Slashdot Mirror
Israeli Ministry of Commerce Picks OO.org Over MS
CaptainT writes "According to this article in The Register Microsoft office was replaced by Open Office in the Israeli employment agency.
MS scorns the defection...
This follows current Israeli antitrust legislation and the recent release by IBM and Sun of Hebrew support in OpenOffice.org. Is the Israeli Defence Force going to follow?"
In my opinion, Open Office still has many issues which need to be fixed in future releases to compete with MS Office. I don't know whether that was taken into consideration in this move, but certainly a step in the right direction for open source.
A blog like any other.
Some of the best thinkers and code writers come from Israel. Given this fact, it is no wonder they resent outside monopoly control over software, albeit from the friendly US of A.
OTOH, Israel should be latching on to stuff like AbiWord, Gnumeric etc. rather than OOo. The latter neither provides full feature compatibility with MS Office, nor has any specific advantages to be adopted as a standard.
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If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
I'm reminded of when a large australian company changed to an OSS desktop solution, and MS decried this as "a blow for choice in the market". No explanation of how this could be possible, but everything is sound bites, a mere snippet of text that cannot possibly convey any real meaning of a situation.
... agency has selected an immature and unproven software package" could well be applied to anyone looking towards Longhorn.
"The
Few will make that leap of judgment to understand the hypocrisy.
RST
Exactly the same feeling about this story. But Microsoft is not the US right ? Two different issues here, and I'm not going to debate the former one. Finkelstein already did the job.
However, this is a good step for free software, indeed. And I sincerely think that OO is able to cope with the requirements of the employment agency. I won't say what OO would be able to cope with in my opinion, I don't want flamewars over MS.
Jeez, is this auto-censorship ?
I need a cigarette...
Regards,
jdif
Let's overcome our weakness.
when the little pebbles start to hit microsofts bank accounts then ill agree, untill then microsoft will do the same old thing. You have to understand, to most people windows is what a computer is, they have no intrest in changing.
Selling software wont make you money, selling a service will.
apparently thats wrong
or ford wouldnt switch 10,000 desktops
xyz wouldnt switch 200 desktops.
people are jumping ship.
it willl reach the critical point soon enough
hell, even using windows, and going with OO hurts microsoft.
people have no interest in computers. they switch when they get used to things at work.
individuals dont make the choice, industry does.
well, i'm staunch anti-(anti-peace) and the day that EITHER side lays down arms will be a step forward. You must realize that siding one way or the other solves nothing.
Too bad world leaders ignore a 2-millenia old teaching in favor of killing, greed and jealousy.
World War II happened a long time ago. Although the Holocaust shouldn't be forgotten contemporary Germans should not bare the burden of the past. Although not as grand in scale the U.S. committed a holocaust against American Indians, but since they are the good guys that's ok.
The Israelis use German machine guns. That's ok though right?
Moron
"The employment agency has selected an immature and unproven software package and its functionality is at the best close to Office 97", said Microsoft representatives. What exactly does this mean for Office97? It had no feature like PDF-Export or XML-Support - but was far more immature than OO?
Too bad world leaders ignore a 2-millenia old teaching in favor of killing, greed and jealousy.
Indeed, the "2-millenia old teaching" I assume you're referring to (i.e. the collection of oral traditions collectively known as "The Bible", which was actually a continuous work from the 2nd millenium BC to the 5th century AD) does favor killing, greed and jealousy. Oh, and sexism and racial hatred too !
I just can't get where Christians got their "loving God" stuff from, but it's certainly not from the Old Testament. The Bible is a long compendium of slaughters, most of them being comitted ad majorem Dei gloriam. Ever read the Books of Kings ?
The Arabs did not invent anything. Waging Djihad and stoning blasphemers and adulteres comes directly from good old Moses. The difference between the East and the West right now simply comes from the fact that the West managed to break the bounds of Religion. The East didn't.
Thomas Miconi
Yea, adopting a simple black and white mentality sure makes this an easy issue to deal with. The way you worded the above paragraph gives the impression that you think acts of agression seem to originate solely from the Palestinian side and the Israeli government (and extremists, yes there are Israeli terrorists as well you know) is left high and dry trying to defend its citizens. Blowing up a Starbucks is definetly not a counter attack but why don't you point your finger at Israel as well? Are you telling me that they haven't inticed violence at all or overreacted in any way by killing innocent Palestinians?
