
Looking At Gobe 192
mneptok writes: "OSNews is running a review of a beta version of Gobe Productive, the office productivity suite initially developed for BeOS by the former producers of ClarisWorks. The beta tested by OSNews is for Windows, but a Linux GTK (and that's toolkit only) version is planned for release after the Win32 version ships. A public beta of the Win32 version is imminent. Looks like a nice, affordable 'army knife' office app for Windows users, and a serious contender in the Linux office space." We had some coverage of this a while back,
Personally... (Score:2)
I've been throwing off the Microsoft yoke in stages - my mail client is eudora lite, my office suite is staroffice, and my browser is k-meleon. Hooray, I guess.
Don't tell anyone, but I actually save all my wordprocessing docs in RTF. So the program I use doesn't matter all that much, to some extent.
Re:Personally... (Score:1)
1) OSNews is a terrific site. Eugenia is really doing a great job with it.
2) I've tried GoBe on Be and found it usable, if hardly a replacement for MS Office. But $125? That seems to me to be conceding the don't-want-to-pay market to Sun and they're unlikely to derail Microsoft among people with money to spend.
And now a completely offtopic question.
StarOffice 6beta rocks my world (at least, those parts of it that deal with office productivity).
I've installed the Linux OpenOffice beta (638c) and have a really stupid question: how do I start it? I can't figure out what the executable is, and I haven't found any documentation on the site to answer that. If it installs something in your desktop menu, it doesn't know about WindowMaker.
Re:Personally... (Score:1)
Re:Personally... (Score:1)
Re:Personally... (Score:1)
export PATH=$PATH:$OPENOFFICEDIR/bin
or creating a link
ln -s $OPENOFFICEDIR/bin/soffice
or have it start automatically in your
or use an icon for your desktop?
Re:Personally... (Score:3, Insightful)
Ah yes, the valuable "dont-want-to-pay market." They are, of course, the real prize market that most companies shoot for.
Gobe's price is a THIRD of the Office UPGRADE price!
Well.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Still I don't quite see the market. Office people want what they know: MS Office,
if your not using that, it really doesn't matter what you're using. So why not chose something that doesn't cost 120 bucks, like StarOffice or KOffice?
Still, I haven't used the software, maybe it IS an OfficeXP killer. My point is: It'd have to be.
Re:Well.. (Score:1, Redundant)
Does OfficeXP have a similar license-validation mechanism to what Windows-XP has? If it does, then OfficeXP will be the OfficeXP killer.
Re:Well.. (Score:1)
[opinion] Though I won't use it myself, I predict both will be successfull simply because they are some of Microsoft's flagship products and will be 'recomended' (forced upon) many companies who have put all their eggs in the Microsoft basket. [/opinion]
Re:Well.. (Score:2)
Office XP will be bundled with new computers and soon will be the only MS Office suite available to small to medium businesses.
Large businesses usually have premium Microsoft licenses which permit them among other things to buy an XP license and install 2000...
Re:Well.. (Score:1, Offtopic)
The industry is in a rut, its m$ hardware, m$ OS, and m$ office suite. There are people trying to compete, but with m$ spending millions and new releases every couple months, it seems like an uphill battle. Soon as a new product comes out, M$ has a better product, or a Soon to be released better product.
Linux companies arnt making the money on support that m$ makes. M$ makes millions each month on support, and school classes alone. Many many companies with better products either go out of business or get bought up, to have its product shelved.
Really a sad state of affairs, Linux is so powerful, lots of opensource appications, games ported, but still the market is too small to keep in business.
I think maybe 10 years from now, Linux will be the best OS out, be able to run every application, run on every hardware, do any task. But we will be locked into some subscription model and security system that will lock us into m$.
ClarisWorks was awesome (Score:1)
Re:ClarisWorks was awesome (Score:1)
ive done several (and i mean several) spreadsheets for school and home in clarisworks, 3.0 i believe at the time, although i might have also done some in 2.x.
the one thing that ClarisWorks was missing, however, was presentation software.
