OpenOffice.org Tries to Woo Dell

Rob writes "OpenOffice.org project members have written to Dell (pdf), hoping to persuade the company to adopt OpenOffice in response to customer demand. John McCreesh, OpenOffice.org marketing project lead, writes 'Let's have a conversation about how we could build an OpenOffice.org supplied by Dell product to give your customers what they are asking for.' Demand for open source products on Dell's IdeaStorm web site prompted the letter. A somewhat obvious question is raised: why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?"

Comments

default

[otacon]

It isn't on there by default, because that would mean people might actually use it...and we can't have people just running around using free software, can we?

Re:default

[the_humeister]

I remember when StarOffice was installed by default on eMachines computers. No one used it. Instead they pirated MS Office and used that instead. This was just a few years ago too. So people won't necessarily use something just because it's installed by default unless they're familiar with it (ie Windows).

Re:default

[otacon]

True, but if they are informed that it does the same thing then they would be more likely to use it. Example: Years back my family started using WordPerfect, because it was already there. Granted I informed them they could essentially do the same thing. But you are very right it has a lot to do with being familiar.

Re:default

[AKAImBatman]

I remember when StarOffice was installed by default on eMachines computers. No one used it.

FWIW, StarOffice 5.2 was a POS with some decent technology hidden inside it monolithic interface. Its usability was utterly terrible, and was more of a chore to use than a pleasure. The work done by OpenOffice has changed all that. OOo is often just as pleasent to use, sometimes moreso than Microsoft Office is. It hasn't been growing in popularity quite as fast as FireFox has, but OOo installations are definitely becoming common.

If you preinstalled OpenOffice, I guarantee you that most of those customers would use OOo rather than pirating Microsoft Office.

Re:default

[westlake]

It isn't on there by default, because that would mean people might actually use it...and we can't have people just running around using free software, can we?

Corel worked damn hard to establish WordPerfect as the OEM default - and people still chose to upgrade to Microsoft Office. The "free" bundled office suite always comes across as just another throw-away.

Re:default

[the_humeister]

If you preinstalled OpenOffice, I guarantee you that most of those customers would use OOo rather than pirating Microsoft Office.

I wouldn't be too sure of that. In the past few years, Dell did come preinstalled with Wordperfect Office. No one used that either.

Re:default

[AKAImBatman]

Dell did come preinstalled with Wordperfect Office. No one used that either.

Throwing out the name of another really crappy office suite in no way proves your point. WordPerfect was included because it was lousy. It was an attempt to convince customer that they get an Office Suite for free, but if they want the good stuff they should upgrade to MS Office.

OOo is currently on a very competitive level with MS Office. That is why Dell will not include it. People would use it, which would cut into the profits from Microsoft Office sales. Are we clear now?

Re:default

[the_humeister]

I'll grant you that StarOffice was "crappy" in terms of user-interface although it was still functional. Doesn't sound like you've used Wordperfect Office though since it is by no means lousy. For the average user, any office suite would theoretically do. Look at all the unwanted crap that gets installed by default. In the minds of the average user, the bundled office program will be lumped in with all the other unwanted crap and thus be considered inferior. And since the upgrade to MS Office costs money, it must be better.

As for Open Office being competitive with MS Office, for me that would only apply to the word processing program. I find the Open Office presentation program still inferior to MS Office.

Re:default

[AKAImBatman]

Doesn't sound like you've used Wordperfect Office though since it is by no means lousy.

You have got to be kidding me. The Wordperfect that was distributed for free with new computers was that horrendous amalgamation of DOS keyboard functionality with Windows buttons all over creation. It was terrible from a usability standpoint, and was only liked by the die hards because they were trained on how to use Wordperfect before MS Office came along.

(I probably have the old WP discs lying around somewhere.)

X3 is not a bad version, but it's also not being distributed for free.

For the average user, any office suite would theoretically do.

Just because it has the functionality, does not mean that the user knows how or wants to learn how to make it do it. The interface must be acceptable to the user, or they'll go right back to the competitor.

As for Open Office being competitive with MS Office, for me that would only apply to the word processing program.

You forgot spreadsheets. The two combined make up the bulk of Office Suite work. Which they work very well for.

I find the Open Office presentation program still inferior to MS Office.

I've found it to be more than acceptable for home use (you don't exactly make a lot of presentations in a home setting), but I agree that it's less than ideal for business use. However, that's not really an issue when the choice is between Microsoft Works and OpenOffice.

Re:default

[Sparr0]

As for Open Office being competitive with MS Office, for me that would only apply to the word processing program.

I disagree. The spreadsheet program is also more than sufficient for anything short of macro-riddled corporate applications-in-spreadsheets.

I find the Open Office presentation program still inferior to MS Office.

In the same way the PowerPoint is far inferior to KeyNote

Re:default

[Uzuri]

Speak for yourself -- *I* used it. And it's why I went on to use OpenOffice when I got a box that didn't have it on it, because OpenOffice was far more similar to Star than to MS word.

A somewhat obvious answer:

[hhlost]

OOo is free, and therefore Dell gets no cut.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[hhlost]

How much would you pay for OOo installed?

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[synoniem]

To be more accurate: OOo is free, and therefore Dell gets nothing but the support calls and even offshore they want to be paid.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[babbling]

That's actually not true. If Dell were to add an option on their website saying "OpenOffice $25", they would be allowed to charge the $25 to bundle OpenOffice with a Dell computer.

Nothing in the GPL forbids Dell or anyone else for charging money for the software, so Dell wouldn't just "take a cut", they can set the price they like and take 100% of it rather than having to give some of it to Microsoft.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[stasike]

Dell gets paid for each piece preinstalled crapware, trialware and crippleware they force uppon poor buyer. That is why you can get PC without an OS from a big OEM manufacturer for the same price as identical PC with XP preinstalled. They can rake in enough money from preinstalled craplets to pay those cca. 49.95 bucks Microsoft charges them for an OEM version of XP. Dell would happily preinstall OOo. But who is going to pay them?

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[JackMeyhoff]

No, they should charge for Open Office SUPPORT, not the office suite itself.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Mr. Underbridge]

That's actually not true. If Dell were to add an option on their website saying "OpenOffice $25", they would be allowed to charge the $25 to bundle OpenOffice with a Dell computer.

Technically true, but to bother supporting it they'd need a given threshold of their customers to choose it, and I'm guessing they don't think they will. Might also be afraid of the public backlash when some idiot consumer reporter at a TV station breaks the big story that Dell is charging customers for something they can download for free.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[AKAImBatman]

I just went to Dell's site and scoped out their offerings. Even in a $359 package, Microsoft Works is "included in [the] price". That package does not include Microsoft Word. To get Word, you have to upgrade to a $79 Works Suite. Obviously, Dell could offer OpenOffice as an alternative to their default Works package and pocket the difference.

Of course, I have a sneaky suspicion that the minimal Works package is an attempt to get users to purchase Microsoft Word at a minimum. They probably hope to convince consumers to purchase Microsoft Office Professional "because they might need it". Obviously, having a full office suite available at no charge might cut into those profits. Especially since OOo has a much better reputation than the WordPerfect, Claris Works, and Lotus Suite products that PC producers used to bundle. So they're relying on Microsoft to provide the (if you'll excuse the colorful language) "shitty" office suite to convince consumers to upgrade.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[babbling]

I'm not saying what they should charge for, just making it clear that they can charge extra for including OpenOffice.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[babbling]

Why would Dell offer support for OpenOffice? Does Dell offer support for Microsoft Office? As far as I know, Microsoft provides the support for Microsoft Office, and I can't see why Dell would offer support for OpenOffice since they have nothing to do with its development.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[babbling]

Most people would pay something for it.

I wouldn't, because I know how to install it myself, but if I didn't know how to install it myself I'd be willing to pay at least half of what Microsoft Office would cost me.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[JackMeyhoff]

Then people will not select it. People shop on price.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[DogDude]

They can't just sell software without support. It has to at least be available from somewhere. This is a multi-billion dollar corporation. They're not going to sell do-it-yourself kits. They're still responsible for selling good stuff, else their reputation goes down the tubes.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[bberens]

I just went to Dell's site and scoped out their offerings. Even in a $359 package, Microsoft Works is "included in [the] price". That package does not include Microsoft Word. To get Word, you have to upgrade to a $79 Works Suite. Obviously, Dell could offer OpenOffice as an alternative to their default Works package and pocket the difference.

Of course, I have a sneaky suspicion that the minimal Works package is an attempt to get users to purchase Microsoft Word at a minimum. They probably hope to convince consumers to purchase Microsoft Office Professional "because they might need it". Obviously, having a full office suite available at no charge might cut into those profits. Especially since OOo has a much better reputation than the WordPerfect, Claris Works, and Lotus Suite products that PC producers used to bundle. So they're relying on Microsoft to provide the (if you'll excuse the colorful language) "shitty" office suite to convince consumers to upgrade. You're completely missing the potential that Microsoft pays Dell to include Works on each machine as cheap advertising for Office.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[kripkenstein]

As far as I know, Microsoft provides the support for Microsoft Office, and I can't see why Dell would offer support for OpenOffice since they have nothing to do with its development.

Dell might want to offer support for OpenOffice for a very good reason - because it makes them money. On the one hand selling Microsoft Office gives Dell a small profit (I presume that nearly all the money goes to Microsoft), and low support costs (they can't be zero, since people will call even if they are immediately redirected to Microsoft; still, they are low). On the other hand, the grandparent post was right - they can charge whatever they want for OpenOffice - even much less than MS Office - and still make a nice profit, because they pocket all of that profit themselves, only needing to spend on support. My guess is that this could be very profitable. It is probably not happening because (1) Dell are conservative, and this is a big change, and (2) possibly Microsoft would retaliate and raise prices for Windows and Office, phrased as 'reducing their discounts'.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[AKAImBatman]

You're completely missing the potential that Microsoft pays Dell to include Works on each machine as cheap advertising for Office.

Am I? You're saying that getting a large cut of each Office sale is not "payment" enough?

Step 1: Offer up "Microsoft Works" suite at little or no cost to the manufacturer.
Step 2: Downplay the effectiveness of Works in favor of the expensive Microsoft Office Suite.
Step 3: Thereby convince the consumer to upgrade.
Step 4: Profit!!!

(For you Slashdot purists, you can add "Step 3.5: ???".)

I think you're overestimating the need for Microsoft to further intervene. The system is already well configured for both Microsoft and Dell to make over a hundred dollars in profit off of each MS Office sale. In the world of retail, that's a LOT of profit.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Moofie]

Yeah, and $25 is way more expensive than MS Office, right?

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Mr. Underbridge]

Why would Dell offer support for OpenOffice? Does Dell offer support for Microsoft Office? As far as I know, Microsoft provides the support for Microsoft Office, and I can't see why Dell would offer support for OpenOffice since they have nothing to do with its development.

Because they can't put it on the machines and tell customers who call up with questions "Sorry, we don't support this, and not only that, no one will." The really low-end beige box manufacturers can do that, but Dell can't.

Put another way: what is the phone number people can call with questions about Open Office? Help forums and news groups won't be acceptable answers to Dell's customer base.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[spirit of reason]

Or they could make it the default option and charge more for any of the other office suites. Then you'll have no idea how much they're charging (unless there's an option for no office suite).

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Anonymous Coward]

And many Dell customers would no doubt like it better this way - if they've paid actual money for OpenOffice then they'll probably be more inclined to take the time to see how it's different from the office suite they're used to and learn how to use it.

Many people are immediately suspicious of software that is advertised as being 'free'; they appreciate things they've paid for themselves more than those they didn't.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[sharkey]

This would seem to be a good idea, given that they already charge $10 each for things like turning off autoplay, setting the BIOS to boot from the CD, turning on PXE boot, etc.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[bill_mcgonigle]

Yeah, and $25 is way more expensive than MS Office, right?

MS Office is "free" with a Small Business Desktop from Dell, haven't you heard?

The sad reality seems to be that Dell thrives at Microsoft's pleasure and they'd be dumb to muck that up. To bad the DOJ had no teeth.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[dragonsomnolent]

I see your point, and agree that they would face huge backlash if that happened, but they could spin it as free OOo, and then tack on an additional line item like $25 support for OOo, if they really wanted to.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[joto]

I'm sure this can be explained right on the page you order from. E.g. with text like:

Note: Dell doesn't sell or support openoffice, as it can be downloaded freely from http://www.openoffice.org./ However, by ordering it here, it will come preinstalled on your computer, configured for the same language as your operating system

If the TV-station idiot consumer report guy doesn't get that, I'm sure some lawyers will.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Just Some Guy]

OOo is free, and therefore Dell gets no cut.

...but they do in effect make their system a couple hundred dollars cheaper than a competitor's system that ships with Office.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[pizpot]

"Oo is free"

Dell can charge what they want for it. Why would they not charge for installing it right? They should. GPL does not mean can't be charged for. It means can't steal. (duh)

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Bert64]

SUN will provide support for openoffice, at a price.
You don't get support for any other office suite for free either, you either have to pay for it and get support bundled, or you pay for it and then pay extra for support. At least openoffice is free, so those who don't want support don't need to pay anything.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[einhverfr]

Agreed that this is what they should charge for. THis avoids the public backlash about charging for a product they can download free of charge.

However, I make an open source software cd for Windows I sell for $25. I tell people that this is just a media charge and that they can download all the software from the web. I do sell some. Not a lot, but a few.

Furthermore, they could also offer paid support for OpenOffice, though most of these call centers (even overseas) run at a loss. They could even do something like, "Add OpenOffice to your service plan: $50" or the like.

But each of these things also has ramp-up costs for Dell.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Mr. Underbridge]

SUN will provide support for openoffice, at a price. You don't get support for any other office suite for free either, you either have to pay for it and get support bundled, or you pay for it and then pay extra for support. At least openoffice is free, so those who don't want support don't need to pay anything.

Agreed, but it's simply not Dell's place to put unsupported software on their machines. Farming out the support isn't a great option for them either given their attempt to dispel the notion that they don't care enough about customer service. Put another way, why does Dell need to bundle it since OO is free and easy to install? If the answer involves people that wouldn't normally be able to find OO, these people will definitely need support, Dell won't be willing to farm it out, and in the end Dell has probably determined that it's more trouble than it's worth.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[AK Marc]

Then people will not select it.

Offered and not selected would be better than the currrent not offered and not selected.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[yasth]

FWIW, MS offers works effectively free for throwing in an office demo. IIRC it even becomes a revenue generator because if the demo office is purchased through certain means the OEM gets a kickback.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Vicegrip]

Dell doesn't support software. Only hardware.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[jesterzog]

Nothing in the GPL forbids Dell or anyone else for charging money for the software, so Dell wouldn't just "take a cut", they can set the price they like and take 100% of it rather than having to give some of it to Microsoft.

Not to mention, they can add value to OpenOffice so that the Dell version is worth paying extra for, particularly by embedding all kinds of fancy widgets to direct Dell customers to Dell's certified business partners.

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[a.d.trick]

No, they can charge as much as they want for the software. Free as in speech doesn't mean free as in beer, necessarily.

That said, the source code must be available (in a usable form) for for free. Actually, they may charge for distribution costs of the source code too, but that's generally a pretty nominal fee. Therefore, there's nothing to stop you from compiling it yourself and then distributing your build to all your friends. So the above isn't a terribly effective business model unless you're offering support or providing a service (like shipping a computer with the software already installed).

Re:A somewhat obvious answer:

[Machtyn]

So, no one is ever going to read this, but who cares... I gotta have my say.

What about all the crapware they put on the computer? I've serviced so many computers with crapware that my customers want taken off (because the 5MB file takes up too much of their 150GB drive) that I can't think that a whole lot of users are buying the games and other stuff on the PCs. Therefore, when people do call up to discuss about their free 60 minute game, Dell is still paying out on a product that isn't and probably won't be paid for. It should also be noted that Dell won't support certain software on its computers.

Back to OOo, I've also had a whole lot of my customers complain profusely when I tell them that that version of Microsoft Office 200x is only a 60 day trial and after that they have to put out $200+ or go with the insanely inferior Microsoft Works. I say... use OOo, and they end up liking it.

Huh...

[Frosty Piss]

This is news? Do you think that maybe Dell already knows about OpenOffice? A letter is going to swing the deal? Not likely. Dell is only vaguely interested in Linux, and there are still questions about if that is just the standard ploy to get a better Microsoft deal.

By the way, I've sent Dell a letter about a little time management application I've been working on for a few years. I'm expecting a reply!!!

Re:Huh...

[zappepcs]

Whatever happens, this will raise public awareness of OOo by some measure. If only 15% of the public suddenly finds out that there is free software available that does all they need to do, it's a good thing for all. It will also help point out the situation that makes it cheaper for Dell to preload windows than to give away free software. Hopefully consumers will begin to question that and bring to light what MS is still doing to hamstring an entire industry.

Re:Huh...

[SCHecklerX]

Yup!

When my dad bought a new computer, he asked me about buying Microsoft office (or pirating a copy). Instead, I set up OOo for him. He's really happy with it. Open Office shines even better when you aren't using it only to view Microsoft Word docs, but rather authoring from it directly.

He thanked me and notified me that he loves OO, and has no need to use Microsoft Office.

For me, the killer app in open office is OODraw. I've used this for creating cards at christmas, and most recently to create a CD Label template. I *tried* to use the crap you can download from Avery, but it was horrible! The OODraw template works exactly as I want it to. Microsoft Office doesn't have anything equivalent (although they do have visio). OOo's only real missing pieces are something like visio (Shouldn't be hard if they start with the OODraw engine?), and some project management software like Microsoft Project.

