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Codeweavers Releases Crossover Office
rleyton writes "Codeweavers have just announced Crossover Office, a Wine derivitive which allows MS-Office 97 & 2000 products as well as Lotus Notes to run without a Windows OS License. If it's as cool as the Crossover plugin product, then it could mean a significant step forward in Wine's progress." NewsForge got hold of a final beta copy a couple of days ago and has a Crossover Office review up already, and DesktopLinux.com has one too. This looks pretty cool, yes.
Now if a PHB tells you can't run Linux, because you need Office - tell him you'll save money by not needing a Windows license, and call still use Office.
> all that needs to be done is support an API that is now almost 7 years old
This is absolutely false. The very act of installing Office 2000 on Win95 extends the Win32 API. When you install, you not only get Windows Installer added to the system, you also get updated version of DLL's installed under your WINDOWS directory.
What kind of Application installs OS updates without informing the user or giving you a choice?
Perhaps you never noticed why mouse scroll wheels started working in all sorts of dialogs and whatnot even if you never installed Intellimouse? The answer is that Microsoft applications routinely extend the OS and API.
Lastly, the WINE team has never said their target is to emulate the Original Win95 API. Even if they had done that, they would be dependant on the new DLL files, the same as Win95 is today.
I don't have that much time, but:
"Despite these facts of life, Microsoft has decided to introduce a new licensing scheme that forces organisations to upgrade products according to rigid timescales or pay higher prices."
http://www.vnunet.com/Features/1127149
I'm tempted to post this anonymously to avoid the inevitable Trolls and Flamebaits this will earn me... but I think I'll put my high karma to good use and stand publicly behind my opinion.
Simple fact: The Gimp, like many other Open Source programs, has a poor user interface. Unlike Photoshop, which, despite its massive feature-set, is easy for an average user to pick up, the Gimp's functions are all buried in multiple levels of right-click menus. It also uses an annoying multi-window interface that clutters your taskbar horribly. The simple fact is that Photoshop is just a lot more pleasant and easy to use.
Likewise, MS Office is a much smoother experience than StarOffice (which, admittedly, has improved by leaps and bounds since its thrice-damned 5.0 incarnation).
Now, I'm behind Open Source 100%, but I don't get so caught up in my zealotry that I lose sight of ease of use issues. If an everyday user can't sit down and use an Open Source program just as easily as they could use a proprietary one, then they're not going to want to switch. It's as simple as that.