Something like powerpoint.
It had a slide-show feature which worked with the documents you created, but it came nowhere near powerpoint.
However, even that changed with version 6.0.
Unfortunately, however, i never was able to get my hands on a copy...
And Apple stopped developing it for Windows, so i cant try it on my dual celeron either.
Re:ClarisWorks was awesome (Score:2)
I remember a friend saying many years ago "In ClarisWorks you can do anything!" And he's right.
The drawing surface is really a poor man's page layout program. You can set up multiple text boxes where the text will overflow from one box to the next. Set up complex multiple column layouts, and when you edit text in an earlier box, the text "flows" throughout the "linked" text boxes. Setup multiple "chains" of linked textboxes if you wish. Each text box has full word processing features. Wrap text around odd shaped pictures. Draw complex pictures. Paint pictures. (Paint is pixmap based, Draw is vector-object based.) Make slideshows.
Put spreadsheets into wordprocessing, to form tables. Directly draw or paint inside word processing documents. Even play a QuickTime movie inside of a word processing document. (It prints as a still image.) Spinning logos in letterhead or slideshows.
In fact, the biggest thing that I thought ClarisWorks lacked was that its pixel manipulation (i.e. Paint) is not more Photoshop like.
Re:Well.. (Score:2)
As much as I dislike M$ policies, Access is still a good low-end database product (does MySQL have an easy-to-use GUI build in??) that is definitely unmatched in any of its rivals.
Let's get real ... (Score:4, Insightful)
There's nothing more important in the Office world than compatibility M$ file formats. Which reminds me that the current antitrust settlement doesn't say anything about opening file formats.
Back to StarOffice & powerpoint viewers (thanks god there's Wine!)
The Raven
Re:Let's get real ... (Score:2, Interesting)
For BeOS and Linux this office suite is one of their killer applications that users should be proud of. For Windows users, it still has some features left to be desired when a 'monster' like OfficeXP is already out and about. The Word
Uhm.. And this is a serious contender in any market, how? And it's closed-source, so it doesn't do anyone any good as a learning tool, either?
I'm sorry, but I just don't understand the front-page hype about it. It reminds me a lot of that vector-drawing program for linux that came out a little while and didn't do much other than coredump all over the place..
Re:Let's get real ... (Score:1)
(i'm so not a fan of the wait 2 minutes till you can post again thing.. i'll just sit here. hey, we're
Re:Let's get real ... (Score:2)
While I won't gainsay Eugenia, I'll have to say that I haven't had any problems with Gobe Productive 2.0 (under BeOS) in its export/import capabilities for Microsoft Word. The RTF filter is rather dimwitted (logically, it should be capable of everything the Word filter is, but in practice it definitely isn't), and the HTML export is extremely barebones--although in some ways that's a blessing, since it means I have much less crap to remove when I want to turn it into a real web page.
I used StarOffice 5.1 under Linux and Windows and it drove me absolutely batshit. I applaud the effort in OpenOffice to fix some of its predecessor's atrocities, but it's still an amazing resource pig.
Speaking solely for myself, I'll be looking forward to gobeProductive for Windows, and I'll certainly see if I can run the Linux binary at work under FreeBSD. (Yes, bizarrely enough, I use FreeBSD at work and Windows at home these days, although I'm in the process of setting up a Slackware 8 partition on my PC.) I know some people have had good luck with AbiWord, but I'm not one of them; the only open source office application I've liked so far has been Gnumeric. The new Productive release fixes one major hole in previous incarnations (no sections). If they've added the ability to start numbering at pages other than 1, I'll be set. If they start taking advantage of their frames to move toward being a baby desktop publishing program, too, that'd rock. :)
You guys... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:You guys... (Score:1, Interesting)
I'm fat, lazy, and sweat when I eat. I buy cheap beer, and listen to 80s music. I'm not a programmer, though I could be a spitting image of Stallmon, just with better taste in clothing. I pay to have it done.