Re:Huh...

[Frosty Piss]

Whatever happens, this will raise public awareness of OOo by some measure.

I'm not sure how you can say that, since if Dell does not include OpenOffice, which is very likly, "public awareness" via the Dell vector will remail the same, which is none.

Dell is not interested in OpenOffice. Dell is a for-profit business. OpenOffice offers them nothing. In Dell's mind, it is not a "value added feature."

Here's why. Very few Dell customers actually want Linux. Legions of Dell customers want Windows. Legions of Dell customers using Windows want MS Office because it does what they want, while OpenOffice "isn't quite there yet" (I'm mostly talking Excel users, actually.)

Re:Huh...

[zappepcs]

Don't be offended here, but let me tell you what is really ignorant about what you have said.

>Here's why. Very few Dell customers actually want Linux.
Because relatively few people know about Linux and what it can mean to them. They only know windows because Apple and MS are the ones with $$$ television advertisements.

>Legions of Dell customers want Windows.
Because relatively few people know about Linux and what it can mean to them. They only know windows because Apple and MS are the ones with $$$ television advertisements.

>Legions of Dell customers using Windows want MS Office because it does what they want, while >OpenOffice "isn't quite there yet" (I'm mostly talking Excel users, actually.)
You have NO CLUE what normal users use MS Office products for. You may want Excel, but I'm guessing you haven't even really tried OOo products.

NORMAL people do things like use MS Excel because they don't know how to make nice columns in Word or notepad. They use Excel instead of a database. They use MS Word when they should have used notepad because it lets you change the fonts, but then spend 45 minutes trying to figure out how the bullets work!!

My mom has been an editor for over 20 years. During that time she has had a great deal of exposure to the applications available from Microsoft, and apps available on both Windows and Mac. She is now using OOo and is quite happy with it. For you to have said what you did shows that you have no knowledge of what OOo is or can do. You sir, speak like a fool.

Here's why

[Asylumn]

why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?

Because then customers would have less of an incentive to purchase MS Office. This gives MS a huge incentive to pressure Dell, et al, to not offer alternatives on a windows machine.

Seems fairly obvious to me.

Re:Here's why

[Volante3192]

Incidentally, when I got my Dell laptop (...4ish years ago I think) my options on office software were a Corel WordPerfect Suite, MS Works and MS Office variants.

I had to pick one of them, and the free option was Corel.

Having not needed a new laptop since then I haven't bothered to see if they changed that. Although by the sounds of the discussion, appears it might have.

Upon first glance

[oskard]

I thought it said:
"OpenOffice.org Tries to Doo Well"

Re:Upon first glance

[Mark_in_Brazil]

I thought it said:
"OpenOffice.org Tries to Doo Well"

My experience was more horrifying. I saw "something something W. O'Dell." I'm pretty sure he's not even in charge over at Diebold anymore, but even something that looks remotely like his name still gives me the creeps.

Re:Upon first glance

[OldManAndTheC]

Well, they will do well if they woo dell. :)

Umm...

[faloi]

why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?"

Because your average home user buying an off the shelf PC (regardless of who it's from) has no idea what Open Office is. Even if you provided it as an option, given the choice between a (seemingly) free version of some MS product and Open Office, the average customer would take Open Office. Throw in the bit about most customers expecting to get support from the PC manufacturer for everything that's on there, and you have to talk about training your tech support folks on how to handle Open Office support calls.

Tech savy users and corporate customers are likely to blow the default image away and replace it with something tweaked to their choosing, so you wouldn't be saving them a tremendous amount of time by having it installed anyway.

Re:Umm...

[neersign]

Because your average home user buying an off the shelf PC (regardless of who it's from) has no idea what Open Office is

All the people I've dealt with have no idea what 'Works', is too. I wonder how many times the techs have been asked "does Works include Word?". It's been so long since I used Works that the only difference I can remember is that Works and Word have different native file formats. I really don't think most users would be able to notice any difference functionally between the two.

I have no idea what the stats are on sales w/ Office vs. sales without, but from my personal experience, I'd assume that most people decide not to bundle Office with their system purchase. And, I'd be willing to bet that given a cheaper alternative like OOo, an even bigger majority would not bundle Works with their system, too. My guesses as to why would be (A) on bargain PC's any added cost is not wanted, so Works right now is the cheap option and it is "good enough", or, (B) they aren't going to use Works anyway and are going to use their own copy of Office, so they don't want the added cost.

Re:Umm...

[bigdavex]

Because your average home user buying an off the shelf PC (regardless of who it's from) has no idea what Open Office is.

Dell has an option to include Corel Snapfire Plus. I sincerely doubt that most people have heard of it. Yet there it is.

Even if you provided it as an option, given the choice between a (seemingly) free version of some MS product and Open Office, the average customer would take Open Office.

I doubt that. I think most people would perceive that buying the MS product would make it most likely that they'd be able to exchange documents with others. I'd take a free copy of MS Office, knowing I could download Open Office.

Throw in the bit about most customers expecting to get support from the PC manufacturer for everything that's on there, and you have to talk about training your tech support folks on how to handle Open Office support calls.

Support cost is a real issue. They'd need to collect something from the customer for that.

Re:Umm...

[owlnation]

Because your average home user buying an off the shelf PC (regardless of who it's from) has no idea what Open Office is.

I'm not sure what a home user needs with any office package. Perhaps that's part of the issue. I see Open Office's main potential customers in the short term being small and medium sized businesses. Then Corporations once smaller companies had been converted.

Large companies, will get MS Office discounted when they sold their souls setting up their Intranet. No-one much outside of a corporation needs Powerpoint, home users really don't have much need for Excel or Access, and less need for Word than they think they do.

In my home, and I do a lot of freelance business from home too, I open up Excel once in a blue moon, and use Word two or three times a year (although, I do use Final Draft and Notepad daily). In fact, I'm pretty certain I use Office type products less each year. Were it to come to it, Writely and Google spreadsheets would cover all of my needs, without having to download and install anything.

Re:Umm...

[karnal]

I know when I was growing up, I had a coco3 with color scripsit and a 9 pin dot-matrix printer. Once I got that combo (must have been 16 or so) I never turned in another hand-written paper again.

Homes with children will ultimately need an office suite, something with good grammar checking and spell check. OpenOffice would accomodate in that area.... is there a good replacement for Publisher out there? (My wife would probably switch if there was, but I'm stuck on her using MS until I find one...)

Re:Umm...

[faloi]

I doubt that. I think most people would perceive that buying the MS product would make it most likely that they'd be able to exchange documents with others. I'd take a free copy of MS Office, knowing I could download Open Office.

Fuzzy bunnies. My brain got ahead of my keyboard again. Yeah, the MS product would be the product of choice for people given an option.

Re:Umm...

[bigdavex]

Fuzzy bunnies. My brain got ahead of my keyboard again. Yeah, the MS product would be the product of choice for people given an option.

I actually read that sentence 4 times, because I was getting all ready to agree with you that people will take the MS product. Whatever the heck flavor of office that comes with the dirt cheap Dell is $150. So I'm sure for some people the cost would drive them to the Open Office, even if Dell charged $20 for support.

And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[Jimmy King]

A somewhat obvious question is raised: why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?"

I would say for the same (or at least closely related and similar) reason that PC's come with and the majority of people want/keep using Windows over other OS choices which are arguably better and just as easy or easier to use. It's what people are familiar with. I'm pretty confident your average joe on the street has heard of MS Office. That same guy probably has not heard of OpenOffice. People know the name, the use it at work, they are comfortable with it. Given the choice between a computer with OO and a Computer with MS Office, all other things being equal (or at least equal to your average use), they're probably going to take the one with MS Office. Therefore, it makes sense for computers to come with it (most at least come with Word and Excel these days, I believe).

On top of that, it's still not 100% compatible with MS Office... I frequently have to slightly adjust things converting between OO's .odf and Office's .doc and have had some features of Excel spreadsheets not work in OO. That alone is going to make it unacceptable for use on projects for school or work which are then going to probably be used in MS Office.

Sure, as OO is free, it could be included along with Word/Excel/full MS Office, etc. but I suspect at best it'll go mostly unused and just take up disk space and at worst potentially confuse customers.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[mgpeter]

On top of that, it's still not 100% compatible with MS Office... I frequently have to slightly adjust things converting between OO's .odf and Office's .doc and have had some features of Excel spreadsheets not work in OO. That alone is going to make it unacceptable for use on projects for school or work which are then going to probably be used in MS Office.

Stop Using the Proprietary MS Formats - The vast majority of people complaining about OOo complain that it doesn't open MS Documents 100% Accurately. If you would simply start to use the default file format - ODF you won't have this problem.

At a local school we decided to have the teachers use OpenOffice.org, or if they wanted Microsoft Office - to have the teachers find the funding for it themselves. Most chose OpenOffice.org and the #1 complaint was that it did not open Word Documents 100% accurately - mostly drawings wouldn't show up correctly. Once everyone transitioned to use the ODF format - all complaints stopped, and once they started using OOo most found it better than MS Office - Especially once they learned how to utilize styles.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[Toby_Tyke]

Stop Using the Proprietary MS Formats - The vast majority of people complaining about OOo complain that it doesn't open MS Documents 100% Accurately. If you would simply start to use the default file format - ODF you won't have this problem.

Maybe our places of employment use MS formats. Maybe our customers use MS formats. Most people do. If your customers demand you send them MS office files, what are you going to do?

I often work from home. Without MS software on my home machine, I would not be able to do that. You work in a school, and persuaded them to change their IT policy and adopt an open alternative. That's great.I work for a multinational company employing tens of thousands of people. They are not going to change their IT policy just to suit little old me.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[Jimmy King]

As soon as you convince my employer, my school, and the local IT headhunters to start using OO instead of MS Word, I'll get right on that. Until then, I'll write anything I need to at home in OO and save to Word format, then take a few seconds at work or school to make sure the formatting is correct before sending it off to anyone of any importance. Unfortunately, we can't expect the general public to be willing to go through those same extra steps just to use a piece of software they've never heard of.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[L0rdJedi]

Maybe our places of employment use MS formats. Maybe our customers use MS formats. Most people do. If your customers demand you send them MS office files, what are you going to do?

Ask them if a PDF is ok. Unless you're dealing with a government (local, state, or federal), I've found that most places happily accept a PDF document. Well, except headhunters, but they're a different story altogether. I've seen a fair number of headhunters ask for Word document resumes for jobs for Unix admins. Uh, hello, Word does not run on Unix.

I'm not suggesting that anyone use OO.o (I still don't think it's there yet), but if you want to use it, printing your files to PDF before sending them to someone is the way to go.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[bob_herrick]

I suppose that is ok if you are not collaborating with you client. In our business, also a multinatinal with tens of thousands of employees and thousands of customers, PDF's are for production purposes, and for archival purposes, but we use live word processing documents for draft work and anything for which a customer edit might be required, which is most of our traffic.

At the present time I am aware of no client that requires OO, and, frankly, no client that does not use MS Word.

Sorry, but that is just the reality of it.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[westlake]

At a local school we decided to have the teachers use OpenOffice.org, or if they wanted Microsoft Office - to have the teachers find the funding for it themselves

and at our district the Mac disappears from the labs and the classrooms and everyone runs Office. outside the school OpenOffice has zero visibility. in an environment where jobs are scarce, MS Office skills are marketable.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[Bert64]

Well it wouldn't be just to suit you...
There are many valid technical and business reasons for using an open format, that's why there are frequent stories about large organisations switching.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[PitaBred]

Word doesn't even work well with itself. I've saved documents in Word just to have it unable to open them minutes later. Same with Excel. It may be "standard", but don't try to pass it off as supremely interoperable.

Re:And a somewhat obvious answer already exists

[Toby_Tyke]

There are many valid technical and business reasons for using an open format, that's why there are frequent stories about large organisations switching.

There are, I agree, but do not underestimate how wedded the world at large is to Office. I would love OO.o to kill it off tomorrow, but we're years away from that point. I personally have never even been in and office that did'nt use, um, Office. I have a job application form on my desk. It does not ask for "experience using word processors and spreadsheets", it asks for experience with MS Office. If your business needs to exchange files with another company, not using MS Office will likely put you at a disadvantage.

As part of my job I have to e-mail over a daily log of support incidents to a client. I have to send it as an excel file. No choice in the matter. On one occasion, when there were only two jobs logged, I sent it as a plain text e-mail. They were on the phone five minutes later demanding an excel file. Yes, copying and pasting two lines of text was beyond them. Imagine how they'd cope with any little niggles an OO.o generated excel doc had.

Re:Why?

[mungtor]

MS Office isn't installed on a new PC by default either. Even at an OEM type discount, it isn't free.

OpenOffice is freely available to anyone with an internet connection, and Dell simply doesn't see the business case for distributing and supporting it. Even if they tried to distribute with a support disclaimer there would still be a lot of calls to support about it. Also, Dell would have to distribute CDs with the source code since OpenOffice is GPL'd, etc, etc. None of it is a show-stopper, but why go through all the hassle with no reward? Distributing free software that they don't want to support (or don't think they can sell support on) doesn't make sense for Dell.

Yeah, it would be nice, but warm feelings and the respect of the /. community doesn't keep the lights on.

Re:Why?

[AKAImBatman]

could it be because everyone uses Office and it's proprietary formats?

Yet they offer the incompatible (and amusingly named) Microsoft Works package. If they can offer Microsoft Works by default, why can't they offer OpenOffice as an option?

I believe that is the point the author is trying to make.

Re:Why?

[Hatta]

The first thing I did when I got my dell laptop was flash the HD and reinstall an OEM copy of windows.

Your Dell laptop came with a solid state hard drive?

Because they can't up-sell you

[xenocide2]

It's not about customer value -- anyone asking for OpenOffice already knows about it and can easily install it. Dell's strategy is to make the cheapest PC's around to bring in customers, then make it as easy as possible to spend more than that. They are not the Wal-Mart of computing. A 30 day Office trial pays Dell. Even so, they want you to buy Office -- they get more money that way. OO.o has no such financial arrangement, and it would be tricky for Dell to attempt to charge customers for it.

Re:Because they can't up-sell you

[kripkenstein]

it would be tricky for Dell to attempt to charge customers for [OpenOffice]

Tricky how? Legally there is no issue here. The only thing they need to do is set up the support for OpenOffice, as far as I can tell. Or am I missing something else that you intended?

Re:Because they can't up-sell you

[mounthood]

Dell's strategy is to make the cheapest PC's around to bring in customers, then make it as easy as possible to spend more than that. They are not the Wal-Mart of computing.

That's exactly Walmarts strategy:

1. Have the least expensive item in a category to draw in customers.
2. Charge more for all the other items in that category. (More relative to Target, etc...)
3. Profit !!!!!?!?!!#!!

Re:Because they can't up-sell you

[xenocide2]

If they charged for it, there'd be a political price to pay. People would ask why they're charging for something OO.o offers for free. There would be calls to ask Dell to donate to OO.o. People would complain about internet updates costing OO.o. They'd have to pay careful attention to this or risk bad PR, primarily.

Re:Because they can't up-sell you

[kripkenstein]

If they charged for it, there'd be a political price to pay. People would ask why they're charging for something OO.o offers for free.

Well, the answer is simple: they are selling support.

There would be calls to ask Dell to donate to OO.o. People would complain about internet updates costing OO.o. They'd have to pay careful attention to this or risk bad PR, primarily.

This might have a PR influence, but only among computer geek types. And among those, the majority would applaud Dell installing OO.o, I would think (but I might be wrong). So my personal guess about the PR issue is that it would be an overall win.

Re:Because they can't up-sell you

[Eil]

Even so, they want you to buy Office -- they get more money that way. OO.o has no such financial arrangement, and it would be tricky for Dell to attempt to charge customers for it.

How so? There's absolutely no legal or moral reason they can't charge for open source software. Even the GPL--most restrictive of all OSS licenses--states that you can charge money for GPL'd software. You just can't forbid your customers from sharing it freely or charge any (real) money for the source code.

Still, they would probably earn the trust of the OSS community more if they made it clear that what you're really buying is support rather than the software itself. Every Dell machine that's sold comes with a service tag. In order to get technical support for OpenOffice, you'd have to give them your service tag. When helpdesk looks up your service tag and shows that you bought OpenOffice with the machine, they proceed to offer support.

The only downside is that OpenOffice is actually quite a bit more buggy than your average piece of software (which is reasonable, as there is quite a bit more complexity) and there are a lot of operations that *should* be simple to do in OO, but aren't. Dell could actually lose out on trying to support OpenOffice. But something like AbiWord, Firefox, or GNOME itself would probably work OK.

Spoonerism!

[sootman]

Am I the only one who read that and saw "OpenOffice.org Tries to Do Well"?

May I sew you to your sheets?

Duh.

[bannerman]

It's simple. Dell computers already come bundled with a more polished suite for free. It may not be as powerful or feature complete but there it is.

"Microsoft Works 8. DOES NOT INCLUDE MS WORD [Included in Price]"

Re:Duh.

[CastrTroy]

Included in price does not mean free. If they had a free alternative, how much would they charge for MS works?

Re:Duh.

[bannerman]

How much do you really think Dell pays for Microsoft Works 8.0? I doubt they pay anything for it.

Re:Why?

[zaydana]

I know i'm going to get modded down for this but... if you have the wisdom to use linux, why are you using a dell laptop? Those things have precision engineering aimed at getting them to die 1 month after the warranty expires :-/

Re:Why?