My point isn't that the Palestinians are being treated unfairly (eventhough I feel they are). It is that people like you need to adopt a more balanced view regarding this situation. Both sides are equally guilty for committing atrocious crimes and that the blame should be shared equally.
True, but with the BSA breathing down your neck, that's not such an attractive option. And besides, if you bothered to read the article, it says that one of the Israeli government's main concerns had to do with editing documents in Hebrew text, which is difficult to do with MS Office and is not something particularly high on Microsoft's priorities. They couldn't give a rat's ass about all of the other "features" that new versions of Word and Office had. The key feature they were interested in is not there. If they can't easily write documents written in their own national language, then what good is it? The version of OpenOffice they'll be using has this type of support.
As I recall, the same thing could have happened around 1996-7 with Iceland, had a viable alternative existed at the time. Microsoft was slow to add Icelandic to Windows and Office 95, despite repeated requests from the Icelandic government. The language eventually made it into Windows 98. Sadly, no viable alternatives to a Windows desktop existed at the time. (Before anyone shouts, I hope everyone remembers what Linux looked like at the time, and whether anyone would let barely computer-literate government workers use it in the state it was back in 1996.).
Internationalization and localization is really something that Free Software does very quickly and effectively, and something that Microsoft is particularly weak at by comparison. Perhaps the use of Linux and Free Software will begin to grow more rapidly in places where i18n and l10n matter a lot.
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
E.g. the software has to recognize when you start typing in a number and switch directions (The number five hundred thirty one still appears as 531 in hebrew, not 135).
Excuse me for displaying my ignorance, but surely there must be hebrew right-to-left mechanical typewriters? I assume that you could type digits on those. I doubt they could switch direction, so the typist would enter the number as 135 so that it would appear as 531, right?
So, for a hebrew touch-typist, would a word processor that changes directions always be a good thing? Should it be configurable?
)9TSS
to answer your question with another, why do americans feel they have any right to live in the US ?
were they there before 1492 ?
and the australians ?
The statement can be read both ways.
The day will come when people buy software for reasons other than utility: fashion, conspicuous consumption, political affiliation... but today it's simply a matter of price and functionality.
Microsoft can say what they like, but very few people will try OOo and then MSOffice and then choose to pay for MSOffice with their own money simply because of a sound bite.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
Microsoft's attitude speaks volumes here as well
Glad someone else saw that, too. Earth to Redmond: In addition to being obnoxious, the "tight fisted" comment can be read as an anti-Semitic slur.
So MS has painted themselves into a corner, and now they're kernel-panicking. They can't support Linux or BSD for business reasons, the Mac is a *nix box now too so it's out of the picture for them, and they've already pre-announced that their next Windows version can potentially, via DRM and copyrighted file formats, usurp the document owners' rights to their data. Why would one of world's most security-conscious states go for a deal that locks them into the world's least security-conscious software company?
"Buy it or we'll call you names" isn't going to cut it as a response. And for some reason, I don't think you need "advanced enterprise features" to crank out form letters that read: "Dear [applicant]: Thank you for your interest in..." even if it they do read from right to left.
Gotta give MS the Darl McBride Brass Balls Award though. It takes a lot of nerve for a company that can't even suffer the possibility of a hypothetical competitor cutting into its revenues in the future, to call someone else "tight-fisted" for not reaching into his pocket for cold cash right now, just to buy the privilege of paying again and again any time MS decides to "increase shareholder value."
And then there's the delicious irony of IBM and free software being the spoilers. [theatrical-trailer-voice] Twenty years ago, he stole their operating systems, (clip) and plunged the world into reboots (clip), incompatibilities (clip), and perpetual upgrades (pause). Now, they're back - with a vengeance! (30-sec. action clip sequence to dark screen. Cue titles) Desktop Wars II: IBM returns. Now playing in Israel and the West Bank. In theaters worldwide next Summer. This feature has not yet been understood by the Software Association of America.[/theatrical-trailer-voice]
If opening a document makes you a criminal, then I say the sooner the better, then the general populace might understand that having corporations like MS run your government isn't a good thing.
It's just as likely people will ditch MSOffice than OO. In fact more so - who will want to work with a package that can't save files you can open anywhere else (even on a non-fritz PC which will be the vast majority for many years to come - there are *zero* fritz chips in circulation at the moment). No company is going to use Word if they deal with Europe, asia, in fact anywhere else but the US, because their documents would be unreadable.
OTOH I can't see MS committing that kind of suicide. They're not *that* stupid.