I want my MS-Office (no, really...) (Score:2)
Re:I want my MS-Office (no, really...) (Score:2)
Re:I want my MS-Office (no, really...) (Score:2)
So could others. If we had a truly competitive marketplace.
MS is not the only company who knows how to make good software. The problem is that there is a big lack of incentive to invest in a product that has to compete with MS, when they are a monopolist. Everyone knows better. All they have to do is give their product away, for awhile, until you die. Special!!!!!! Six month coupon for FREE!!! Office XP! included with Windows XP!!!! Be sure to get yours today!!!!!! Limited time offer!!!! (until our competition dies)
Gotta change the name! (Score:1)
Then i saw the fact that there was no L.
So is it pronounced GOB, like a gob of glue,
or maybe GOOB.. like.. GOOBER! haha
or GO-B?
Oh well... Good to see some development in the linux office arena. I'm sick of StarOffice, I want Applixware back, and Koffice ain't my cup o'tea either.
Really, I need something to replace my dad's machine running win98 and MS Works 2000, I'd LOVE to switch him over to SuSE, but he's got tons of old MS Works word processing docs that i'd need to convert, haven't had the best success going to
Oh, well, my $.02
Re:Gotta change the name! (Score:1)
What happened to ApplixWare? Did they tank? I have a perfectly good retail copy somewhere here... with printed manual...
Re:Gotta change the name! (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Gotta change the name! (Score:2)
In case you haven't figured that out, it rhymes with these words:
- globe
- robe
- Moby (but without the "ee" sound)
- etc.
Re:Gotta change the name! (Score:2)
XP Lite, etc? (Score:2)
there is definitely a market for a non MS suite in the hundred dollar range.
I can remember Claris works, and a number of other similar and excellent products. Not every one wants to spend multiple hundreds of dollars just to write a basic letter.
Heck I would be very happy with a Lite version of windows and office, half the features for half the price. I kan do witout a spel cheker. or all of the fancier features no one uses. Give me the 20% or 30% that 80% of the people use 90% of the time.
Re:XP Lite, etc? (Score:1)
Watever appened to the Win. version of ClarisWorks (Score:2)
I liked the way all the selection entries in the dropdown font menu appeared in their own fonts.
About 2 years ago I built a computer for someone & he wanted ClarisWorks for Windows installed, but I couldn't find a downlaod anywhere of it.
Even old versions or demo versions that you use to get on magazine CDs.
Re:Watever appened to the Win. version of ClarisWo (Score:2)
I think that there has been talk of doing a new release for Windows, but the Apple online store [apple.com] only seems to have AppleWorks 6.2 for Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X.
Re:Watever appened to the Win. version of ClarisWo (Score:2)
cosmus@tpg.com.au
Mick's the name
I'm still in contact with that bloke - I'll be able to ring him up & say that I managed to find ClarisWorks for Windows, for him.
He'll then think I've been spending the past 2 years deligently looking for it for him
Save as .PDF??? (Score:1)
I sure as hell don't see it under Word2000's Save As
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:2)
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:1)
thanks
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:2)
I sure as hell don't see it under Word2000's Save As ;)
But you can get an 'Print to PDF' thingie. You just have to install the Windows version of GhostScript, and some little program they offer on the same site allows you to install it as a printer driver. (it's been a while since used Windows, so I don't remember the details :)
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:2)
--
Evan
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:2)
Re:Save as .PDF??? (Score:3, Informative)
- j
Re: PDF not that open (Score:2)
True, but all new PDFs are compressed with ZIP so this isn't a concern anymore.
I also remember reading somewhere (maybe
Well if the fonts in a PDF aren't on your system then you can't view them, obviously. But how is this any different from any other word processor file? The nice part is that fonts can (and in most cases, should) be embedded into the PDF so if anything, this is another reason to use PDF over something like RTF.