[tomstdenis]

Mine has been running fine [in Linux] for a year now. It seems like a solid design. Can't really complain about it.

In fact it works better in Linux than Windows as I can't find the damn Intel HDA drivers for this thing. Sound and wifi work out of the box with the Linux kernel.

My first laptop was a Compaq [forget the model] Athlon 1.8Ghz. It too was solid. I dropped it [in a metal case] twice, left it in the cold [in transit] and even poured about 100mL of water on it [by accident] and it kept going [after drying out].

In my experience Sony and Toshiba laptops are the flimsy'est even if the specs are otherwise nice. IBM laptops [lenovo now I guess] are also pretty tough though the ones I saw also weighed like 12lbs.

Tom

A somewhat obvious answer is given.

[mwvdlee]

A somewhat obvious question is raised: why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?

Because Microsoft will give less license discount if they did.

Re:Why?

[Nerd4News]

Hmm top secret ... could it be because everyone uses Office and it's proprietary formats? That's why.

Or maybe it's because Dell can't make any money off OO?

Re:Yet...

[Ninwa]

The discount vendor has an insentive in offering you these products, because that's the sort of market they're reaching out to (the technically savy). Dell already has a large enough market and it's a market that would likely be confused if they recieved OOo and not MS Office.

Just my 2g.

Re:Why?

[CastrTroy]

First they could just include the source on the hard drive. Or even better, they could just put up an FTP site where the source is available. It wouldn't even have to be high traffic. I seriously doubt more than 1% of people who buy Dell computers are going to want to download the source for OpenOffice. Nowhere in the GPL does it say you have to include the source with the product, just that you have to make it available. You can even make someone send you an email/snailmail, and charge them for a CD and shipping.

Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[Experiment 626]

If Dell charged for OpenOffice, open-source advocates would scream bloody murder (OMG it's supposed to be free, why does choosing OpenOffice add $50 to the price of a PC?) On the other hand, customers expect whatever comes with their computer to be supported, which costs money. There's also the opportunity cost from OpenOffice cannibalizing sales of the much more profitable MS-Office. Also, they would hurt their relationship with Microsoft. So they can either give it away and lose money, or sell it for whatever it costs them to offer, but continue to take lots of flak for it not being free. I would expect them to avoid the issue unless a competitor manages to eat into sales by offering systems with OpenOffice.

Re:Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[mhall119]

If Dell charged for OpenOffice, open-source advocates would scream bloody murder (OMG it's supposed to be free, why does choosing OpenOffice add $50 to the price of a PC?)

Name one instance where selling open source software has caused any large group of people to complain? The only complaints I have ever heard is when the company selling the software is also violating the license is some way (usually not distributing the source). I doubt anybody would complain if Dell charged $50 to install and support OpenOffice.

Re:Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[pedestrian crossing]

...customers expect whatever comes with their computer to be supported, which costs money.

Hogwash!

Try calling Dell and see how much support you get for MS Works.

If it starts up, they consider their job done.

If it doesn't start up, they will tell you to wipe and reload from the image.

If it still doesn't start up, they will RMA the computer and send you a new one.

That is the complete extent of the application support you will get from Dell.

The "it costs Dell money to support OOO/Linux" argument is a tired canard, and anyone who has ever called Dell for software support knows it.

Re:Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[Kickersny.com]

http://blog.siteadvisor.com/2006/02/how_would_you_ like_to_pay_3795.shtml Many more instances can be found on Google for other free (in both senses) software sales. eBay also used to be rife with it.

Re:Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[mhall119]

While SiteAdvisor seems to be complaining about FreeDownloadHQ misleading people into subscribing to their website under the guise of selling the software, they are not complaining that they are charging for the software itself, which in fact they are not. Your article also links to http://www.spreadfirefox.com/node/19766 where the Firefox community agrees that FreeDownloadHQ is well within their rights to sell a subscription to their software listing service, even if that listing includes free software.

So again, the complaint isn't that free software is being sold, it's that FreeDownloadHQ is misleading consumers about what they are paying for and why.

Re:Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[Experiment 626]

That is a good counterpoint. The instance I was mainly thinking of was how when Lindows Click-N-Run was announced, the reaction from Slashdot types was largely that it was stupid to pay for such a service when yum/apt/up2date let you get the same open source packages for free.

Many of the reasons people pay for software that can be had for free don't apply to geeks. We aren't readily fooled by scams like the one the other reply to yours mentioned. We tend not to need software support, don't want a dumbed down yet premium cost interface for acquiring software, and don't usually have the kind of limited Internet connections that lead people to order CDs of software that can legally be downloaded instead. As Slashdot types have fewer reasons to pay for software that can be had for free, and tend to prefer software free in both the speech and beer senses, communities like this one look upon paying for free software with skepticism.

I stand by my comment to the extent that if Dell did offer a $50 OpenOffice option, there would definitely be posts in the ensuing Slashdot article griping that that it wasn't free. Giving the matter more thought in light of your post, however, this might be more of an isolated reaction than an overall consensus like I initially supposed.

Re:Makes sense from Dell's perspective

[mhall119]

Many of the reasons people pay for software that can be had for free don't apply to geeks. We aren't readily fooled by scams like the one the other reply to yours mentioned. We tend not to need software support, don't want a dumbed down yet premium cost interface for acquiring software, and don't usually have the kind of limited Internet connections that lead people to order CDs of software that can legally be downloaded instead.

Not only that, but all those Grandma's out there who can't seem to use Linux are also afraid to install any new software, be it OpenOffice or MS Office. Having it pre-installed is, for them at least, worth the $50 convenience fee.

I stand by my comment to the extent that if Dell did offer a $50 OpenOffice option, there would definitely be posts in the ensuing Slashdot article griping that that it wasn't free.

If Dell doesn't offer an OpenOffice option at any price, there would definitely be posts in the ensuing Slashdot article griping about that too. In fact, this very article already has some speculative preemptive griping about them NOT offering it.

This is Slashdot, any article about any topic will have posts with people griping, you know that.

Re:Why?

[aputerguy]

It's obvious -- Dell makes more money *selling* MS Office then *giving* away OpenOffice.

Even when the customer doesn't buy MS Office up front, you can be sure that MS pays Dell for every "60-day trial" version which comes installed on most PCs nowadays. Even if MS didn't unfairly retaliate, giving away OO would take away from subscribers buying or upgrading to paid MS Office so Dell would inevitably get less of a commission back from MS.

On the other hand adding a preloaded OO is unlikely to shift share to Dell so not much upside -- particularly, since the relatively small minority of users who consider this as a factor could easily download it themselves.

Plus supporting OO would add support costs.

So, while I would love personally to see more OO, I don't see the business case from Dell's perspective

Re:Why?

[Larus]

The preloaded crap for HP is Microsoft Works, which is enough for people really but expires in 30 days. Yet almost everyone I know asked to install Office over Works, despite the fact that Office more bloated and expensive. It also has license conflict with existing Works.

What this proves is that the non-Slashdot hoi polloi like the name 'Office' better than 'Works'. And the same is true for 'Microsoft' over 'Open'. These are the prime customers for Microsoft, and I consider it adverse selection anyways.

I've been using OO for years, and nobody I collaborated with ever complained of format problems.

Instead of Wooing Dell

[falcon5768]

Why dont you woo Apple (who have a shakey relationship with Microsoft to start)and in return get help for that long promised native OpenOffice version not using java like NeoOffice has to do...

oh wait, I forgot the guys in charge dont like Apple either.

Re:Instead of Wooing Dell

[mgblst]

Don't worry, I think they are preparing a Letter to Apple as well, right after they finish on the ones to Amiga and the Acorn Arhcimedes. They will really be pulling in the numbers once they convince those 3, probably won't even bother answering the phone calles from Dell.

Re:Instead of Wooing Dell

[falcon5768]

um your point? Microsoft has long sold the shares that they bought nor did Apple ever need Microsoft to buy them, it was a gesture of good will between the companies. Before you go pulling up some webpage from the .com bubble days, maybe you should ALSO look into the facts about that instance. Microsoft has nothing invested in Apple anymore.

Re:Why?

[truthsearch]

Branding. I've been saying for years that Dell and those who compete with Dell could take a Linux distro and brand it with their logo. If they make their own distro or even just their own version of OpenOffice they can co-brand and it and get more customer loyalty. Also, if Dell is in more control of the whole package (instead of just re-distributing Microsoft software) they can produce a better product. That's part of Apple's niche, but someone like Dell could easily do the same by using open source.

The default OO install...

[The Orange Mage]

If Dell goes through with this, there's one thing they should do: Make the default blank document (as in File->New) EXACTLY like MS Word's. It bugs the hell out of me that OO uses wonky non-standard margins by default.

Obvious?

[east coast]

A somewhat obvious question is raised: why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?

Obvious? What's obvious is that Dell can make a profit from MS Office. Frankly, if I were a business I would look to the profit aspect first.

Also consider tech support. I would think that Dell is going to get more support from MS than the OO people when it comes down to wide spread issues involving their product. Tech support is doubtlessly a large chunk of Dell's overhead. The better support from their software vendors the less that overhead will be. That's a big plus and anyone who's taken business-101 type classes can tell you this.

Not to mention that free software still has a stigma about it. This isn't likely to go away anytime soon.

Re:Obvious?

[ivan256]

Not to mention that free software still has a stigma about it. This isn't likely to go away anytime soon.

In technical terms, that stigma is called "Zero marketing budget".

Re:Obvious?

[pembo13]

It seems to me that Dell is allowed to sell vanilla OO.org for any price they want.

Re:Obvious?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

What's obvious is that Dell can make a profit from MS Office. Frankly, if I were a business I would look to the profit aspect first.

You make the profit angle seem one sided. It is not. Dell makes money by selling computers and by selling copies of MSOffice. If they include OpenOffice for free or for a small support fee that just covers those support costs they might sell fewer copies of MSOffice, but they also might sell more computers because their computers are now better than the competition who does not include a free Office suite. It is called a "value added" gambit. Now it may be that Dell has looked hard at the numbers and feels that right now they can make more money not offering OpenOffice, but then Dell is also slipping in market share and no longer holds the top spot. If a competitor decides to undercut them by installing OpenOffice, it makes them vulnerable.

Also consider tech support. I would think that Dell is going to get more support from MS than the OO people when it comes down to wide spread issues involving their product.

Funny. Actually, Dell could easily make OpenOffice their own and do support in house. They have a few coders and the source is right there for them to submit changes to. OpenOffice gives them more options for getting support, not fewer. They can go with in house, OpenOffice.org, a third party, or Sun and take bids from all concerned. With MS they can go with MS and hope for the best.

Tech support is doubtlessly a large chunk of Dell's overhead. The better support from their software vendors the less that overhead will be.

I'm unconvinced that a significant portion of their support cost are escalations to software vendors. I suspect almost all of it is faulty hardware, or user failure to understand what is going on at a basic level. Why would you assume otherwise?

That's a big plus and anyone who's taken business-101 type classes can tell you this.

Hopefully the guys running Dell have a bit better education than that. There is a real business case for OpenOffice and money that can be made from support margins and that business case is more and more reasonable the tighter margins on PCs become in comparison to MS Office.

Not to mention that free software still has a stigma about it. This isn't likely to go away anytime soon.

You mean like the stigma attached to the iTunes jukebox software? Or maybe you were thinking of the stigma attached to the Adobe PDF reader or the Flash player? Or maybe you were referring to he stigma surrounding Sun's Java Runtime? All of that is free software that is well branded and most people don't even think about it. OpenOffice has reasonable branding now and if Dell included it as an option either for free of for a small fee, I doubt anyone would attach any stigma to it. Or, Dell is free to make a fork and rebrand with either the Dell brand or some other brand if they're concerned about dilution.

The truth of the matter is that the hardware market is commoditized and Dell is slipping from their place as the biggest player who can get the best bulk pricing. Software is an easy differentiator in the market and is relatively cheap for the potential benefit. Dell may need to get a bit leaner in the add-on sales to regain market share. Of course there is one complication that no one has addressed and that is doing so hurts MS's biggest cash cow. MS is an abusive monopoly and has the power to destroy any Windows reseller, via their differential pricing. If I was running Dell, that is what might stop me from looking hard at OpenOffice. Now I don't know what is going on at Dell. Maybe they looked at the business case and decided MS Office reseller business was too good and they have a better strategy for winning the commodity market share back. Or, maybe internal politics make the software add-on segment of the company too powerful to buck, even when the company overall would do better otherwise. Or, maybe they just assume MS would punish them, or MS has hinted or outright told them not to do it "or else." We're all just guessing as to which of the above is true.

Re:Obvious?

[east coast]

You make the profit angle seem one sided. It is not. Dell makes money by selling computers and by selling copies of MSOffice. If they include OpenOffice for free or for a small support fee that just covers those support costs they might sell fewer copies of MSOffice, but they also might sell more computers because their computers are now better than the competition who does not include a free Office suite. It is called a "value added" gambit. Now it may be that Dell has looked hard at the numbers and feels that right now they can make more money not offering OpenOffice, but then Dell is also slipping in market share and no longer holds the top spot. If a competitor decides to undercut them by installing OpenOffice, it makes them vulnerable.

While I do see your point and tend to agree with you, you must also consider that anyone can download OO. I'm not going to switch from HP (my personal favorite) to Dell for OO. Granted, I'm certainly more in the know about OO than Joe Sixpack but if the market really does change based on the OO offering it won't be long until people who desire OO will realize that there is no need to go to Dell for OO. Even if they decide to offer support for OO through their own customer service they're going to need to jack the prices a bit for the new overhead costs. Offering OO at a small fee may help offset this but they're going to lose their marketing edge at the same time by charging for the tech support. Offering OO is a tough situation and one that I don't think is going to help Dell in the long run.

Funny. Actually, Dell could easily make OpenOffice their own and do support in house. They have a few coders and the source is right there for them to submit changes to. OpenOffice gives them more options for getting support, not fewer. They can go with in house, OpenOffice.org, a third party, or Sun and take bids from all concerned. With MS they can go with MS and hope for the best.

But you're talking about more overhead in the way of a new development division and the loss of MS profits from Office sales. Somehow I don't think these wash too well with the CFO and his bean counters. While they may be able to break even you're talking about putting a proven model against a risky new model. Even if you could break even on paper you'd still be making a hard sell of this to the financial portion of the company. Not saying that it can't be done but I'd place my money on the existing model winning. "Better the devil you know" kind of thing.

I'm unconvinced that a significant portion of their support cost are escalations to software vendors. I suspect almost all of it is faulty hardware, or user failure to understand what is going on at a basic level. Why would you assume otherwise?

Actually, I'm not assuming otherwise. The failure to understand what is going on at a basic level is exactly what will cause this overhead to increase. While you may be fairly knowledgeable about OO and other software packages Joe Sixpack and Grandma Kegger are a whole different story. They buy a Dell, they know the machine isn't working right for some reason. Who are they going to turn to? Even if they are smart enough to figure out the problem is with MSO/OO you'll still have a portion of them looking at Dell for answers. After all, Dell support is included? Right?

I work for a large pharmaceutical distributor. We do mail-order pharmacy and we have a substantial customer service center. The number of calls that we get that aren't related to our distribution of the product is pretty high. Some of these are questions that should be going to the manufacturer or a doctor yet come to us instead. This is the way things work in the mind of Joe Sixpack. I have no reason to believe it will be different for Dell.

Hopefully the guys running Dell have a bit better education than that. There is a real business case for OpenOffice and money that can be made from support margins and that business case is more and more reasonable the tighter margins on

Re:Obvious?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

...you must also consider that anyone can download OO. I'm not going to switch from HP (my personal favorite) to Dell for OO. Granted, I'm certainly more in the know about OO than Joe Sixpack but if the market really does change based on the OO offering it won't be long until people who desire OO will realize that there is no need to go to Dell for OO.

I don't think that is a significant market influence. Most users don't know they can download OpenOffice. Many fear to install any software at all without help. I know people who will buy a CD-ROM at Walmart, stick it in and click and hope it works, and that is about the extend of their knowledge. If it is not for sale at Walmart, it might as well not exist, even if it is a free download for anyone who knows about it.

Even if they decide to offer support for OO through their own customer service they're going to need to jack the prices a bit for the new overhead costs.

Actually the cost spread out across all the machines they sell amounts to basically nothing. A few engineers and a process guy each at 100K a year, doubled for overhead and you're talking a million bucks, divided by the 2 million machines they ship and you're looking at $.50 a box. That's what .001% of their advertising budget to be able to tell everyone their computers come with a free office suite? It's hard to find so much potential bang for so little.

Offering OO at a small fee may help offset this but they're going to lose their marketing edge at the same time by charging for the tech support. Offering OO is a tough situation and one that I don't think is going to help Dell in the long run.

I don't think adding a few bucks for support just for that machine, or rolling it into the overall cost would hurt them. As for the long term, open source development is certainly a more efficient (cost) model of development and unless governments interfere to stop free trade, in the long run it will win and Dell will have to offer it, or something like it. Also, Dell has their neck in a noose with MS and they know it. They certainly do not want a single OS to dominate as then they can't get competing bids and are beholden to a single supplier. Anything that loosens MS's grip, is a long term win for Dell.

While they may be able to break even you're talking about putting a proven model against a risky new model. Even if you could break even on paper you'd still be making a hard sell of this to the financial portion of the company. Not saying that it can't be done but I'd place my money on the existing model winning. "Better the devil you know" kind of thing.