The difference between the East and the West right now simply comes from the fact that the West managed to break the bounds of Religion. The East didn't.
OK, dragging this thread back to being a legitimate slashdot topic...
The Islamic world was historically in the vanguard of science, knowledge, and all forms of culture. But at some point the West experienced the Enlightenment, and the Islamic world did not.
By acknowledging the primacy of the individual, and the primacy of science over religion (Hello, Galileo!) the Enlightenment allowed the West to become the economic, technological, and political force it still is today.
Might it have something to do with the land that they were given was at the time brittish territory? Or the fact that their ancestors had lived in that area for as long as the palestinians? Originaly they had a very small section of land, given to them by the brittish government. Then 6 other nations decided they didn't like that and invaded. Israel beat them back and in the process captured territories (a convention of warfare, any land captured is yours) and now the paletinians are pissed because they have less land. Lesson to the palestinians, if you want to keep your land, don't go starting wars you can't win.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Sure it is. Religion is a series of strongly held beliefs based on faith (i.e. no or little scientific proof) usualy (but not always) centered arround a belief in a higher authority.
Atheism is the belief that said higher authority does not exist. Atheism in and of itself however is a leap of faith, because there is no evidence that a higher authority doesn't exist.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Although my initial reaction is to look at this thread, then look at the 'Slashdot' at the top of the page and question its relevance, I have to say that it could be the Middle East is relevant to all of us in the light of current affairs. I won't comment on it very much except to say that when the spittle starts to fly, all I'd really like to see is some information so I can go away, read up and maybe draw my own conclusions on such matters. In effect, I'd like to thank the last poster for suggesting a good google search, and if anyone else wants to argue these points, however passionate you are about it, please remember the rest of us and provide some resources for information. That way, inquiring minds who might be interested won't simply come across posts full of rants which can often, we must all concede be highly, HIGHLY subjective when it's something we feel strongly about or have arrived at our own conclusions about.. In a nutshell, thanks for the links to historical info etc, and if everyone on every side of the arguments could provide links to resources, or searches etc, awareness will be raised and we can draw our own conclusions in the manner of thinking individuals who have freedom of thought, movement and expression and the right to draw whatever conclusions, and hold whatever opinions we like.
Actually Office 2K debugged most of the features of Office 97. By the same token, Office 2k3 should debug all of them and some of the new features introduced with Office 2K.
I agree with your mother. I updated much earlier but that was because O97 wasn't stable with larger documents or embedded objects. However, I now stick with O2K on my remaining Windows system.
See my journal, I write things there
I belief the burden of proof is upon those who propose the existence of some unmeasurable things. You might as well take the leap of faith to NOT believe it when I tell you that I talk to angels.
The Jewish people were sent into exile 2000 years ago, and yet they survived the Inquisition, pogroms, WWII, Stalin, etc. and always aspired to return to their land.
It's really dangerous to assume its reasonable to pick the time when your chosen nation was at its largest extent and assume you get to put the clock back.
One could just as reasonably say that they were once part of the Babylon empire, and therefore should be part of modern Iraq. Or under the Romans, so should be part of Italy.
These mythic religious fantasies are really damaging - witness the crusades.
There aren't any good, simple solutions to these problem. Several people have reasonable claims to the territory, and they need to work towards a reasonable solution.
In English we don't say "dollars hundred" but we write "$100". Yet in our word processors we don't type "1-0-0-$" (the way we say it), with the word processor momentarily switching into right-to-left mode when the "$" is struck (although there may be some obscure autocorrect setting for this that believe me, if I ever encountered it, I would immediately turn it off). Perhaps it's because I learned touch typing on a real typewriter, but when I type I want the letters to come out in the order I type them, period. Mentally, when I think verbally "ten dollars", my fingers "feel" the character sequence "$-1-0". It just happens. As soon as some wizard starts second-guessing me and changing the order of things, it interrupts my flow and I become less efficient, going into hunt-and-peck mode with the arrow keys to go back to try to undo what the wizard did, and when the wizard insists on redoing what I just undid, spending the time to find the setting for that wizard so I can kill the damn thing.
Since office 97
Outlook
The point of the parent post was that Word has long had most of the functionality that most people use.
Outlook is a different application than Word, even though it might be bundled together with Word in some overall purchase of Office.
As much as I hate MS, in Outlook they did design a lot of convenient, easy-to-use features which make it quite useful and something people might want to buy. Despite the occassional problem with viri, people basically like using Outlook and appreciate what it does for them.
