Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Abiword: Support Expectations

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the something-to-think-about dept.

bockman writes "Abiword developers have put up a letter, explaining what they expect from their user community and what the community should (and should not) expect from a volunteer-based open source software project like theirs. A much needed reality-check in these times when a large number of non-developers have joined the Linux users world." This is a must read for anyone who uses any open source software.

4 of 412 comments (clear)

  1. Expect to see this linked from Microsoft.com by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Flamebait

    If I were Microsoft, I'd link to this letter without comment. As a business user, I'd be sore pressed to consider anything but Commercial software after reading this.

  2. Huh? by FFFish · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    "As AbiWord evolves, it becomes a serious alternative to commercial products for more and more people..."

    "As AbiWord is getting more powerful and usable, we attract more and more users who expect the same feature set and product polish as they'll find in a commercial product such as Microsoft Word. Which is, in a simple word, absurd."

    So AbiWord is becoming a serious alternative to commercial products, but doesn't have the same functionality as a commercial product?!?

    Don't mislead the newbies, and you won't have upset newbies. Good motto to live by.

    --

    --
    Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
    1. Re:Huh? by nexthec · · Score: 1, Flamebait

      Oh, it gets better: on the home page itself: "AbiWord is a free word processing program similar to Microsoft® Word. It is suitable for typing papers, letters, reports, memos, and so forth."


      Not


      "AbiWord is a free word processing program similar to Microsoft® Word, Including Tech Support It is suitable for typing papers, letters, reports, memos, and so forth."


      I see no problem comparing the software, while tech support is different. Its been the same way with share ware for years, and windows people have been sucking off that for a long while now and dont seem to have a problem.



      Honestly I dont think it is really that important that we make Linux easy, and convienent. I think that we(the linux community) needs to make it what we want, to solve the problems we have, and it will work fine. Linus didnt write the first kernel with the goal of ridding the world of microsoft, but to scratch his itch, and that it has gone this far is very admirable. Now if people want to make it easy and convient, more power to them, they get to charge for tech support, ie RedHat. However, because redhat wants it to be newbie friendly does not require that Abiword makes it so.

    2. Re:Huh? by dvdeug · · Score: 4, Flamebait

      > Sure. Much of the so-called "functionality" of modren commerical word processors is, for most users, nothing but bloat.

      Like what? The equation editor - I know engineering students who find that very useful for school work. Full Unicode functionality - aka support for 1/5 of the world's population's native languages? Multilingual spellchecking? What?

      >And if you need more, you don't want a word processor, you want a document preparation system

      Most people want a simple, WYSWIG, omnipurpose tool, so that's what they use, regardless of what computer geeks think is right.