powerpoint in terms of features...
And sadly I'm far too incompetent a coder (and already torn 4 ways between family, job, MtG:judging, and rest and hobbies as I'm hugely introverted) to be able to help change that.
Feature Wish List
- copying objects copies their animations and interactions, including "on click" or links if copying multiple at once.
- replacing an object doesn't destroy it's animations, links, etc.
- ability to replace multimedia objects (images, sounds, etc.) from clipboard, not only storage.
- ability to edit animations in bulk in more than just activation, type, and order. i.e. timing, sound effects
- animation rules such as reset on completion or not to actually do what they say.
- transparency to not block interaction with objects.
And this one is probably a faulty user error:
- change the default colours from that blue to something I'd occasionally use.
That said, the word processor, spreadsheet, and graphic design application are all a head better than the proprietary versions I've tried.
Calc is also not an Excel replacement for a lot of use cases. It's good for basic number crunching but it lacks a lot of functions, conditional formatting, and if you set up data validation on any cells....good luck finding them again. There is no menu for it. You need a PLUGIN to scan the sheets for cells with data validation and manually remove them
Does the new one look better or something? Or is it just the fact that it's AI-written that's getting people excited?
Nobody wants to use Microsoft specifically. But that's what they're used to. And that's what the industry standard is. LibreOffice does not prioritize compatibility with Microsoft Office formats. LibreOffice has tabbed mode which feels a bit more like "home", but for some reason is missing options on this Ui view.
That's why people are interested. If it looks exactly like Microsoft Office and is 100% compatible with Microsoft Office formats without having to use a Microsoft product, that is a win. Will it be possible to maintain since it was so heavily vibe coded? That remains to be seen. But let's not pretend that open source projects are just as good or better in every way. LibreOffice is a lot closer than most, but Gimp is no Photoshop, for example, and after 30 years of waiting, I think it's safe to say that it's not gonna be. As much as I respect both LibreOffice and Gimp.
Apparently it looks identical to MS Office, so it isn't "better" than MS Office or LibreOffice in a functional sense (arguably less so since it's probably very buggy code)
I wouldn't say it's people (normal people would be using MS Office or LibreOffice most likely) excited that it's LLM generated, though some AI Bros probably are, I imagine some outlets are promoting this to sell whatever the new model is these days. And when there is a lot of news around a topic, it's covered by more and more people (something about all press is good press here)
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