It would be nice if people could pay less and just get the nice new applications like Outlook and Visio that they want instead of rustproofing add-ons like Word and Windows itself with new features they don't use.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
modded Funny ? I don't agree with that. It is serious, and closer then you might imagine.
k ed .php
Aside from the politics between Israel en Palestines, which seems so complicated a question that I will not pass judgement over it, Israel armed forces are killing people.
Not just palestines but, to bring the matter closer to home, brits and americans as well.
http://www.palsolidarity.org/activists/ISMattac
These were young western people, that were protesting non-violently. They did not deserve death, especially not such gruesome ones.
I'd like to state that this is an israeli question, and not something concerning Jews, indicated by the fact that there are rabbis too that feel strongly about the matter.
http://rhr.israel.net/overview.shtml
I may not care about politics, but taking human life this way is wrong. This ofcourse goes for both sides, but when non-violent protesters get KIA there's something very very wrong imo.
What does the regime of Israel has to do with adoption of OSS in it's goverment and army?
That would be like someone will say they don't want to use Microsoft Windows (or Red Hat Linux for that matter), because they are US companies, and it has a certain regime in Iraq or somewhere else. (Actually, what you saying to even less logical, since you don't have to support someone to support their move to OO, if you support OO).
If you have a problem with an article about the IDF being posted of \. because of what they do, you have a serious problem, and it's no surprise the comment is posted anonymously. But what's the actual problem with a government moving to OO?, being one of many governments planning to do similar steps, which is what the story is about.
150 staff to remain on MS Office? Can you say "manager"?
"How perfectly Goddamn delightful it all is, to be sure" Charles Crumb
Oh well, I am bored. So here goes:
The parent poster was referring to the fact that ownership of anything is a pretty interesting idea. Land even more so -- stable ownership of land is a gift of society, so there is no real guarantee of ownership when you leave (or get thrown off) some land you saw as 'yours' if there is no larger society there to acknowledge your ownership.
So the Muslims were expanding into other territories. These terretories did not start of populated, nor did they remain in the same hands for very long in historical terms. So who does the land 'belong' to?
Should the United states be abandoned and left to the remaining native Americans? Should Africa be swept clean of Europeans and left to native Africans? If so, which native Africans. The first tribe to occupy the land, or the second who took it by force or the third who paid them for it?
Not quite so easy.
Languages aren't inherently fast -- implementations are efficient
just why you assume he is european?
i would say except americans themselves, and a few american fanatics, no one else likes them all around the world!
"um pais infeliz
o mais hipocrita da terra
malucos suicidas
imbecis que adoram guerra"
Gabriel o Pensador
How hard do you have to twist to come up with such intellectually dishonest ideas such as these?
Isreal was the homeland of the Hebrews. This is a historical fact acknowledged by all of the relevant parties and supported by objective archealogical evidence.
Much less hard than you, obviously.
If you read the bible, you will see the bit where god told the jews that that was meant to be their land and that they should take it.
Which they did.
Butchering every man, woman, and child who was already living there.
It actually brags about this bit.
Pull your head out of your ass and realise that the Israelis are scumbags and the Palestinians are as well.
Playing favorites oin this battle is the worst sort of intellectual dishonesty.
I disagree, if you read the bible god has a pretty dark side.
He was racist.
He was sexist.
He was homophobic.
He condoned slavery and beating of slaves (even to death).
He killed nearly every single human on the face of the earth. (the flood)
There's so much more I could point out, but I doubt it will make any difference.
"MSWord gives you a default filename based on the first few words in the document when you save a new file."
you call that a feature? i always give it a different filename, usually b/c the auto-names suck--the first line of what i write genereally isn't the most intuitive or memerable thing about my file.
I saw it on Slashdot, it must be true!
The land that you call Israel was the homeland of The the Canaanites and Phoenicians. The Torah, Bible, and archealogical evidence support this. The Torah and Bible state that the Hebrews ethnically cleansed the land of the Canaanites. You know, like Hitler tried to do to the Jews.
So maybe you should drop the Nazi crap and stop the hate.
Wow, since Office XP is pretty similar to Office 2000, which really wasn't much of an improvement over Office 97, plus the fact that I don't think I've ever used a feature in Office XP that wasn't in Office 97, I'd say MS just landed a ringing endorsement of Open Office!
"Consider the lillies of the goddamn field."