- j
Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:4, Interesting)
For those of you who don't normally read osnews and Eugenia's reviews, she continually gets crap over her spelling and grammer. Specifically, she gets a lot more whenever they are linked by
*off soapbox*
*ontopic*
I really liked Gobe Productive when I used BeOS. I even bought a copy. However, I wish they had decided to use qt instead of gtk... It just mesh better with the rest of my desktop. Oh, well.
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:1)
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:1)
<flame> Maybe if she used full featured word processors that have spelling and grammar correction in many languages, she wouldn't have that problem. </flame>
Really though, doesn't that in-and-of-itself show why MS is still ahead with consumers for product popularity?
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:2)
The sad thing is, because of Microsoft's popularity, people are bound to do just that (and while their spelling and grammar will be fine, they will have much larger problems).
I won't go into why writing web pages in a word processor is a bad thing.
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:2, Insightful)
But seriously, flaming someone for poor grammar in a language that's not their native one is really, really, really lame... English is my native language, and I'm sure my grammar and spelling leave somthing to be desired, but that's becuase I don't care enough to check everything. The reviewer is trying above and beyond the call of duty (ever tried to speak a foreign language? if you haven't, don't bother sharing your opinion) to be intelligible, and a such deserves to be applauded, not flamed.
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't you think that learning the basic, grade-school-levels skills like spelling and grammer would be a more appropriate reaction than this whining? If you don't like being accused of bad grammer, learn to use good grammer. If you don't like constructive criticism about your spelling, learn to spell. No, a spelling checker won't help ... did you really want to say affect or effect?
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:2)
Say, anyone know much about Automated Transition Grammars? I've been looking into natural language translation that would understand an average slashdot post.
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:3, Insightful)
When a spelling flame, using hate-filled language like "basic grammer skills", gets modded up, you know it's time to find some other site which isn't such an asshole magnet.
Re:Spelling/Grammer Nazis... (Score:1)
But at least she spelled grammar correctly.
Um...EXPORT, anyone? (Score:1)
Re:Um...EXPORT, anyone? (Score:1)
As well as better WMF support.
Not consciously trolling, but... (Score:1)
At $120 US for the suite, it's not an unreasonable price, but the basic functionality (imitating MS Orifice) is already there for the most part on StarOffice, etc for nothing, and for Windows you'd just buy/pirate OrificeXP.
Recall that Applixware basically went out of business when the free-use/open source suites came out on Linux. What the hell are these guys gonna do? I feel for them, I really do. If they want to keep this alive they should seriously consider something along the lines of the OpenBeOS/Blue OS/atheOS projects. Sorry... please convince me that I'm wrong.
Re:Not consciously trolling, but... (Score:1)
ClarisWorks was great (Score:2, Insightful)
How do the other office suites stack up? StarOffice is a positively huge application (especially for those who need only "light word processing.") KOffice seemed buggy and unimpressive. WordPerfect for Linux has one of the most rauciously flawed font renderers I've ever come across. So... I've had my eye on Gobe for some time--I hope they come through.
BRx.
My Linux Productivity Suite (Score:2, Funny)
CircusLinux [newbreedsoftware.com]
Koules [paru.cas.cz]
And the one site we all love dearly.
Re:My Linux Productivity Suite (Score:1)
Im a student and I'm lazy. But I have also done both of the above during summer placements.
Wow...a sane commercial license... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Wow...a sane commercial license... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Wow...a sane commercial license... (Score:1)
License (Score:3, Insightful)
There's more than just openOffice... (Score:1)
And the good side is that the two or three suites can share code, leaving to the user to choose based on look and feel and size (more bloat, less bloat...) and as they mature and gain in quality it'll become harder and harder to sell a closed source office suite for Linux and other open source OSes...