The risk is pretty minimal because they don't have to stop selling MSOffice, so the change is gradual and reversible. Reward is a function of risk. If they do it first, they get first mover advantage and might get 6 months of stealing customers form others before they are copied effectively. If they wait and someone else does it, they might lose those customers. The question is, what does Dell need right now? Do they need more market share or do they need to keep their revenue stream as predictable as possible? My view says the former. They've just been booted out of first place for market share and lost a lot of face and bargaining power they need to get the best prices from component suppliers. They're no longer the top dog. Even if they lose some money going this way, they gain more market share which trickles down to the pricing they can get on all their components and translates to how big of margin they get on each machine.

What support margins are you refering to and how is that going to offset lost profits from MSO? I'm sorry but this is a pretty flimsy statement and it's hard to tell exactly where you are going with it.

I was speaking in the hypothetical if they charged for OpenOffice, that they could charge more than it takes to cover suppor

Re:Obvious?

[SanityInAnarchy]

Frankly, if I were a business I would look to the profit aspect first.

Frankly, you'd be a boring, unimaginative, and evil business. You also wouldn't be a particularly uncommon business.

Re:Obvious?

[east coast]

Guy, without considering profits first and foremost a business will not remain a business for long. Any business that has thrived has put profits first at some point in their lifespan. Probably a majority of their lifespan would be a very safe bet. So if you consider bankruptcy as being lively, creative and good I guess you're not going to find many other kinds of businesses out there.

Re:Obvious?

[SanityInAnarchy]

Guy, without considering profits first and foremost a business will not remain a business for long.

They have to be high on the list. They do not have to be first, and they do not get to be an excuse for being evil.

In fact, let me suggest to you that they cannot be first in any successful business. After all, it's technically more profitable to completely ignore the law, until you're caught. Do you really think all businesses should be the Mafia? After all, protection rackets are pretty profitable. So is prostitution.

And why do we tolerate this kind of behavior on the corporate scale, anyway? Typical retarded Slashdotter response: "Oh well, they're a business, they're in it for profit and nothing else." Do we tolerate similar behavior from individuals?

Think about what that would mean to an individual.

"Girl, I love you, and I wish I could marry you, but it costs money to buy all those flowers and stuff. Even the condoms cost money! We need to break up because, as you know, money is everything."

Do you still think profit should be everything? Why is it so much different for a business?

I suppose you could define "profit" as something else on the individual level. After all, profit for a business enables them to survive, so in a form of natural selection, the way a business survives is by being more profitable than everyone else. So maybe we should put reproduction -- or, hell, put all of the principles of natural selection to work on the individual level, as a moral code.

In that case, you should rape every member of the opposite sex you ever meet who could potentially have children with you -- or be more discriminating, only rape the really good-looking ones. And you should kill every other member of the same sex who wants the same people. You shouldn't go much for profit, only enough to feed you and your family/harem -- anything after that is a waste and isn't helping you reproduce, unless it's about attracting a mate, and why do that when you can just take one?

Oh, sure, there's the legal system and all that. Ok, so was it ethical for people to set up a legal system in the first place? Why would they be drafting legal documents when they could be fucking or caring for their children?

Certainly there's more to life than that! Certainly there are things we, as individuals, can and should do -- I'm not even talking about giving to charity, but at least make some friends, and don't kill or threaten your guy friends to ensure less competition for the girl. Makes sense, right?

So get this through your head: Profit is no excuse for a lack of ethics.

So if you consider bankruptcy as being lively, creative and good I guess you're not going to find many other kinds of businesses out there.

Nonprofit != Bankruptcy. In fact, just plain unprofitable still != bankruptcy.

It's very possible to make plenty of profit for the company and for the employees while maintaining some sort of ethical and moral standards.

It's also very possible you could make more by employing sweatshop labor, or monopolizing a market, or by stifling innovation. And if you do any of these, your business is unethical, and you are unethical, and you can keep telling yourself that profit is all that matters until you believe it, but you are still a pathetic, despicable bastard.

Re:Obvious?

[east coast]

Wow. Did you forget to take your meds today or something? Heh.

So I've gone from being honest enough to admit that profits are a key to business success to now being a rapist with no ethics? LOL.

Move along. If anyone is pathetic here it's you. Come back when you grow up a little.

Re:Obvious?

[SanityInAnarchy]

I've gone from being honest enough to admit that profits are a key to business success

You didn't say that. You said they were THE key, and that businesses shouldn't consider anything else.

Come back when you grow up a little.

Speak for yourself. Growing up means taking responsibility and demanding it of others, and not letting people get away with the excuse of "Businesses should make money."

Re:Obvious?

[east coast]

You didn't say that. You said they were THE key, and that businesses shouldn't consider anything else.

Quote me where I said they shouldn't consider anything else.

Speak for yourself. Growing up means taking responsibility and demanding it of others, and not letting people get away with the excuse of "Businesses should make money."

If businesses do not make money they cease to exist. Why is this concept so hard for you?

Re:Obvious?

[SanityInAnarchy]

Quote me where I said they shouldn't consider anything else.

Oh, right, you just said they should consider it first. Which means that they should consider other things, but only after they've considered profit.

Specifically, you said:

Guy, without considering profits first and foremost a business will not remain a business for long.

So tell me what that looks like. When do they get to consider anything other than profit?

If businesses do not make money they cease to exist.

If I do not eat, I cease to exist. However, it's really a tiny concern -- there's plenty of food, and I don't have to work very hard to keep myself fed.

I certainly do not have to eat till I'm obese, or hoard food in some Y2K-inspired shelter. I don't have to steal food from the mouths of others.

Please, try to see this as an analogy, and not as a personal assault. I am not calling you Jabba the Hutt -- it's an analogy.

And, back in the real world, it's perfectly possible to run a business, and have it make money, and remain a business for a very long time, without ever putting profits first in the sense you're implying -- in the sense where you use it as an excuse for anything wrong they do.

Think of it this way: Will Dell cease to make profit if they start shipping OpenOffice? If that's what you're implying, then you should have said that, and I certainly don't agree. It seems like what you're implying is that Dell won't make as much profit -- which is really the way a business should operate, just as it's the way an individual should operate: Get enough profit, food, etc to stay alive, and then do the right thing.

Or, for that matter, I prefer to do the right thing, and then focus on staying alive. Or do you believe selfless acts are never justified? There's actually a theory about how while the selfless individual may be selected out, communities which never produce selfless individuals will also be selected out.

Re:Obvious?

[east coast]

So tell me what that looks like. When do they get to consider anything other than profit?

Uh, you don't have priorities in your life? You don't have something that always comes first? When do you get time to consider anything else? It's fairly sad that you feel the issue is so black and white. If you didn't have such a bug up your ass about people actually making money maybe you wouldn't have such a problem with what I'm saying.

If I do not eat, I cease to exist. However, it's really a tiny concern -- there's plenty of food, and I don't have to work very hard to keep myself fed.

If things were that easy in business most businesses wouldn't go under in the first couple of years. I bet if starvation of the population was around 30% a year you'd scramble to get food where and when you could. You can deny it but when it comes down to survival most people do what they need to stay alive. Business should be no different. You see them as big faceless entities but some people probably has a fair share of their life's savings riding on the health of the company.

Please, try to see this as an analogy, and not as a personal assault. I am not calling you Jabba the Hutt -- it's an analogy.

You've already likened me to a rapist in a round-about fashion. How much worse can it get?

And, back in the real world, it's perfectly possible to run a business, and have it make money, and remain a business for a very long time, without ever putting profits first in the sense you're implying -- in the sense where you use it as an excuse for anything wrong they do.

Again, quote me! The last time you said some shit like this and I told you to quote me you backed down. Are you going to do it again? Quote me as to where I said that making a profit is an excuse for "anything wrong" one can do. I don't recall ever even mentioning the breaking of the law in my posts. Maybe you're just reading too much into it and went off raving like a mad man and now are trying to save face? Get real.

Think of it this way: Will Dell cease to make profit if they start shipping OpenOffice? If that's what you're implying, then you should have said that, and I certainly don't agree. It seems like what you're implying is that Dell won't make as much profit -- which is really the way a business should operate, just as it's the way an individual should operate: Get enough profit, food, etc to stay alive, and then do the right thing.

The right thing? How is preinstalling a free piece of software that anyone can download on their own suddenly the morally correct thing to do? Where the hell does this higher sense of right come from? Is it one of these "I hate MS so much I could just scream" type of things? I'm serious here, maybe you have some personal vendetta against MS but 98% of the world doesn't feel that way. I certainly don't. If people feel so good about using free software than use it. Why does it have to be forced on others? People have the freedom to choose. There is nothing stopping anyone from installing OO. More power to them if it fits their needs. I've recommended it to a few who were looking for some basic office functions without the expense.

Or, for that matter, I prefer to do the right thing, and then focus on staying alive. Or do you believe selfless acts are never justified? There's actually a theory about how while the selfless individual may be selected out, communities which never produce selfless individuals will also be selected out.

Well, if you'd rather die than have Dell not offer OO so be it. I'm not going to stop you.

If you can't understand why I scoff at someone who rants and raves about the offerings of one company on one piece of software (that is free and that anyone can get on their own) then I'm afraid you need to step back from your PC and at least go outside for a little while.

We're not talking about resistance to the Nazis in 1938 Germany here... we're talking about software that anyone can own.

Re:Obvious?

[SanityInAnarchy]

You've already likened me to a rapist in a round-about fashion.

As an analogy, to illustrate an attack. And you of course ignored the entire argument and used that analogy to say "Take your meds." Because obviously, anyone who disagrees with you enough to write a long-ish response must be frothing at the mouth.

Really, I'm quite calm.

If you didn't have such a bug up your ass about people actually making money

I have nothing against making money. I just don't think it should be anywhere close to a first priority. And if you think you can take another analogy (gasp!), I don't have anything against sex, but I don't think it should be such a high priority as to justify rape.

Quote me as to where I said that making a profit is an excuse for "anything wrong" one can do.

You only used it as an excuse for this particular action. So, it's not all about you personally. There are plenty of people here who throw this excuse out no matter what a company does. Sony Rootkit? They have to make profit. Oil spills? Oh well, they have to make profit. Don't be evil, but you know that's only so long as they make profit. Steve Jobs telling others to stop doing DRM while it continues to be the only option for iTMS? Apple's a company, they have to profit. MS monopoly? They're a business, they have to make profit. There's also either an implied or stated "What do you expect?" at the end of that.

As for you, I'm logically deriving this from things you did say. If profit is a first priority, than everything else is secondary. I'm trying to get you to admit that there may be other things, even implicit things like following the law, which should come first, even if they mean less profit or none at all. Life savings or not.

I suspect that this is what you meant in the first place, and that you think I'm being pedantic here. But if you can't just fall back on "Well, they have to make a profit," then you'll actually have to explain to me why profit comes first in this case. If you don't care about OpenOffice or open source, or don't think they're important enough here, you could say that, and I'll accept it -- and sadly, a different group of fanatics might come and flame you then. If you honestly think it would kill Dell's business model to distribute OpenOffice, I could say I doubt it, but we'd be done, since at that point, we're really in speculation.

Maybe you're just reading too much into it and went off raving like a mad man and now are trying to save face?

Maybe I'm just doing a reductio ad absurdum argument.

I can't imagine I'd care much about saving face now, really -- look how deep we are into the thread. No mod can hear you scream.

The right thing? How is preinstalling a free piece of software that anyone can download on their own suddenly the morally correct thing to do?

Maybe you haven't been following the discussion about things like preinstalled Linux.

It's not about hating MS. It's about the fact that MS has such a huge monopoly on desktop OSes and office suites that we're even having a discussion about whether Dell can afford to do anything but install a trial Office. It's not that the morally correct thing to do is take up pitchforks and go kill MS, but rather, to not be a part of that machine where it makes sense.

Well, if you'd rather die than have Dell not offer OO so be it.

I'm illustrating a point, and you missed it. Again.

I would rather have Dell die -- the company, not any individual -- than have the Microsoft monopoly last another ten years. I would rather have Dell make less profit and distribute OO than have them make more and distribute trial Office, though I admit that's probably not worth losing a company over.

You are the one who made it black and white here, though. According to you, if MS Office

Re:Why?

[dantal]

And why can't they make any money off of OO? There is nothing in the GPL that says you can not sell it or the service of just installing it. What you can't change for, other than a small duplication fee, is the source.

Re:Why?

[rbochan]

...Dell simply doesn't see the business case for distributing and supporting it...

So Dell provides support for that stupid Weatherbug that they include(d)? That godawful McAfee "security suite" they include? That evil Sonic bloatware? Quicktime? RealPlayer?
No?
I didn't think so...

Yeah sure...

[Bullfish]

That will go over with Dell like a pregnant woman doing a pole vault... No percentage (that they would get with any other commercial office product) means no profit...

This WOULD have made sense last year...

[ProppaT]

It would have made since for PC builders to supply OO on new computers last year. It would have given the user added value for free. It's a great suite of tools. Even though I have Office at work, there's I still use OO for certain applications.

The problem with OO right now is that, even though OO is a great substitute and can use Office files...it CANT use Office 2007 files. People are going to be saving files with .docx by default in 2007. This creates a huge compatibility void until someone creates an open source DTD for OO to open and render .docx files. No matter how good OO gets, Office is THE standard. If it can't keep up with Office compatibility (and I'm sure it eventually will catch up), it's about as useful as WordPerfect (i.e., it's fine as long as you don't have to use anybody elses files).

Re:This WOULD have made sense last year...

[Jorophose]

MS NEVER follows standards. EVER. IE7 does NOT support proper (X)HTML/CSS, doesn't include a native SVG viewer, and created the phenomenons known as "ActiveX from Hell" and "Sorry, this site needs IE". Office XML isn't a standard. Hell, the only reason it's still being reviewed in ISO, is because some secretary in bed with MS pushed it in. And even if it gets recognised by ISO, they're going to have to release the source code. I don't care if we can't make deriatives, just let us create interoperability, and you can keep your shitty format.

Re:This WOULD have made sense last year...

[bill_mcgonigle]

The problem with OO right now is that, even though OO is a great substitute and can use Office files...it CANT use Office 2007 files.

I think your information is out of date. Neooffice, the OSX Port of OpenOffice.org is reading them now in a prerelease.

Re:This WOULD have made sense last year...

[greginnj]

No matter how good OO gets, Office is THE standard.

Untrue, because there is no such product. Office 2003 may be 'the' standard, but lots of people even still use Office 2000. You'd have tough time proving that Office 2007 is 'the' standard as of 3/13/07.

The problem with OO right now is that, even though OO is a great substitute and can use Office files...it CANT use Office 2007 files.

The problem with Office 2003 right now is that, even though Office 2003 is a great substitute and can use Office files...it CANT use Office 2007 files.

There. Fixed that for you. You should be aware that OO and O2K3 are in pretty much the same boat. The fact that MS makes a 'converter' is besides the point; why should people go to the hassle of downloading, installing, and using the converter just to enable anti-social behavior by the small minority of Office 2007 users?

People are going to be saving files with .docx by default in 2007.

Only if they are a) smoking crack, b) don't care about their customers, c) don't care about efficient communication with their vendors, or d) all of the above.

This creates a huge compatibility void until someone creates an open source DTD for OO to open and render .docx files.

No, it creates a huge compatibility void for you if you insist on sending out .docx and .docm files to people who haven't upgraded yet. Please post transcripts of the sure-to-be-hilarious conversations you have with your customers still using Office 2003 when they complain that they can't read your docx's, and you explain to them that they are at fault because they are not using 'the' standard...

The vast majority of Office 2007 deployments will come about through scheduled hardware upgrades -- when people find out that the only MS office suite they can buy from their vendor is 2K7. Since most buyers are sitting on their hands, leery of Vista, the tipping point towards 2K7's format becoming 'the' standard will definitely not occur in 2007. It may not even occur in 2008. If you were signing off on the standard desktop build for Dell, would you want 2K7 defaulting to .docx files or to .doc files as of March 2007? Which do you think would lead to fewer support calls?

Re:This WOULD have made sense last year...

[intangible]

Irrelevant; Dell computers don't come with Office, they come with Works which can't view the shiny new Office 2007 formats either. OpenOffice is ahead of the curve here anyway, with the Novell filter it can read docx.

Re:This WOULD have made sense last year...

[doktor-hladnjak]

The problem with Office 2003 right now is that, even though Office 2003 is a great substitute and can use Office files...it CANT use Office 2007 files.

There. Fixed that for you. You should be aware that OO and O2K3 are in pretty much the same boat. The fact that MS makes a 'converter' is besides the point; why should people go to the hassle of downloading, installing, and using the converter just to enable anti-social behavior by the small minority of Office 2007 users?

Actually, Office 2003 and XP can read the new Office 2007 file formats natively with a free add-in. In fact, 2003 will even go find the add-in when you try to load a docx for the first time. No converter necessary.

Re:This WOULD have made sense last year...

[greginnj]

Actually, Office 2003 and XP can read the new Office 2007 file formats natively with a free add-in. In fact, 2003 will even go find the add-in when you try to load a docx for the first time. No converter necessary.

Noted, thanks for the correction. But it's yet another case of MS determining that I need to be online to use software that in itself doesn't require web access. ...-grumble-...

Moo

[Chacham]

They are trying to woo who?