But we must admire these guys efforts. Congratulations Gobe, I hope you sell lots of copies to Win users.
Gobe's liscensing terms actually get it (Score:5, Interesting)
The real money for liscensing is in corporate liscensing. The really financially damaging software "piracy" is among corporate (or government agency...) clients. There's not terribly much to gain from having draconian liscensing schemes that prevent multiple parties in a household from having the software installed; one might even argue that there are no economically justifiable reasons from curtailing any installations, but that's another argument.
Historically, office-suite penetration has occurred from the corporate level down to the private level; that is, people are forced to use software at work and therefore find themselves having to use it at home as well. The corporate market is fairly well saturated by microsoft Office so it'd be suicide for Gobe to fight there first. Far better would be to worm into the home office market, and try to get employees familiar with it so they can demand their employers reconsider.
By making it almost pleasant to use their product (and for a reasonable price), they get my vote.
But is there a cross platform license (Score:3, Interesting)
Then they can have the 3 versions all on one CD in a crossplatform box. Retailers love that - it makes stocking easy.
Bit like if you buy the boxed version of BeOS you get both X86 & PPC versions inside it.
Actually I think the boxed version of ClarisWorks itself came with both Mac & Windows versions in it. You know, like it had compatible with both Macintosh & Windows markings on the box.
Counterpoint (or "requisite MS bashing)... (Score:2, Interesting)
The real money for liscensing is in corporate liscensing. The really financially damaging software "piracy" is among corporate (or government agency...) clients. There's not terribly much to gain from having draconian liscensing schemes that prevent multiple parties in a household from having the software installed;
Others might not agree with this statement...
According to Wired [wired.com], regarding Windows XP:
I'm with you in that I think that the money is in corporate liscencing. Then again, I don't have any software that anyone would want to buy.
Re:Gobe's liscensing terms actually get it (Score:2)
They really seem to get the reality of the way people want to use the licensed product.
I paid real money for ClarisWorks, many years ago, for my Mac. It was a fantastic investment. Inexpensive upgrades. Reasonable licensing. NO SERIALIZATION nonsense, or copy protection, no mandatory registration, etc. Just try it. When AppleWorks or ClarisWorks is launched for the first time and asks for your name and serial number, just leave it blank and click OK. Yes, really. Try it. It's worked this way for years.
AppleWorks (and older ClarisWorks) runs on both Mac and Windows -- and serial number is not needed with either. I can say from personal experience.
They get it with the licensing. Most reasonable people don't mind paying a reasonable price in real money for an outstanding product.
On a similar note, I think The Kompany also gets it. A long time ago, so did Borland. Ever read Borland's "no nonsense license agreement"? It was in plain english, and readable.
By contrast MS makes their licensing programs vague. You never can be sure if you're in compliance. Suppose hypothetically, I have 5 workstations that are used by 8 people. Do I need 5 licenses or 8? Well, the only way I've found to correctly interpret MS's licenses is to interpret them in whatever way is most favorable to MS in terms of $$. What if the 5 workstations run the software from a central server. Do I need 5 licenses or 8? And don't even dream about a license that allows you to take your work home with you to your personal computer when using MS. Or to take your personal copy in to the office. What if I have 10 workstations shared by 5 people? Need 5 licenses or 10? What if every engineer has 3 computers in his workspace, why can't I install Product-X on each workstation for convenience? It still only benefits one person. But nooooooooo. You must get 3 seperate MS licenses.
Re:Gobe's liscensing terms actually get it (Score:1)
Sounds like a good deal. (Score:2)
When the Linux version is released, it's gonna be great for FreeBSD users like myself. I like to run simple, quick programs. (For example, IceWM as opposed to a desktop environment like GNOME or KDE.) As I recall, Gobe was lean and quick on BeOS. I hope the Linux version is like that too.
Oh well.
BeOS (Score:4, Insightful)
It is also shocking to be reminded off how bad the Linux office productivity stuff is in comparison. Staroffice (5.2 at least) is shockingly bad, and Abiword just looks like MS Wordpad, though I do like GNUmeric. K-Office is nice but still feels unfinished.
But the most impressive thing about Gobe was its size. Or rather the lack of it. This program is just *so* slick and I will be getting a copy when its finished
Po
less solid contenders ... more killer apps (Score:1)
We have too many solid contenders today. All of which are just not quite solid enough for daily use.
Register my plea for a kickass application that people will want to migrate to, away from Office.
BTW What happened to StarOffice.com (Score:1)
I tried to download the Star Office 6 beta recently, but for some strange reason it tells me that it can't find SOT638MI.DLL (ok, on Win Me, I admit).
Anyway, I tried to visit StarOffice.com and got the following message:
StarOffice.com Temporarily Shutdown
A Power Failure has damaged our main host...
Will come back soon...
Is this the right site? Does anyone know what happened?
I feel so abandoned... (Score:1)
SO drops support.
Gobe makes an office suite for Be...Be drops off the face of the planet, BeOs wise.
Gobe wrote the precursor to Appleworks (i.e. claris works) Dropped or Sold? Dunno.
And for all the slamming I've seen (ok, and done, too) of Microsoft... I've played with the GM of Office for X... all I can say is "wow".
Silly me for hoping Star Office would get there first and "save me".
(colorful series of explicatives deleted)...for all of the proclamations that Microsoft does not give the consumer a choice...I have to ask myself now "Do their competitors?"
I'm dead serious.
Maybe it is a sign of the times that Microsoft owns Windows and Macintosh computers lock, stock and little/big endian bits, or maybe comptitors have just given up trying altogether.
Has MS proven "that he who tries to be strong everywhere, ends up being strong nowhere" the phrase wrong?
Saying there is no competition because 1 player owns the marked is one thing.
Saying there is no competition because no one is trying at all, is another.
Someone give me a reality check, please!
Either I'm missing some critical piece, or I've hit the problem dead on....only thing is I don't know which.
Help.
Re:I feel so abandoned... (Score:1)
Claris was sprung off from Apple. Claris then ported ClarisWorks to Windows. Claris also bought the popular FileMaker package. Claris was happy. Apple was not.
Apple joined in Claris again. This was a few months after ClarisWorks 5.0 came out. Some of the Claris developers decided not to work for Apple and left to form Gobe. Apple renamed ClarisWorks to AppleWorks and released a new version. Apple was happy. Gobe was happy.
Re:I feel so abandoned... (Score:1, Insightful)
Microsoft does produce good software, sometimes the best in its class and usually "good enough" if not.
Microsoft also illegally attempts to make sure that nobody else can create products to compete with theirs, or failing that to make sure that nobody could sell these products.
The fact that any of Microsoft's products would have won in the marketplace anyways does not diminish the fact that Microsoft breaks the law to ensure this happens.
PS: Does GISBoy refer to Geographical Information Systems? I'm starting to look into that sort of thing. I've tried using Grass, it's a completely unusable piece of crap as far as I can tell. Any good software or docs you can recommend?
What's most interesting.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What's most interesting.. (Score:2)
Re:What's most interesting.. (Score:1)
It still has a few features I miss, and I've run into a few annoyances getting the print preview to actually match what comes out of the printer, but overall it's pretty usable for everything I need to do - mostly spreadsheets and typing contracts.
Re:What's most interesting.. (Score:4, Insightful)
you'd have the problem of software designed by committee, but I don't have the exact ideal solution for that right now. perhaps if the org doesn't do exactly what each wants they can hire an in house programer to add a feature of choice.
this of course needs to be thought about alot, it's just a quick offhand idea floating in my head.