Support

[eck011219]

Not only are all the financial and business reasons offered by readers here probably completely true, I'd bet they also don't want the support calls. It doesn't matter what you tell people about what you will or won't support -- I would imagine Dell gets hundreds of calls a day about something not working right in the pre-installed copy of Word someone bought with their Dell machine. I wouldn't think it would be worth it to either train support staff to provide basic support for OpenOffice or even to spend the time telling each confused caller that they have to go somewhere else for help.

Which just brought me to a related thought -- OOo online documentation is, in spots, quite skitchy. Dell and other manufacturers may have set standards for what they consider to be a product worthy of inclusion, and those standards may be partially dependent upon level of documentation.

But this is all Reason Three at best -- I'm sure marking up the OEM version AND getting a better volume discount from Microsoft weigh more heavily than this.

Re:Support

[eck011219]

Fine, let's go down this road. I've bought Dell boxes -- quite a few of them in various capacities, for corporate and client and personal use. They all come with a stack of crap, and I generally remove it. But that doesn't change my point -- they had to weigh the advantage of including that (economic vs. customer satisfaction vs. support vs. whatever else) to the value of adding it. I don't know from WeatherBug, but I'm sure AOL was a selling point for a lot of consumers. Doesn't make it a good product, but it makes it something worth considering if your goal is to sell lots of computers.

When I set up a Dell box for myself, I take all the crap off. When I set one up for a client, we go over the pros and cons and I remove the chaff and leave what they want. I don't always agree with their choices, and I make my recommendations with what I believe to be solid reasoning. If they don't buy into my philosophy, fine -- I charge them to support crap like AOL. But really, you could as easily argue that OOo is bloatware as one could say about AOL, if it doesn't suit your needs. Tools is tools, and people use what they are comfortable with. It's imperfect to a high degree, but it's reality. I'd rather have a client who I can reliably reach at his or her AOL address than one who is struggling to figure out how to use a normal mail client. Moreover, I'm sure THEIR clients feel the same way.

If everyone on the planet worked in IT, we should truly be appalled at the personal computing world. As it stands, though, there are levels of comfort appropriate to a much wider range of users. Some of these options suck from an efficiency standpoint, but they get the job done and keep average Joes on the computer (thus making it more likely that they'll stick to using their computer and allow us geeks to improve their experience over time). I'm getting sick of the "AOL sucks" thing -- it does to us, but it very often scratches a simple itch for new users.

Novell docx filter

[D3m0n0fTh3Fall]

Didn't Novell anounce the release of a shiny new docx import filter a week or two ago?

Re:Why?

[billcopc]

You hit some often-ignored but obvious points there, but I'm afraid it's a near-miss. The #1 reason why Dell will not supply OpenOffice isn't the cost of shipping media, nor the support nightmare that would inevitably ensue. The #1 reason is because OpenOffice would compete with MS Office.

If the average joe's computer came with a free word processor and spreadsheet, they no longer need to spend $250 and up on MS Office. Not only would Dell lose money from those lost software sales (which are far more profitable than the PC sales), but they would be hurting their #1 partner: Microsoft.

If people want to use OO.o, they can get it freely on the net without Dell getting involved. The "large number of customers" who want this are just a small fraction of the residential crowd, which itself accounts for maybe 10% of Dell's business. Their big fish is the corporate sector, where one sales pitch can net thousands of system orders. If one of those big guys wants OO.o, they will have a sysadmin to load it into the Ghost image, or they can pay Dell's solution integrators lots of money to do it for them. Either way, the home user doesn't get squat.

On a more general tune, I get irritated whenever some free software project whines about big-business partnerships. Those big partnerships exist because there's big money going back and forth. You have to pay to play, that's how it works in corporate america. The free software loudmouths are like a poor family with a retarded son, bitching because Mensa won't let them join. The reality is we don't need Dell, HP and friends to bundle Linux, OpenOffice, or any other free software, it's a losing battle. If/when free software truly exceeds Microsoft in functionality, ease of use and installation, and enterprise support, that's when the big guys will COME to us. We're not there yet.

Re:Why?

[CaptainTux]

Even if they tried to distribute with a support disclaimer there would still be a lot of calls to support about it. Also, Dell would have to distribute CDs with the source code since OpenOffice is GPL'd, etc, etc.

1: So Dell gets a support call about Open Office. They handle it the same way they handle most technical questions about MS Office: go to the software vendor. Problem solved. No additional work required.

2: Why would Dell need to distribute CD's with source on them? Nowhere does the GPL even mention that you have to do this. All they have to do is include a piece of paper in each box that says "Want the Open Office source? Email: xxx@dell.com", or set up an FTP site, or make someone mail in a source request form, etc, etc. Problem solved.

Submission title

[hey!]

Sounds like the lead in to one of those unspeakable folk songs where every other line is "hey, nonny,nonny oh".

Because OO is a headache for support providers

[Yogi_Stewart_4]

If I was a support provider (and I am within my organisation), I wouldn't want to provide OO either. Try opening something simple like a word document with an inserted image in it with OO, and then supporting illiterate users.

Re:Why?

[Kelz]

My theory is that Dell gets a lower OEM price on windows because they bundle MSW with their PCs (and what is MS works really besides a promotion to buy office?). It could be that any money they save by bundling Open Office may be lost because they stopped bundling MSW with Windows.

So

[geeksdave]

Charge $5-10 for an install fee and tell the reporter to bugger off. You still make money, look good to open source, charge a reasonable fee to handle your overhead and get to tell some reporter idiot (I know they're idiots, I worked in TeeVee for 8 years as a photog) to get lost. Geeze not a difficult business decision here. Whether they have the cojones to go against M$ is another argument.

Re:Why?

[Aladrin]

No, instead Dell has deals with those companies to do the support themselves. If Dell pays some company to support Open Office for them, it's no longer free to Dell. If they don't, they're distributing software that their customers have no support for.

Re:Why?

[Richard_at_work]

The OOo source code set comes to 259MB - thats an extra 259MB Dell has to copy, an extra 259MB that is wasted on the customer hard disk, or 259MB that Dell has to account for in its bandwidth build if it supplies an FTP server.

In short, its an extra hassle that Dell would have to satisfy.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

here's a possibility

[malevolentjelly]

Maybe because Microsoft Office is a superior product. They don't offer beta versions of MS Office either. If customers want to use OpenOffice they can download. In most cases, it's got critical deficiencies that will confuse most customers. I've tried the ol' OpenOffice switcheroo on non-open-source-enthusiasts before. They were basically confused and frustrated with OpenOffice and why it didn't do the same things.

Microsoft Office is a lot more intelligent than people give it credit for.

Re:here's a possibility

[nagora]

If customers want to use OpenOffice they can download.

But they won't, regardless of quality. If users just downloaded the best free option off the net then no one would ever have to design their webpages to allow for IE's quirks ever again.

MS's entire business is founded on the fact that 90%+ of people use whatever software that comes with their machine; Office suites, OS's, browsers, whatever.

In most cases, it's got critical deficiencies that will confuse most customers.

Deficiencies or differences (from MSO)?

TWW

Re:here's a possibility

[malevolentjelly]

Deficiencies. I was very clear the first time. Although I dislike the general Office interface, I'd have to say that MS Office 2007 is beautiful and extremely intuitive.

It's important not to draw parallels between non-related things. IE is inferior to Firefox in many cases, outside of memory footprint. IE is offered because Microsoft needs to offer a web browser- it's the same reason Apple offers Safari. Safari and IE7 are generally decent browsers with solid interfaces, but I think more web companies generally cater to Firefox.

IE7 and Safari remain a "good enough" solution for out-of-the-box consumers.

This isn't web browsers we're talking about, though, it's Office suites. Bringing up an open source strength in order to discredit an open source shortcoming is not going to solve any problems for anyone.

Considering the way web standards operate, it would seem obvious that a horde of random developers would be better at maintaining a browser than a large corporation- firefox is in the domain of the web. Creating a standards compliant browser is the ideal task for an open source software model, especially when open source developers are the ones who are making up the standards.

Effective office suites need only solid design practices and decent software engineering. Good ideas and usability research are the basis for a solid office suite. These are categories where OSS falls flat. I was certainly not surprised when Microsoft released a brilliant and productive new office interface and system out of nowhere- whereas OpenOffice still struggles to resemble Office 2000.

Re:here's a possibility

[westlake]

Maybe because Microsoft Office is a superior product

MS Office Home lists for $150 with a three-seat license.

The chances are good that a user will qualify for academic pricing or other discounts. If his needs are specialized or demanding, than OpenOffice isn't in the picture anyway.

That said, a user is likely spend as much or more on consumables in three months than he will spend on OEM Office in five years.

"Free-As-In-Beer" just isn't as compelling as the Geek likes to think

Re:here's a possibility

[nagora]

I'd have to say that MS Office 2007 is beautiful and extremely intuitive.

I disagree on both counts, which does not mean that I think OO is any better.

but I think more web companies generally cater to Firefox.

Sadly, the fact is that they all cater to IE, and Firefox if they have time/budget. If IE was not pre-installed then no one would support it at all.

IE7 and Safari remain a "good enough" solution for out-of-the-box consumers.

IE is only "good enough" because every web designer in the world is forced to support its errors and work around its many failings. Their efforts, not Microsoft's, are what makes an HTML page render correctly in that browser.

Considering the way web standards operate, it would seem obvious that a horde of random developers would be better at maintaining a browser than a large corporation

I don't know how you think web standards operate but in fact they are set by thousands of programmers and designers looking at the HTML spec and then a list of bugs in IE and franticlly trying to find a compromise between the two. I don't see what the connection is with the Open Source Vs Corporation argument.

Effective office suites need only solid design practices and decent software engineering. Good ideas and usability research are the basis for a solid office suite.

Maybe. Who knows, since that's never been tried. Office suites are designed by feature boxes on the side of the packaging. Certainly in the field of word processing, neither Microsoft nor anyone else has really come up with anything particularly good.

was certainly not surprised when Microsoft released a brilliant and productive new office interface and system out of nowhere

One man's "brilliant and productive" is another man's "not better, not worse, just different", I guess.

TWW

Re:here's a possibility

[Bert64]

If their requirements are specialised or demanding, then it entirely depends what is so specialised about their needs...
There are a lot of things openoffice can do, that msoffice can't... If these features are what you need, ms is out in the cold. Also, if you have a special requirement which neither app implements, you can at least hire programmers to implement it into openoffice.

You may need an office suite to run on multiple platforms (linux, solaris)
You may need your office suite to behave the same on multiple platforms (msoffice for windows and mac are wildly different)
You may have java, javascript or python programmers on staff to write macros, msoffice only allows macros to be written in vba.
You may need ISO compliance.
You have have extra specialised requirements, that require you to make in house modifications to the core code.
You may need to parse documents using external programs - this is much easier with xml based documents in an open format.
You might want the ability to give employees/students/users/etc their own copy to run at home.
You might need to parse the documents as they enter your organisation checking for embedded malware, viruses etc.. much easier with an open format.

Re:here's a possibility

[malevolentjelly]

Effective office suites need only solid design practices and decent software engineering. Good ideas and usability research are the basis for a solid office suite.

Maybe. Who knows, since that's never been tried. Office suites are designed by feature boxes on the side of the packaging. Certainly in the field of word processing, neither Microsoft nor anyone else has really come up with anything particularly good.

was certainly not surprised when Microsoft released a brilliant and productive new office interface and system out of nowhere

One man's "brilliant and productive" is another man's "not better, not worse, just different", I guess.

TWW

I'm not a web developer, so you may well be right about IE and Firefox. I switched from Firefox to IE7 to save on memory.

I'm not sure what you're trying to argue in the actual OO vs MSO debate- you seem to be some sort of office nihilist. Do you have a serious professional interest in advanced document formatting? One is undoubtedly better than the other- I agree with the point that the money issue is pretty tiny to most users.

Re:here's a possibility

[nagora]

Do you have a serious professional interest in advanced document formatting?

Yes, but I use DTP / typesetting software for that: TeX, InDesign, Quark, even Inkscape for 1-pagers. Word processors all fall between "more power than I need for letters and other simple documents" and "Not powerful or easy enough to use for complex layouts".

Indeed, even for simple documents I use TeX with suitable templates since I can then work using a simple, fast, memory thrifty text editor and concentrate on the subject I'm writing about, and leave worrying about visuals to later, when I'm not actually trying to think about content. For magazine work, I try to use InDesign over Quark, and again I separate working on layout from working on copy.

TWW

Re:here's a possibility

[malevolentjelly]

Yes, but I use DTP / typesetting software for that: TeX, InDesign, Quark, even Inkscape for 1-pagers. Word processors all fall between "more power than I need for letters and other simple documents" and "Not powerful or easy enough to use for complex layouts".

I think the argument of OpenOffice being implemented by Dell is about 300 miles south of where you're going here. I'm talking about squares and you're talking about cubes. It's more of an argument of "what does the average jackass want to use?" They're going to be interested in being a couple clicks away from something looking decent- I challenge you to explain to your mother how to use a TeX template to make a more attractive document without the need for a fancy word processor. :P

Re:here's a possibility

[dennypayne]

You probably shouldn't call his mother a jackass. :-P

Denny

Re:here's a possibility

[TrancePhreak]

There are certain people who really don't like Firefox. I would use Opera over it given the choice, even when Opera was not free without ads. FF is bloated, leaky, and crashy.

Re:here's a possibility

[TrancePhreak]

You may need to parse documents using external programs - this is much easier with xml based documents in an open format.

Office has a COM interface. You can import it to any language that supports COM. This makes it much easier to read than having to find all the documentation on a format and learning it's xml handling rules.

You might need to parse the documents as they enter your organisation checking for embedded malware, viruses etc.. much easier with an open format.

Any modern scanner reads MS format documents.

You might want the ability to give employees/students/users/etc their own copy to run at home.

If you use Office at work, you are entitled to use it at home.

Re:here's a possibility

[nagora]

I challenge you to explain to your mother how to use a TeX template to make a more attractive document without the need for a fancy word processor.

Well, the point of having templates is to let non-technical staff be able to produce documents, so I don't think I'd have any trouble with that; I certainly didn't with my girlfriend (creating the templates might cause some trouble, though). However, the argument you were making was that OO has deficiencies which "confuse" users; I was wondering what you were thinking of. The side argument that I made - that WYSIWYG wordprocessors are all poor for making complex documents - did not, in fact have anything to do with TeX per se, although it does a better job on certain types of documents such as textbooks, novels, and short letters (ie, not heavily illustrated) than Word or OO.

The implication I was trying to make was that do formatting and content creatation at the same time, makes for an unsatisfactory set of compromises and results in all modern word processors being fairly average at their jobs.

TWW

Re:here's a possibility

[nagora]

There are certain people who really don't like Firefox. I would use Opera over it given the choice, even when Opera was not free without ads. FF is bloated, leaky, and crashy.

I agree. That's why I use Opera.

Re:here's a possibility

[westlake]

If these features are what you need, ms is out in the cold

We are talking here about the bog-standard OEM Windows install.

The user who needs integration with Peachtree or QuickBooks accounting. The user for whom Solaris has no more relevance than the Amiga or the Commodore 64.

Re:here's a possibility

[Bert64]

Programs supporting opendocument have APIs too... I understand koffice is especially powerfull in this regard, and i believe IBM's workplace suite is too.

No scanner reads the files thoroughly, it may have some idea where to look for common macros but that's about it... There are still more undocumented places where malware could hide, and the scanner has no hope of validating any of the data content to try and weed out potential exploits.

And where did you hear that it's ok to take a copy of msoffice from work and run it at home? I've never seen such a clause, and it would certainly terminate when you move jobs anyway, and use your files to ransom you into buying a copy.

Re:here's a possibility

[Bert64]

I was responding to the blanket statement that "anyone with special requirements will be unable to use openoffice". I was showing that special requirements can go either way.

Re:here's a possibility

[TrancePhreak]

Potentially in the EULA... Nobody ever reads those things, but sometimes they provide interesting information.

Re:Why?

[cyclop]

OpenOffice is freely available to anyone with an internet connection, and Dell simply doesn't see the business case for distributing and supporting it.

Yes, but how many know about it? As for the marketing, why shouldn't a "Complete office suite included -for only 5$ more!" work? They would even profit from it if they charge a minimal amount.

OpenOffice bundled on new PCs

[Yaddoshi]

The company I work for always adds OpenOffice to every new PC sold by default, because getting OEM Office drives the price up by almost $200 (and our price is already higher than Office Depot, Office Max, Best Buy and Walmart on comparable PCs of the main brands). I find, however, that people who are comfortable using MS Office don't like OpenOffice, just like people who are comfortable with Corel WordPerfect typically don't like MS Word. You like the program you are most familiar with, even if other programs do the same task better. Nobody likes having to learn to do the same thing in a different manner. I still tie my shoes the same way I taught myself to as a child, even though the normal way to tie one's shoes tends to keep them tied longer than my method.

With that in mind I find it highly amusing that MS Office 2007 requires a substantial learning curve before most users can become efficient with it. Nice job yet again, Microsoft. Justify the massive pricetag of your newest product that is nothing more than a minor upgrade with a facelift by including an interface overhaul.

I have customers that are still using MS Office 97, purchased almost ten years ago. Why? Because for them, it still works just fine.

Re:OpenOffice bundled on new PCs

[drinkypoo]

I have customers that are still using MS Office 97, purchased almost ten years ago. Why? Because for them, it still works just fine.

That's exactly what I did until OO.o got (in my opinion) good enough for daily use. Today, I exchange documents with MS Office users on a regular basis.

I am about to try creating a pretty wonky word doc, though, so I'll find out just how good it is soon enough...

Re:Yet...