Re:What's most interesting.. (Score:1, Informative)
Being paid full time, though? Yes and no. It is their dayjob, but they put up a lot of the capital themselves, and accepted significantly smaller paychecks than they could have gotten had they been working elsewhere or ridden the
emacs and gcc were written by a dedicated individual with talent (regardless of what you think of RMS' bathing habits or politics), so I think what matters most is skill and devotion, 2 things generally lacking in 60% of slashdt readers (the other 40% are skillful, devoted trolls).
ClarisWorks was availiable for Windows too (Score:2)
Re:What's most interesting.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Guess again. Gobe Productive actually uses Libart for the cool vector rendering. Not only that, but they've contributed some nice patches back, and they've paid for bug-fixing and enhancement work. So I think they do get the Open Source thing.
Gobe Productive (Score:1, Interesting)
Unfortunately as long as M$ Word is out there, and M$ uses its customary tricks, the alternative WP programmes will be marginalised. Remember Word Perfect ? It has more owners than I've had hot dinners ! Give Productive a go, use Star Office, try Abi Word, and then maybe Word will be sold at a reasonable price and competition may start to work !
Re:Gobe Productive (Score:1, Interesting)
more office suites? (Score:1)
1) abiword
2) staroffice
3) corel word perfect
4) kde office suite
5) Gobe
6)
Re:more office suites? (Score:3, Insightful)
I need indexes, tables of contents, style sheets,
StarOffice is getting close. But it's not there yet. KOffice doesn't have any sort of index. AbiWord didn't impress the last time I looked. Applixware hasn't been updated in a few years. Word Perfect doesn't work with recent Linux distributions. KLyx has disappeared from KDE. Etc.
KOffice and AbiWord have seemed the major hopes, but haven't been very impressive yet. (This weekend I ended up borrowing my wife's computer so I could use MS Word to organize a small collection of poems (with table of contents and index
To be absolutely truthful, at the moment the best word processor on Linux seems to be a combination of a browser and a text editor (write it in html, and then look, to make sure you got it right), but this isn't very appropriate for printed output.
what I really need (Score:2)
Does such a beast exist? If it did we could totally ditch MS completely at my office.
Re:what I really need (Score:1)
http://www.thekompany.com/products/rekall/ [thekompany.com]
it currently supports mysql, postgresql, and xbase but is supposed to get support from more with the coming port to QT3.
It has has an integrated python debugger for scripting! sweet...
ApplixWare is alive and well (Score:1)
In any event, it's my top pick for a Linux productivity package, and it's reasonably priced (under $100). The user interface is similar to MS Office or StarOffice, but it is more utilitarian (and quicker to navigate). Plus, I think it is available for Windows desktops as well as most flavors of UNIX.
Good Timing Maybe? (Score:1)
Re:the $ question (Score:1)
You contradicted yourself, how would it make money if it IS free. Opera is not free, yet it's still around. Perhaps this can be an alternative for people who want something light. And I'm sure the BeOS people who have moved on to Linux or moved back to Windows will definitely buy this.
Re:the $ question (Score:1)
Nitpick:
The latest versions of Opera (at least for Linux and Windows) are free (as in beer), as long as you don't mind having a random banner ad at the top of your screen.
Re:the $ question (Score:1)
For most people, neither Word nor Excel is anything to get excited about. It simply is. It passed what ever meagre needs they have a long time ago. They could probably use a crufty old Win16 or DOS version if they really wanted to.
The only limiting issue is whether or not they can deal with obnoxious twits that like to send around proprietary format datafiles.
Re:Conspiracy theory (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Interesting Idea - Hard To Sell (Score:1)
That's how msword was originally perpetuated.
Re:Interesting Idea - Hard To Sell (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Interesting Idea - Hard To Sell (Score:3, Interesting)
Worked magificently on BeOS 5 Pro and PE.
Buy the thing now, and you can get the windows and linux version for the same money. use it on win at work (if you suffer like the rest of us) and linux at home.
Re:Preparing presentations in linux is a nightmare (Score:1)