[Darundal]

Not really. They could advertise that even their lowest-end, cheapest systems came with a full, Office-compatable application suite. Of course, they could then extoll the advantages of MS Office over OOo on the page where you pick it, which might actually increase sales of Office, but in the end, the user would still be getting a better deal and Dell would still be getting, at the very least, further reinforcement of their reputation (deserved or not) for providing good systems at low prices.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

So if I really want to fail, I should call my product "Open Works"?

Re:Why?

[minus_273]

1: So Dell gets a support call about Open Office. They handle it the same way they handle most technical questions about MS Office: go to the software vendor. Problem solved. No additional work required.

2: Why would Dell need to distribute CD's with source on them? Nowhere does the GPL even mention that you have to do this. All they have to do is include a piece of paper in each box that says "Want the Open Office source? Email: xxx@dell.com", or set up an FTP site, or make someone mail in a source request form, etc, etc. Problem solved. 1. MS office is not shipped free with a dell computer. Open office would be like windows, something dell provides and thus their responsibility.

2. The source is the major cost. Clearly the FTP server is not free, the bandwidth is not free some one needs to reply to the email address. The thus it will cost dell money to include open office with no measurable increase in revenue because of the inclusion of open office. the source requirement in the GLP is the biggest hurdle.

Re:Why?

[jedidiah]

...except Mensa is a matter of merit that even a poor family can aspire to be included in. "Pay to play" and "old boy relationships" on the other hand are the exact opposite of the sort of meritocracy that Mensa is supposed to represent.

In your rush to craft a bad analogy, you captured precisely why it is that those of us that gravitate to the notion of meritocracy find "selling shelf space" so galling.

The open source crowd isn't complaining that their retarded child can't get into Mensa. They are complaining that their child genius is being excluded from Mensa for not being sufficiently blue blooded (or some other similar BS).

The invisible hand of capitalism is supposed improve economic efficiency and improve product not enable graft and corruption. Your philosophy is the essence of why banana republics don't get anywhere economically.

Re:Because It's not easy to use

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Draw isn't very useful, except in a few limited cases. Don't try the database app either, its not ready for prime time.

Stick to writer, calc, and impress. Those are the good ones. 80% of people who use MS office just use word, excel, and powerpoint. Not many spring for the deluxe version that would include visio.

Re:Why?

[petabyte]

I don't think that is the case. I've had 3 dell laptops - 2 of them latitudes I bought at the end of corporate leases so they were behind the times when I got them. A Pentium, a Pentium 2, and now I have the ultra-cheap B130 Inspiron. It was 500 bucks shipped to my door. I, like tom, took the liberty of booting with a ubuntu disk and dd'ing the partition table into oblivion. My difference is that I'm not running windows at all on the laptop - it runs kubuntu feisty without issue at the moment. I also replaced the 802.11 broadcom with an intel chip and everything on the machine works perfectly out of the box. The system's I've built (2 desktops) have more issues.

Could it die? Sure, but so could any other system and with a laptop, its not like I can go to any store and pickup some spare parts to change out. The data on the hard drive is mirrored on my freebsd mini-itx fileserver and my athlon64 so I wouldn't be out much if the laptop went anyway. I've bought, and built computers and experienced plenty of hardware failures (usually hard drives actually). I've learned, cheap and redundant is usually the best policy.

Re:Why?

[j-pimp]

The OOo source code set comes to 259MB - thats an extra 259MB Dell has to copy, an extra 259MB that is wasted on the customer hard disk, or 259MB that Dell has to account for in its bandwidth build if it supplies an FTP server.

In short, its an extra hassle that Dell would have to satisfy.

On an 80 gig hard drive that 259 megs is trivial. Considering that the machines are probably RIS installed, the time to copy over another 259 megs is trivial, and dell has the option of putting thes ource on ftp or cd as well.

The average user that would use this, is one that went with the Corel office package previously. So the bottom line question for Dell is how much money they stand to lose for not reselling Corel office, and if they can recover the income lost by not including a demo of Corel Snapfire on new desktops by lets say additional kickback from google if they include picasso as well as the google toolbar.

Re:Why?

[CastrTroy]

Like I said, the traffic could be minimal. They could even charge for the cost of the bandwidth. I'm sure they could support the traffic they'd generate on at $7.95 a month dreamhost account. The expense would be minimal.

ammendment

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

open office's base ( the database app I just slammed) is getting better all the time. Its not very user friendly, but its the closest app I've seen to access. Soon they'll hit access 2 usability ( which is more than I ever expected of it).

Not that I'll ever use it.

Re:Why?

[danpsmith]

Also, Dell would have to distribute CDs with the source code since OpenOffice is GPL'd, etc, etc. None of it is a show-stopper, but why go through all the hassle with no reward? Distributing free software that they don't want to support (or don't think they can sell support on) doesn't make sense for Dell.

I'm actually kind of here to moderate, but, what about the reward of more customers? You know, I bet a lot of people aren't particularly happy that you don't get any real office software when you get your computer. I can imagine people having conversations such as the following taking place:

Person 1:Computers are such a rip-off, I just bought a new computer and now I have to buy office because my kids can't use what they gave us for schoolwork.

Person 2:I don't know, I bought my computer from Dell, we got office for free and it works pretty well.

People don't know the real difference between office packages. There's people who have used works for years until they run into incompatibility issues with others. People will use what is shipped. They don't have to pay Microsoft anything to ship a version of OpenOffice with their Dell, and they can advertise that they include a full office suite with their PC. Word gets around, it could become quite a little bonus for Dell. So to say there's no benefit is a little misleading.

Re:Why?

[edmicman]

Same old same old. What I don't get is why people think you have to run the preloaded crap anyways. The first thing I did when I got my dell laptop was flash the HD and reinstall an OEM copy of windows.

As is the case for most tech geeks, and probably most everyone on Slashdot. If I don't build it myself, it gets wiped clean and installed with what I want. But Joe Average Consumer doesn't get a shiny new PC and then wipe the drive clean, reinstalling with the other copy of Windows that he has around. Heck, most of the new PC's don't even come with media anymore - it's sitting on another partition. Is Joe going to know how to fdisk the thing and reclaim the partition, too?

Re:Why?

[shaitand]

Actually as long as they distribute the stock openoffice they can just point customers to an existing repository.

Still works fine

[symbolset]

I have customers that are still using MS Office 97, purchased almost ten years ago. Why? Because for them, it still works just fine.

It still works fine because, despite what everyone is trying to sell you, methods of creating and dealing with "documents" haven't changed in many years. The feature list wars were over a decade ago, and everybody won.

Unfortunately for you and software vendors, until they get you to buy it by subscription they have to reengineer the whole thing every few years to get you to buy it again or they go out of business. That and engineered incompatibility are the only things driving the MSOffice profit train.

Get off the train to crazytown. Use OO.o already.

Re:Still works fine

[Yaddoshi]

Get off the train to crazytown. Use OO.o already. Actually I find even with the latest Java installed OpenOffice is just as slow and unwieldy as the latest MS Office packages, so I tend to avoid it. I haven't used MS Office or OpenOffice.org in my personal life for a few years now, although I do take advantage of MS Publisher 2003 at work because it's rather efficient.

Abiword and Gnumeric are significantly faster than Word and Excel or Writer and Calc. I haven't found anything better than Impress for presentations, however (Powerpoint just plain bugs me). And it would be nice if there was a non-proprietary Publisher. Oh well, one can't have everything, right?

Does anyone like Google Apps?

Re:Still works fine

[jeevesbond]

Does anyone like Google Apps?

Certainly not! Although I have nothing to hide, the idea of having my private/business documents on a server under Google's control is not pleasant. Having my documents where Google will be able to rifle through them at will, or turn them over to the US goverment under the auspices of protecting the world from 'terror' fills me with dread.

And it would be nice if there was a non-proprietary Publisher

Have you tried Scribus? It's more professional than Publisher in my opinion, closer to Quark or Pagemaker. Give it a go (in this case it's probably best to get the source and compile it yourself, worth it for the bug fixes and impoved SVG import filters). Scribus and Inkscape are a great combo for graphics and pagesetting.

I do use OpenOffice, but find it feels bloated. It's not, but their weird practice of having all the applications in one massive executable instead of seperate applications and libraries makes no sense (so when loading oowriter, for example, it actually loads oocalc, ooimpress etc as well). Perhaps someone wiser than I could explain this weird design practice? OpenOffice draws a lot of criticism for it's slow startup and apparent bloat.

Re:Still works fine

[Bert64]

You can use scribus, which aims to provide an open alternative to ms publisher...
I've never really used either, so i can't comment on relative features etc.

Re:Still works fine

[Yaddoshi]

I tried Scribus, and after some tweaking I found it offers finer control than Publisher, but I can put together a decent document in Publisher in about 1/3 the time required by Scribus. This is probably partly because I have been using MS Office software since 1995, therefore it is easy for me to use Office applications, even the ones I have little experience with. For personal projects (where time doesn't equal money) I will use Scribus.

My complaint isn't with the software, however, but the fact that no other software can properly interpret *.pub files except for Publisher, and there are also issues with compatibility within the different versions of Publisher (like many office documents, files created by newer versions are not properly interpreted by older versions of the same program, even if you take the time to "Save As: Office 2000 *.pub, for example).

Re:Still works fine

[Bert64]

Your complaint however, is a reason to stop using ms publisher as soon as possible.
Your locked in to it, and your files are being held to ransom in a proprietary format, and because of that your stuck with using a sub-par application.

As you already said, scribus offers finer controls and the only reason it takes you longer to work with it, is lack of experience with it.

Why not create all new files with scribus, and only edit old ones using publisher... That way you can gradually free yourself from the dangers and hassles of proprietary files, and get used to a new app. It need not be scribus either, there are plenty of other DTP apps out there.

Re:Why?

[Zonk (troll)]

Finding drivers for Windows is often a PITA. However, if you're doing a clean install you should look into DriverPacks. This includes nearly every driver available for Windows XP. I use this with RyanVM Update Packs to integrate all updates, a patched uxtheme.dll, themes that aren't so Fisher Price, replace notepad with Notepad2, etc. Works great.

Just more chaff to uninstall

[idamaybrown]

It will just be more stuff to uninstall along with the AOL trial software, etc.

Re:Because It's not easy to use

[KiahZero]

Draw is wonderful for flowcharts and other diagrams.

Re:Why?

[Richard_at_work]

Its not just the bandwidth, its the entire supportive costs of ensuring the source-binary version sync, ensuring its available, pointing people to the right place et al. Its all a cost that needs to be accounted for.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, he meant he opened his trench coat and flashed the hard drive. The resulting shock scared the data off the drive.

use the AOL marketing approach

[dalesyk]

Instead of trying to persuade Big Business types, just get permission to place TheOpenCD in Walmart, Kroger, Target, etc.

Re:use the AOL marketing approach

[whimmel]

That's not a bad idea. I'd be happy to donate a spool of CD-Rs to the cause. In fact, I'm starting an adult dvd business. It wouldn't cost much of anything to include an OpenOffice CD with the DVDs I ship. haha

Re:Why?

[Richard_at_work]

Actually under the LGPL they cant.

Re:Why?

[shaitand]

MS Office is $200+ depending on what version you purchase and that is more than your average bear wants to pay to type letters. The business case for this is obvious but doesn't factor in to new school thinking.

The doesn't really help dell gain new customers directly. Adding OO is a cheap way to retain happy and loyal customers and generate positive word of mouth. Dell spends millions on marketing and advertising to gain new customers. Having a full featured office suite included with the system goes a long way toward the PC being a complete solution for many customers.

Re:Why?

[jopsen]

That's a joke, right? Seriously, I could not imagine that it would cost Dell anything... Dell does have to offer source, but they may even charge a small fee for it. Source distribution is NOT an issue. And be the way, the average user would never realize that he/she is not using Microsoft Office. Yes, many users would, but I wouldn't be sure if the majority would?

arrogance

[WingedEarth]

Microsoft grows more arrogant and decadent every year. Pretty soon they'll want a separate $1,000 license fee every time Word is loaded from each computer's hard disk into the RAM. It's all in their plan, called The Protocols of the Elders of Microsoft.

Dell has a pretty awful reputation now, with their purely monetary thinking, their horrible, out-sourced customer support, and their exploding batteries. Maybe backing free, non-Microsoft software would be a new beginning for them.

Re:arrogance

[Grishnakh]

Microsoft grows more arrogant and decadent every year. Pretty soon they'll want a separate $1,000 license fee every time Word is loaded from each computer's hard disk into the RAM. It's all in their plan, called The Protocols of the Elders of Microsoft.

Personally, I want MS to become even more arrogant and decadent, and push forward with ridiculous license fees. After all, it'd be good for their shareholders. Think about it: if they started charging $1000 per copy of Windows, and $2000 per copy of Office, their revenue and profits would multiply! The downside is they'd lose a lot of customers, who'd refuse to pay the high prices, and MS's management is composed of such control freaks that they won't want to do this, even though it may be more profitable in the end. The customers who stay with them and pay the exorbitant prices (and there's a lot of people and businesses like this) would more than make up for the defectors.

Eventually, economics would catch up to them and competitors would take over, but for a while they could make out like bandits by totally screwing over all the customers (like corporations and governments) who have bought into them and become locked-in. Then they could take the cash and retire as trillionaires while everyone goes through all the pain of finally migrating to non-MS platforms when they're nearing bankruptcy. Those of us who didn't buy into MS's lock-in path can sit back and laugh the whole time.

Re:Why?

[westlake]

They handle it the same way they handle most technical questions about MS Office: go to the software vendor. Problem solved. No additional work required.

Problem not solved.

Take a look at the MS Office home pages. Tutorials. Case studies. Templates, clip art and tons of other resources. Easy on the eye, polished and professional. Then mouse over to OpenOffice.org.

Back to the Future, circa 1993.

Re:Why?

[kripkenstein]

It's obvious -- Dell makes more money *selling* MS Office then *giving* away OpenOffice.

As mentioned in other threads, this isn't obvious at all. Dell don't need to give OpenOffice away, they can charge for it.

Re:Why?

[shaitand]

If they are distributing the stock openoffice then they can point to existing repositories. They don't need to setup their own or pay for the bandwidth.

'with no measurable increase in revenue'

There would be an increase in revenue but I couldn't begin to imagine how you would measure it. Including a full featured office suite that doesn't carry a ridiculous price tag that is half again the cost of the machine would go a long way toward generating word of mouth and customer retention.

Then again, all advertising vehicles fail to generate a 'measurable' increase in revenue. That doesn't stop Dell from spending millions on other forms of advertising.

Re:Why?

['nother poster]

1. MS office is not shipped free with a dell computer. Open office would be like windows, something dell provides and thus their responsibility.

Utter bullshit. (The second point, not the first.) If you buy a Dell, or a Compaq, or whichever megavendor PC, they all come with 3rd party software and trials for software that disclaim any support from the system vendor.

2. The source is the major cost. Clearly the FTP server is not free, the bandwidth is not free some one needs to reply to the email address. The thus it will cost dell money to include open office with no measurable increase in revenue because of the inclusion of open office. the source requirement in the GLP is the biggest hurdle.

Once again, it's not. Even if the disk space cost $10,000 that is a business expense and written off. Bandwidth costs? Get real. No residential customer will download it. If they do, they will get it from download.openoffice.org more likely than not. Besides a URL on the system that points at openoffice.org would meet the requirement of the GPL if Dell doesn't make source changes, and custom configuration is NOT a source change.

Re:Why?

[manno]

Isn't Dell allowed to charge people for the support? Can't they charge people like $10, or $20 bucks for "preloaded OO.o", option? I would think MS was crazy if they are paying anywhere near $1 per system, but I could be wrong. I say this because I'd think that the number of people that get the 60 day trial, and then pirate MS Office greatly outnumber the people that get the 60 day trial, and then buy MS Office.

An important question is this, how many people are going to stick with the OO.o instal, and not switch to a pirated/legit coppy of MS Office? I'm sure some portion of the people that get OO.o installed on their PC's will stick with it, but I'm also fairly sure from personal, all be it anecdotal, experience that far and away the vast majority of people will see that it's not MS Office, and just get a "free" copy of MS Office from a friend.

The answer to the above question leads to more questions.
1. At the end of the day is the $0.00 preloaded OO.o option worth it to Dell?
If most people just pirate/purchase MSO after tooling around with OO.o, it really isn't worth it for Dell to preload it for free.

2. Is it worth $10-$20 for the consumer to have OO.o preloaded?
This is the same situation as the previous question. If most people just pirate/purchase MSO after tooling around with OO.o, it really isn't worth paying $10-$20 to have Dell install it.

No matter what, preloaded OO.o is going to cost Dell money in kickbacks, and support.
3. With that in mind, if Dell hid the OO.o preload premium from customers would customers see the inclusion of OO.o, as an excuse for Dell systems being slightly more expensive than their competitors?
This last one is very complicated, because Dell has a number of different types of customers, let's just talk about the Home/HOSO, and "bulk" customers. For a single home user, chances are Dell might be able to get away with a "fuzzy" $10-$20 premium, per PC. However a customer that buys multiple systems at a time, and has an MSO license it isn't this worth it, any premium no mater how small multiplied over a large number of systems adds up to real cash. Dell ships its Bulk PC's with MS Windows installed, and the MSO 60 day trials, so for each and every one of those 60 day trials Dell gets an MS kickback. Lets say MS hears about Dell shipping OO.o on any part of its line, and all of the sudden Dell stops getting, or gets a reduced kickback for the 60 day trials. I really should say that calling them kickbacks isn't fair to Dell, or MS. Dell's testing, and installation of the trials should be compensable, and it should be assumed that they(Dell) will get support calls about it. Either on how to remover the software, or how to purchase the upgrade to full MS Office. So With all that in mind Dell's plane non OO.o Bulk PC's would be more expensive than their previous MS subsidized systems, because now MS has eliminated, or reduced the 60 day trial subsidy. This would be a handicap for Dell against its competitors like HP for instance.

There's a lot of players, and a lot of money at stake. It will be interesting to see if anything comes of all the talk.

-manno

Re:Why?

[CrazedWalrus]

Any particular reason they can't just send them to the Open Office ftp site? If they just install the vanilla product, there's nothing to do. Source is available, and probably only patches done by Dell that aren't contributed upstream would have to be made available. Soooo.... where's the problem again?

Re:Why?

[dubbreak]

They CAN charge for OOo and they DON'T HAVE TO SUPPORT IT.

How hard is that for people to get into their heads?! I bet they can eaasily charge as much if not more than what MS pays them to put that 30 day Word trial on there. For Word MS does the support, for OOc guess who would do the support? I'll give you a few hints, not Dell or MS.

Of course reality is that Dell would at best use this as flexing power to get either higher discounts on MS software or to get more $$ per Word trial. I don't think you'll be seeing OO stock on a Dell any time soon.

Re:Why?

['nother poster]

They only have to make their source changes available. If Dell doesn't change the source, which I would bet they wouldn't, all they have to do is point a URL/shortcut to openoffice.org to make the source available as far as I can see.

Re:Why?

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Why?

"You'd Do Well to Woo Dell!"

Re:Why?

[MightyYar]

They zip it up in an archive and treat it just like every other support file on their site. They have a whole system in place to do exactly this with all of their drivers and documentation. I can't imagine how it would be anything but trivial.

More of an issue is why should they? What competitive advantage does this offer them? They can't offer it cheaper than their rivals - it's free! It wouldn't even add to the number when they say "over $1200 worth of software included free". They'd be stuck with support calls for a product that offers them no competitive advantage.

Re:Why?

[aputerguy]

You are missing the point. Microsoft PAYS THEM to include MS Office trial-ware and they probably get the watered-down Works for free as part of the bundle.

If they start including free OO, MS will (actually understandably) pay them LESS since FEWER people will either buy now or later upgrade to MS Office.

Right now the combination of Works (if you don't want to pay) plus MSOffice (if you don't mind paying) probably satisfies MOST people and brings Dell MORE profit.

Dell may be a lot of things but they generally are not stupid -- if they thought that the profits they would gain from selling more PCs or increasing long-term customer loyalty with free OO would outweigh the lost revenue from MS (direct + indirect), then they would do it.

Dell already has the advantage in consumer brand recognition and appeal as the "safe choice" -- other companies are more likely to add OO as a way of differentiating themselves and trying to capture a (small) niche that Dell is missing.

Finally, if the masses really wanted OO, then believe me they would be downloading it. Look at how many non-techies learn how to set up bittorent to save a few bucks on a video or cd -- clearly, if they wanted to, they could certainly learn how to click on their browser to download OO to save $200+

Re:Open Office sucks -- face it.

[pembo13]

Well luckily I hadn't been using MSO all that time, so I don't know nor do I care. So for me, it compares in the area where I care about: I don't have to run Windows to use it.

Re:Why?

[minus_273]

funny i am setting up a dell that came with vista business and it has only google toolbar installed.

Save me work

[codepunk]

I have sent three customers to dell so far this year and in each and every case I have loaded open office and had to uninstall all the crapware....dell make my job easier, it is the least you can do for me sending you new customers.

Re:Why?

[Red Alastor]

No, they have to make the whole source available if they redistribute. You don't even have to publish changes if you don't redistribute the app.

Re:Why?

[Draknor]

They CAN charge for OOo and they DON'T HAVE TO SUPPORT IT.

I agree this will probably not happen, but if it did, can you imagine the sh!tstorm it would raise here on /.??

"OMG Dell is CHARGING for OOo! And not providing any support!?!?!"

As much as I would like to see OOo in more widespread use, I don't think Dell or any other big OEM has a business case for supplying it, so long as they get discounts or bundling deals from Microsoft.

I wouldn't have recommended OO til 2.1

[Maxo-Texas]

I've been noodling with it since .94.

I wasn't happy with it until the last release and it won't be everything I need until 2.3.

The one thing we don't want to do is put out a pile of crap (and .94 and even 1.04 were not up to professional standards folks were used to) that makes people think OO is bad.

As of 2.1, it looks ready to show off to people.

Re:Why?

[AKAImBatman]

No worries, there's an "out" to section 4:

3. You may opt to apply the terms of the ordinary GNU General Public License instead of this License to a given copy of the Library.

Just call it GPLed software and point them to OpenOffice.org. If you get buy-in from the OOo folks ahead of time (which at a guess wouldn't be much of a problem), then Dell would be free and clear in not providing any source code themselves.

The only reason why OOo is LGPLed is to allow for easy linking to its libraries and the creation of commercial packages based on the suite. It's not really a library, so it's a bit silly to apply additional library terms in all cases.

Re:Why?

[j-pimp]

That's a joke, right? Seriously, I could not imagine that it would cost Dell anything... Dell does have to offer source, but they may even charge a small fee for it. Source distribution is NOT an issue. And be the way, the average user would never realize that he/she is not using Microsoft Office. Yes, many users would, but I wouldn't be sure if the majority would?

It may not have direct monetary costs, but there are opportunity costs. Perhaps there are advantages to the corel office relationship.

Also, it would behoove Dell to mirror the source tarballs as opposed to going through the legal hoopla of having to say, "This is our diff to the source, we signed an agreement with OpenOffice.org to be our upstream provider."

In the corporate world everything has costs, mainly due to lawyers and process control.

Re:Why?

[joto]

Last time I heard, Mensa was an organization for people with high IQ. Now, the general idea behind IQ-tests is that it is a way to measure your intelligence, an inborn ability that (at least in theory) cannot be improved. I fail to see how this is different from "not being sufficiently blue blooded (or some other similar BS)".

(Of course IQ-test results can be improved somewhat by education, experience in analytical thinking, and doing lots of similar puzzles as you'll find in the tests. That doesn't mean that IQ is an arbitrary measure, and someone who gets approved by Mensa is still going to be one that is born with far above average intelligence, even though the tests can be fooled to some degree. In no way is membership based on IQ a meritocracy).

Now, I'm not against Mensa as such. If people wants to have organizations that are women only, dwarfs only, swiss only, or high intelligence only, that's their decision. Just don't claim it's a meritocracy.

Re:Why?

['nother poster]

Oooh. vista business. That sounds like the standard consumer build. Well, sarcasm aside, maybe dell stopped putting all that crap on their consumer systems in the last 2.8 years. If so, good on them, but I'm betting you bought a Business Class machine, or whatever they are calling them today.

Re:Why?

[manno]

Yeah MS Works, and the other cheap alternative Dell flirted with, Word Perfect Suite, were both more than capable enough "to type letters". Yet I know people that still pirated/purchased MS Office because it was "the industry standard".

Is OO.o any different?

Including OO.o on Dell systems will cost Dell money, either in kickbacks, or in support. They may "hide" the cost, or offer it as a selection with a $10-$20 premium, but any way you dice it, the cost will be passed onto the consumer. If they hide it, it may cost Dell customers, if they offer it as a $10-$20 option it's in the same boat as MS Works/Word Perfect Suite. People wont select it because they either want "the industry standard", or they can get MS Office for "free".

-manno

Re:Why?

[The Great Pretender]

I have to concur. Why spend the money, i.e. peoples time, when anyone who cares can find it on the web. To be honest OpenOffice would be better putting these resources into a fool-proof downloader and installer for the complete novice and broader advertising. (Please note - I too believe the downloader and installer for OpenOffice works great, I'm talking about one for my 60 year-old mum who's a technaphobe)

StarOffice is more appropriate installation

[kbro]

If Dell were to pre-install StarOffice for a fee (negotiated with Sun), then Sun would handle the support calls.

I bet Sun would find a way to get the price pretty low in order to hurt Microsoft Office sales.

Re:StarOffice is more appropriate installation

[westlake]

I bet Sun would find a way to get the price pretty low in order to hurt Microsoft Office sales.

How many millions - hundreds of millions - has Sun dropped on Star Office and Open Office in an attempt to simply become competitive with Microsoft? How many billions in profit has Microsoft seen from Office in those same years?

Re:Why?

[joto]

Open office would be like windows, something dell provides and thus their responsibility.

Are you trying to tell me that Dell takes responsibility for Windows. Last time I checked, even Microsoft wouldn't take responsibility for that! Look at the EULA...

2. The source is the major cost. Clearly the FTP server is not free, the bandwidth is not free some one needs to reply to the email address.

Look, Dell is huge. Running an FTP-site is something an individual like you and me can afford. In no way it will be a "major cost" for Dell. Also, xxx@dell.com wouldn't have to be an actual person. Ever heard of programs responding to email?

The thus it will cost dell money to include open office with no measurable increase in revenue because of the inclusion of open office.

Good point. The only way for Dell to make money from openoffice, is if it's going to get Dell more customers. By the way, that's why Dell asks what the customers want.

Who tried?

[WetCat]

Was there any attempts in the world to sell computers with preinstalled openoffice? Had they been successful? Any experience with suppoer, etc?

Re:Why?

[nelovishk]

Dell would have to distribute CDs with the source code since OpenOffice is GPL'd

According to the GPL, you might distribute the compiled software if you either a) Accompany it with the source code, b) Give a written offer to get the source code, or c) Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute the source code.

In other words, some text in the package might be enough. No CD is needed.

Re:Why?

[MMC Monster]

Do they even need to do that? If they are distributing an unmodified copy of openoffice.org, can't they just say "source code is available from http://www.openoffice.org/", or something like that?

Considering that Dell already ...

[Nom du Keyboard]

Considering that Dell already loads the latest version of MSOffice on their Dimensions even when you don't order it, and it takes up disc space and nags you to activate it in trial mode, or buy and put in your key, and causes update hassles with your older, legal version of MSOffice that you transfered from your old machine to you new one, hell yes, Dell could afford to include OO on the hard drive.

Re:Why?

[Zonk (troll)]

I just replaced Windows with Gentoo Linux. Worked better. :-) Good.

Frankly I blame Intel for not having standard drivers on their f'ing website anywhere. Intel's site is awful. It's the reason I initially started to use DriverPacks since I couldn't find several drivers anywhere on it. I don't trust the ad infested driver download sites, so those are not an option.

The standard HDA driver works fine in Linux, why can't their be a standard HDA driver for WinXP? Because that would make sense.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the easiest thing to do is to ship a CD-ROM with the source. Every computer I've bought of late has come with a few CD-ROMs, and throwing another one in is cheap and easy. The alternative is to provide a written offer, which is cheap to throw into the package but costs people time if anybody takes Dell up on it, and that's expensive. (The ftp site technique only works if the software is distributed by ftp - read the GPL.)

Furthermore, the GPL requires that the software distributor maintain the source for that exact version for a few years. Much easier to stick another CD-ROM into the box and remove all legal liability permanently.

Obv Answer

[DeadboltX]

"A somewhat obvious question is raised: why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?"

Obvious questions deserve obvious answers:
Because Microsoft pays Dell to put a "Microsoft Office 30-day trial" on their new systems, and Open Office will pay them nothing.

Re:Why?

['nother poster]

Been too many years since I read the GPL. Ok, reread it.

Section 3 is the pertinant section. Ok. So it says you either have to include the software "on a medium customarily used for software interchange" or be required to make the source available "on a medium customarily used for software interchange" at the users request if it is not included, for a nominal fee to cover costs.

Still not sure why Dell couldn't just point them to http://download.openoffice.org/2.1.0/source.html through a desktop link or web redirect, or charge $.10 for a download from their own FTP server to cover costs if the first wasn't legal for whatever reason.

Hell, just put the source on the hard drive since that is Dells "medium customarily used for software interchange" with their customers and be done with it.

Now, I am not a lawyer, but I doubt that many associated with OO.o would have a problem with those options if it meant a few tens of thousands more installs.

I'd like to relate a story

[oni]

about a year ago I had to rebuild my dad's computer due to a HD crash. I put open office on there for him. He has a spreadsheet that he uses to track stocks he owns. A few weeks after I gave the computer to him he calls me to say that his spreadsheet doesn't look right.

Well, I do have Excel on my laptop so I went over there and verified that the spreadsheet rendered exactly the same in both OO and Excel. The issue was that there was some Excel feature that he was looking for under some menu. I can't for the life of me remember what it was. But the thing is, a quick google search confirmed that OO had that same feature. So I showed him how to use it.

But he wasn't happy. He just complained so much about having to learn to click a different menu. So I broke down and installed Excel.

Now here is the best part: he just bought a new laptop and guess what's on it - the new version of Office with the funky menus. But he wont complain about having to relearn THAT, because THAT's microsoft.

God that pisses me off.

Re:I'd like to relate a story

[Grishnakh]

This is a prime example of why you should never perform tech support for family. I hope you charged him plenty for your services.

Normally, I would never charge my parents for any work, but if it was something so totally pointless and stupid as this story I would. "Ok, you want Excel just because the menus are different? Fine, that'll cost $500 for a copy of MS Office and $500 for my time installing it."

Re:I'd like to relate a story

[HouseOfMisterE]

In the OpenOffice.org application, you could have used menu item "Tools > Customize > Menus" to arrange the commands in an order that would work for your dad.

how about StarOffice?

[codemachine]

Wouldn't StarOffice from Sun make a lot more sense in this case? Dell can take a cut of the price, and Sun provides support for the product.

An easy one :)

[Corson]

"why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?"

man, that's easy: imagine you run a hardware company; you want to sell you products and maximize your profit; users want windows (for whatever reasons); you get a deal from m$ for windows if it's pre-installed on the hardware you sell; you want that deal, so you try not to piss m$ off, so you don't event think of ooo; m$ is happy, you are happy, but users don't get to learn ooo. that being said, i have tried switching to ooo twice and was disappointed with missing features such as page numbering or an import filter for wp. also, m$ office has become a de facto standard because we all use at work, therefore it would greatly help if ooo user interface was as similar as possible to the m$ office user interface.

Re:Why?

[mungtor]

Dell probably could point to the OpenOffice source repository only with the prior consent of the OpenOffice group. Otherwise, Dell is "unfairly" causing the OpenOffice group to pay for bandwidth on a product that Dell is redistributing.

Anything else on Dell's part is a sunk cost that they will never recover. Anybody who would want to do anything with the source would get it from OpenOffice.org anyway, or wouldn't be running the Dell distributed version of OOo anyway. It's just more hassle than it's worth for Dell for something that people can download for free anyway.

Re:Why?

[mungtor]

1. Yeah, but no.... They still have people sitting in the call queues, tying up techs, harassing them about why they can't help, etc, etc. Not worth the bother to distribute a free product.

2. I was under the impression that if you were redistributing a GPL'd product you had to provide the source for that product if requested. Dell shouldn't be able to point to the OOo repositories since that forces OOo to pay for the bandwidth on an app that Dell is redistributing. I figured that stamping out CDs would be a cheaper option than anything else. Once again, it could be worked out, but from a business viewpoint it isn't worth the effort.

ShopNBC

[LiENUS]

When I worked for the people they contracted their call center to a few years back they sold computers with OpenOffice.org pre-installed. No idea if they still do but they use to...

Re:I dont like it

[Ambidisastrous]

Meh, I think the letter was intended more for the general public rather than for Dell's eyes. Dell knows about OpenOffice, but it's not clear whether pre-installing OOo would give Dell a competitive edge (by decreasing reliance on MS Works and generating goodwill among certain IT folk) or be an unqualified disaster (via Microsoft's wrath, customer-support hell, etc). The letter sounds like OOo wants journalists, bloggers, curious IT lurkers, and money-conscious PC users to become interested in the issue of Dell supporting and benefiting from open-source software.

The option was always there, but now it's become a slightly more high-profile issue -- if there ever was a time for Joe Power User to start bugging Dell about default software configurations, it's now, in the wake of this IdeaStorm madness.

Personally, I think OOo has huge momentum behind it right now, and the current issue of it sucking a little right now will be resolved during the next year or so. Remember, Mozilla was a disaster for the first few years after Netscape begat it; they built tools like Bugzilla, poked at the remaining components, wept and gnashed their teeth for a couple more years, and then went about creating a framework to make the project feasible for the community to develop. OpenOffice looks to have been in a better shape to begin with, but I see they're going a similar route with UNO and the OpenDocument Toolkit Project -- so OpenOffice 2.x may feel like the bloaty, compatibility-beset Mozilla of yore, but there's a niche for a Firefox equivalent on the horizon.

Re:Why?

[PitaBred]

Works doesn't work with .doc files, and Wordperfect did so clumsily, as compared to OO.o. I've used all 3.

Re:Because It's not easy to use

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Sort of. It doesn't really compete with commercial offerings like visio or smart draw. Its too limited in what it does. But if it does what you want, your in luck.

Re:Never.

[Grishnakh]

In normal business relationships, the customer is king, and the supplier/vendor is beholden to them. When you're the customer, you don't care what your vendor thinks; if the vendor wants your money, they better do whatever it takes to make you happy, or else you'll find a new vendor.

If a business relationship is backwards as you allege, then something is seriously wrong.

A silly question I thought we all knew the answer

[RobertM1968]

"A somewhat obvious question is raised: why isn't OpenOffice already available by default on new PC's and Workstations?"

The answer is money. MS, (Symantec, McAfee, AOL, etc), pay for the "real estate" for their software being preloaded on PCs. This is either with the expectation of generating revenues through sign-ups, subscriptions, "Full Version" purchases, or advertising revenue.

Tell me how that will work with OpenOffice.

That question isnt meant to be funny - I'd love to see two things... current OpenOffice on the Mac (heck, OS/2 has it already) and OpenOffice being the de-facto standard on new PCs. But, in order for that to happen, my question needs to be answered (to the PC Makers)... how can OpenOffice provide $$$ to the PC Makers for each copy installed (instead of lets say.... MS Office)? Ad revenue similar to Opera's method perhaps? I dont know.... but if one of the bright minds here on /. (and I think there must be at least 3 or 4... maybe 5 - of which I am not one ;-) )comes up with a working idea, then OpenOffice has a far likelier chance of being pre-installed on consumer PCs (without it negatively impacting the price of the PC).

Give it some thought gang... smart minds like yours may be the ones that comes up with the solution(s).

Robert

Have you even ever used OO.o??

[kjkeefe]

This comment thread is like finger nails on a chalk board. I bet 85% of the people in here bitching about OO.o not being a good enough office suite to use because it doesn't have feature X or it doesn't look nice have not used OO.o in the last 6 months!

Seriously, go download it and install it RIGHT NOW. It IS well polished and it DOES open M$ Office docs well. I think that the real problem in here is that you folks with diarrhea of the mouth used the BETA version of OO.o and have just assumed that the *now* 2.0 version has not improved on anything. Go try it out. The only part of it that isn't ready for the home or office is the Access replacement, and that's because it is really new.

Re:Have you even ever used OO.o??

[bannerman]

I've used 2.0. It's nice. I recommend it to everyone that I build PCs for. Many of my friends use it. You're the one not being objective here. OO.o works good, but it's not as pretty or polished as the commercial alternatives.

Re:Why?

[beemishboy]

Why go through the hassle with no reward?

I really don't think the OSS community knows what they have in OpenOffice. A free and pretty complete office suite for free - no advertisements or strings or demos or popups or whatever attached. That's pretty cool for home users that just want a simple office system - that's what MS works and AppleWorks was really intended for in the first place. If that's no reward then I'll eat my hat.

Add an OOo value pack branded Dell

[mattr]

Dell could take the initiative and be the first to sell OOo with their computers including Dell-sponsored value added.

They should get their in-house designer or hire a few on the outside to make a bunch of templates and really useful things to use with OOo. I've tried all the invoices etc. and I did find one out of all the chaos and websites, but for ages I have been searching for templates. It's like when you buy a Mac and make your own DVD and then you realize they have these amazing automatic animated DVD templates you can just drop video and photos and music into, but there's only like 1 or 2 decent templates and they are way too hard to make yourself. I can just see everyone using the same darned template over and over (the white mirror one I guess).

They could even make some good PR and offer the OOo community a Dell sponsored folder of templates and other art. And how about something that uses the database for something useful? OOo has tons of potential and someone like Dell could turn it into an empowering center that ties together your whole computer even. Anyway I'd pay money if they provided some good business templates like fax, invoice, letterhead, impress backgrounds, photo frames, and other art. Maybe hire a good coder and make some cool apps to go along with it!

Customer satisfaction or open sourse evangelism

[MMInterface]

Other than trying to promote open source software I don't see how this is really in the customers interst. Anybody who wants OpenOffice can download it themselves for free. The choice is already there for anyone who is interested in it. I much rather install it myself then have Dell put it on there. If anything I would like the option of having a machine with the OS and absolutely no additional applications. I think the real motive is OpenOffice users want to advertise the product to the large community of Dell users who normally wouldn't be exposed to it. Dell does not exist to carry out that agenda. If this was a bunch of Dell customers who don't use open office or Linux and they were making this request it would be totally different. But this is coming from an organized effort of people, many of which aren't even customers, telling Dell to put the software they like on Dell machines so others will be exposed to it. I seriously doubt most Linux or OpenOffice users would rather have Dell configure and install the software for them. That almost defeats the purpose, especially if they are charged for it.

You're not the only one

[paladinwannabe2]

I had the same problems back 2 years ago when I was working on my resume (I'm happily employed now). The TAB spacing is slightly off or the font is slightly off (probably both). For most things it seems to work great, but when you are making some sort of presentation/report/CV it can have problems.

Of course, the same thing can happen when you use different versions of Office, if it bothers to open them at all. I always like to joke OO is more compatible with Office than Office is.

Would...

[inotocracy]

...this be enough to keep them away?

Re:Why?

[Randolpho]

MS Office isn't installed on a new PC by default either.

Actually.... Dell *does* install MS Office on a new PC by default. How do I know? Because I recently bought a Dell. I asked for no productivity software, since I already had a copy of MS Office 2k7. I got Office 2003 pre-installed but disabled, requiring a license code purchased online. Just FYI. Dell is firmly in Microsoftland.

Not that I am of the opinion that that's necessarily a Bad Thing(tm). Although I like the price of OpenOffice.org, I like Office 2007 much much better, and I got it for the same price. Legally, even.

Re:Why?

[PolarXL]

First off, I'd like to note my surprise at the (relative to slashdot) objective comments posted- Typically when given a chance, there's a staggering deluge of "OSS good, Microsoft bad" responses, very articulate but staggeringly biased, and in their attempt to sound intelligent by going with anything not MS, commenters pretty much degenerate to "Mongo Smash!" I completely agree- part of it is that it requires significant resources on Dell's part (support or explanation of lack thereof, distributing CD's, preloading compatible java runtime, manhours spent on streamlining the installation, etc) would be significant, but the return would be quite minimal. I think another part of it, though, is that OpenOffice just isn't as good as MS Office- There are benchmarks all over the web showing staggeringly slow (relative to MS Office apps) execution times for starting the applications, opening, saving, and closing files... Not to mention compatibility with MS Office files isn't anywhere near perfect- just close enough to lull you into a false sense of security until you have to open an important document with complicated formatting, written in MS Word, or MS Powerpoint, or something along those lines. And, while this may sound like a horrible joke, in personal experience, OpenOffice apps just tend to crash more often than MS Office equivalents. Incidentally, while it may sound like it, I'm NOT an OSS hater. I hold Firefox, 7zip, Eclipse, Rails, and some flavors of Linux all very dear to my heart. I'm just saying, credit where credit is due. Sometimes, when comparing products, you should look at the actual software instead of the licenses attached. And Microsoft Office is (I'm putting on my flame retardant suit as I write this) a quality suite of software.

Re:Why?

[killjoe]

"Dell simply doesn't see the business case for distributing and supporting it."

Dell supports MS office?

Re:Why?

[couchslug]

Offering Works could be to gently coerce consumers into buying Office. OpenOffice does none of that.
The question is simply, what does OpenOffice to for Dell that will make more money than their current scheme?

Re:Why?

[johnw]

Gordon Bennet! What a phenomenal amount of fuss about how Dell would make the source available. How many typical Dell customers are going to want the source? Practically none.

All Dell would have to do is set up a titchy ftp/http server (an NSLU2 would do) and stick the source on it. This meets the requirement of making the source available, and if anyone ever actually downloaded it they could go out and buy themselves ice creams.

Anyone work tech support?

[LilGuy]

Seriously.. who are they going to point users to when they can't figure out how to attach their open office spreadsheet into an open office word file? (Sorry I've never used open office so I don't know what the program names are.) Companies like the one I work at support employees at work AND at home, but if you're running non-standard crap at home we won't even attempt to help. If you're running, windows, office, and a few other select softwares (adobe & lotus mainly) we will bend over backwards to help out, as long as it's business related (of course we can't verify that).

I know we're not the only company that does this because I've worked at other companies that do this. Imagine now if people started getting open office installed when they got their new dells... who would be there to guide them thru double clicking their open office template or what-have you? Not us, not dell, not microsoft. And as irritated as such users are, I have to admit that without them I wouldn't have had many of the jobs I've had including this one.

OOo Upgrading

[RealGrouchy]

The competition factor with MSO is obviously the biggest one, however one big problem with OOo is upgrading.

In order to upgrade from one version to the next, you have to delete the old version, then install the new one. On top of that, the dictionary settings (if you managed to get them to work) are wiped if you didn't consciously make the effort to back them up.

This means that if Dell were to pre-install OOo on their computers, if a single more recent release has come out, it actually means more hassle for the user than if one weren't installed.

Firefox has set a good example for how to handle upgrades.

- RG>

Simple - Dell Please read this

[skogs]

I am fairly certain that OpenOffice would allow, if asked, Dell to become an authorized mirror. Simple. Bandwidth is then at least 'partially' paid for by Dell.

Load it on their machines by default. Load windows or whatever they want on the machine as the OS, but give them a full office suite so that they can do something worthwhile without having to pay for that moronic microsoft works program...or worse...pay $150 or more for something so stupid and basic as a functional word processor.

Really, do you think mom and pop want to spend $150 on word/excel/powerpoint combos? Unfortunately most aren't powerpoint rangers and the simple powerpoint viewer would probably be ok.

OO.org is way better...comes with more features than MSOffice...most will again be unused...but at least it is free and works out of the box.

And oh yes....the obvious...Dell could give the source as a download. Hopefully with a big disclaimer that says:"Regular users do not need this."

The Pervasive Answer from The Near-Monopoly

[antispam_ben]

Obvious questions deserve obvious answers:
Because Microsoft pays Dell to put a "Microsoft Office 30-day trial" on their new systems, and Open Office will pay them nothing.

It's more obvious (or perhaps pervasive) than that. Microsoft's agreements have historically kept sellers/resellers from offering competing products if they want to have Microsoft software installed or available. If Dell installed or offered OpenOffice, Dell would quickly only have Linux to offer as an OS. It comes with dealing with a near-monopoly - Microsoft can pretty much set the rules any way it wants.

Re:The Pervasive Answer from The Near-Monopoly

[bslorence]

Don't forget that Dell is a near-monopoly in its own way. I wonder what percentage of Microsoft's OS business comes from Dell sales? If it's significant (and it doesn't have to be that large of a percentage to be economically significant), Microsoft might not want to do something like what you've described.

Re:Why?

[shaitand]

It seems you are the clueless one. Works does NOT come with word. There is an edition of works suite that includes word but it will run you about $150. I did some part time work for a retail store that sold computers. The biggest complaint we had were that there were sales people spreading the same non-sense about word coming with works. These salesmen in other stores (and I suspect a former used car salesmen co-worker) told these people that the computers come with a free copy of works suite (true) and that works suite included word (false). Naturally pissed off customers would come back complaining.

What truly pissed me off is that the customers usually ended up keeping the computers and the salesmen ultimately profited from this deception (whether they believed it or not). Because it was such a commonly spread misconception management would never chastise a salesman who spread that piece of misinformation.

Re:A silly question I thought we all knew the answ

[RobertM1968]

You are correct that this is a possiblity - BUT - it totally bypasses my question - which is how can Dell or any other manufacturer get OpenOffice as the pre-installed Office Suite on a desktop WITHOUT raising the costs of the PCs to the end users.

People dont want to buy a PC for $10 more because it comes with OpenOffice - especially when they "all" think they need MS Office.

Most of the people who come in the door to CompUSA (where I work - at least for now) dont seem to understand, no matter how many times you explain it, that the copy of MS Office on the machine is a 60 day trial and then they have to pay for it. You have no idea how many.

Put the two together and you have people who come in, see a machine with pretty MS Office icons (for a trial version they cannot understand will stop working), THINK they need it because the media force feeds them that idea (and the resellers are PAID to convince them it as well), and see the EXACT SAME machine sans MS Office Trial with Open Office instead - but $10 more expensive - which do you think will get bought 9 out of 10 times?

Keep in mind, computer saavy users would simply forgo buying MS Office at all (unless some job or project required it) and instead opt to DOWNLOAD OpenOffice themselves - to those people it doesnt matter if MS Office or OpenOffice get pre-installed. For the rest of the computer owning/using populace, it needs to be pre-installed. MS Office's market share is where it is for quite a few reasons - but ONE big reason is in 60 days you cant open all those neat documents that you created in your 60 day trial and THINK you need to buy it (as the stores, the media and the nag screen MS Office displays tell you that you must).

So, any other takers? How do we get OpenOffice installable by an OEM with no extra cost incurred by the end-user?

I Just Installed OpenOffice On My Mac

[NeverVotedBush]

And I couldn't be happier. It beats the heck out of the AppleWorks package that came with it and keeps me fully compatible with OpenOffice on my Linux boxes.

Thanks, OpenOffice!

Happy customers?

[SanityInAnarchy]

Is this still a facto for anyone these days? Other than Apple, I guess...

iWork

[SanityInAnarchy]

Why would Apple encourage competition for their own office suite? You may as well ask MS to distribute Ubuntu.

Re:iWork

[falcon5768]

because iWork is not a full feature office suit like Open Office is. Its just a publishing/presentation suit.

Re:iWork

[SanityInAnarchy]

Doesn't mean anything. OpenOffice directly competes with iWork. Specifically, Pages competes pretty directly with Word and OpenOffice Writer, and Keynote competes pretty directly with PowerPoint and OpenOffice Impress.

As it is, the only word processor bundled with OS X is TextEdit, and there is no presentation software bundled. So at that point, a consumer could say "Mail is good enough, I don't need Entourage, but I do need some decent presentation software, and Keynote is better than PowerPoint, so I'll buy iWork." Or they could go through a similar process and end up with Office -- something like "I need Entourage," or "Keynote is great, but I need to save PowerPoint presentations."

Or, of course, they could just say "I don't need any presentation software, and TextEdit is good enough."

OpenOffice would provide one more reason to just stick with bundled software. "I have a full-featured office suite, including Impress. I don't need Keynote; shiny as it is, it's just not worth $80."

Don't get me wrong, I wish they did it. But then again, I also wish they open-sourced iWork, and OS X while they're at it. None of these are going to happen.

Re:Why?

[innocent_white_lamb]

You see wrong.
 
Distributing GPL software doesn't allow you to say, "Just get the source code from that guy over there". You are required to make it available.

Re:Why?

[arose]

Just call it GPLed software and point them to OpenOffice.org.

You can't do that with GPL either.

Re:Why?

[AKAImBatman]

b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange

Dear customer, the source code for OpenOffice can be downloaded at no charge by clicking on http://www.openoffice.org/XXXXX/ooo_2.4.7.tgz. We appreciated your business.

All done.

Re:Why?

[arose]

Keyword: medium.

Re:Why?

[AKAImBatman]

The Internet is a "medium customarily used for software interchange". Especially since the customary medium for obtaining drivers and software updates is now the manufacturer's website.

Re:Why?

[pipingguy]

One small letter change makes all the difference in the following sentence:

It's obvious -- Dell makes more money *selling* MS Office thAn *giving* away OpenOffice.

I know what you meant, though, and I think you're right.

Re:Why?

[billcopc]

I didn't say the poor SMART kid couldn't join Mensa... it's only $60 a year or so. The dumb ones need not apply. I hate to kill your puppy, but Linux is NOT a Windows killer, and OO.o is not an MS Office killer. They're remarkable achievements on their own, but it's kind of like having a poor kid from the ghetto bust his ass up to a decent management role. He might have come a longer way than the trust fun kid from Beverly Hills who went to med school, but that doesn't mean ghetto boy should earn more money and fame than the Doogie Howser twit.

Linux is impressive, but it's still inferior in many ways that matter to the common user. If you want an unaccelerated desktop and your own unique branch of Apache, then Linux is your friend. If you want to download games off of Popcap.com and chat all damn day on MSN Messenger, then you're sticking to Windows, because Linux distros just can't do it. Maybe they will, eventually, but by then the Windows crowd will have moved on to something else, and the open source gang will always be playing catch up.

Here's my opinion: Forget catch-up. Ignore the competition! Come up with something that's better from the ground up. Give people a real reason to switch to Linux other than "it's free and technically superior". Free doesn't fly far in capitalist airspace. Why don't you start telling me "It gets all your stuff done faster, easier, and with less downtime"... That's what I'd like to hear, but at it stands right now it would be lies. It's not faster, it's not easier. More stable.... yeah I guess, although my Windows uptimes would put many of you to shame. It's time to stop whining and start innovating.

Re:Why?

[billcopc]

IQ is great, but it only represents maximum potential. People with stellar IQ (such as myself) can be complete morons (such as myself). I come up with as many dumb ideas as a common rap artist, maybe even more because I just exert the brain more than most people. But when I come up with a good idea, it can be very good.

On the other hand, people with low IQ (pick your favorite example) will probably have great difficulty coming up with great ideas, because they just can't stretch their mind that big, and if they do, it requires significant effort. It's kind of like two machines, one with 64mb of ram, the other with 4 gigs. They can ultimately accomplish the same thing, but if you're doing a multi-table sort across eight million records, the 4 gig machine will do it quickly, while the little one will take a few months while it swaps to hell and back. That said, you can also use the 4 gig machine to play Minesweeper :)

To wrap it all up, I don't believe in Mensa really... it's an interesting concept that forgets to account for human nature and its uncanny ability to ruin everything it touches. However, I do believe that not all humans are created equal, and that maybe we could make hot-dog meat out of the dumb ones before they learn to drive and/or run countries, but that's just my biased opinion as a high-IQ smartass :)