Indeed. StarOffice/OpenOffice is useless in real life office work, because it does not export/import Word or Excel files 100% reliably.
Gaaaaa! I really hate it when people say that! As long as we say that the Office format is THE standard and the only acceptable way to transfer documents, Microsoft has won!
Because of its closed nature, it's unlikely that any competitor will ever do MSO files perfectly.
But there's NOTHING saying we can't try to make the OOo format the standard! In fact, I believe that will happen. Governments and companies simply need to DECIDE that an open file format is to their advantage (and it really is, for many reasons), and start switching to OOo for internal use. Then, as other entities decide the same thing, they will be able to use OOo for more and more communication. Eventually, MS Office will have to deal with OOo formats. Then WE have won!
In fact, it's somewhat amusing that MSO does not do OOo formats now. Back in the early 90s, there was a huge race among office suite providers to be compatible with each others' file formats. Now that MS has a virtual monopoly, it would HURT them to include OOo file format compatibility, so they probably won't do it until they have to.
What are you going to do if a nasty exploit was found in, say, glibc?
You should be compiling stuff like Apache from source anyway, so that's no problem. But if it's a big monster system-critical package like glibc, you'll have to get the SRPM, patch it yourself, and build another RPM. It can be done, but it might take a few hours of work when all is said and done.
Of course, unofficial support might continue, by community members releasing fixed SRPMs. But do you want to count on that?
Co-location is OK for some people, but overkill for most, as I found out.
I had a colocated box for the last two years but just gave it up in favor of a virtual server from 65535.net. Costs about a third of my colo, does everything I need, and you don't have to worry about being responsible for the physical hardware.
Extra disk space is $3/GIG per month IIRC. Not bad.
Re:Mostly compatible, but...
on
GCC 3.3 Released
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Is there any reason NOT to declare i386 support dead? No one is going to compile newer software for a 386 (bloat, etc) and older compilers work fine for older software.
In my view, filters are NOT an acceptable long term solution. The spam is still getting sent. Mail servers still have to deal with it. Parts of the world with low bandwidth and high costs will still pay MONEY for it directly (and the rest of us will still do so indirectly).
Why would Bill want to buy Lindows? He won't be able to stop desktop Linux by buying one company. There's also Xandros and Lycoris, and to a lesser extent Mandrake and Red Hat. He'd have to buy all those and more to stop even the existing players from selling desktop Linux.
Then there's ArkLinux, which is probably where the *real* future of Linux on the desktop lies. And it's an open source community project, so it can't be bought!
Actually, if it's a single Hotmail address they're using, it should be easy to simply get MS to shut the address OFF! Then all their work is for nothing!
But like a previous reply said, reporting to the FBI might also be a good idea.
Actually I can see a real case of possible confusion. You know when you have PHP scripts and they hit a DB error, it will say something like "$whatever is not a valid PostgreSQL result identifier."
Replace PostgreSQL with Firebird.
Now recall that the application the user is using when he sees this is a web browser.
It's very, very possible that people will occasionally see messages about "Firebird errors" on a web page... when it actually refers to the backend database!
Also, while it's true they are two completely different applications, they are both software that you run on your computer.
Right. What will you expect to happen when you type
rpm -qi firebird
? What will
/usr/bin/firebird
do? Which project would you expect to find when searching for Firebird?
The Mozilla people are probably legally OK, but they made a HUGE mistake here, and for the interests of the Open Source community as a whole, need to admit their error and fix it.
Considering how many Federal charges could be brought against him, I would guess he would never come anywhere near the FBI, FTC and FDA offices.
Actually, "penis enhancement" products are TOTALLY unregulated in the USA. You could take whatever powdery substance you can find, get it encapsulated in a "pill", sell it as a "penile enhancement", and you would not be committing any crime!
Interesting. I *am* using Red Hat 8, and *sometimes* I may have experienced your text-erase thing. I think that might only happen when Mozilla is unusually busy, like with an intensive Flash animation or something.
As others have mentioned, Ctrl+PgUp/PgDn cycles through the tabs.
But often when I press those, or Ctrl-T to open a new tab, it often does the action more than once. Sometimes up to five times!
Like, I'll press Ctrl-T and up to five new tabs will open. Or, if I have 4 tabs open, and I press Ctrl-PgUp, it will cycle through ALL of them and go back to where I started!
It seems quite random. Sometimes it will correctly only do it once. Sometimes twice.
It has happened at least since Moz 1.2, and maybe earlier, and also in Phoenix.
And those two operations are the ONLY keys that do anything like that. Even Ctrl-W (close a tab) has never registered more than once (thank goodness!!!).
> It's already being developed...http://www.koffice.org/kexi/
Huh, cool, I wasn't aware of that. If this CQL++ does roughly what the Access engine does and can be seamlessly integrated into Kexi, that could indeed fit the bill!
...when and only when a couple appropriate neurons spark inside the skull of an appropriate entrepreneurial computer manufacturer and he/it/they start producing a "ready to go Linux system" which comes with all the software people will likely need and markets the heck out of it.
As long as people have to choose to wipe 'Doze of their box and fiddle with Linux CDs, and getting everything to work right, there won't be much incentive for it to happen. But when a consumer-savvy manufacturer steps in, makes it all just work, provides decent hardware and decent tech support, and sells it all for less than an equivelant 'Doze system, we'll be getting somewhere!
Maybe someone will cut out all the source code for open office except for the word processor, and complie THAT puppy. Then do the same for the spreadsheet... bam, smaller programs that load in a reasonable amount of time.
That might help some, but then you'd lose the integration.
Also, I don't believe OOo loads all the modules when you start it. Most of the functionality is in dynamically loaded shared libraries.
Overall, if small and light is what you want/need, I'd say use AbiWord and Gnumeric. Maybe KOffice.
I do it with PostgreSQL under Red Hat 8, and it isn't hard at all.
The problem is, it really isn't the same thing as Access. Access is nice for small personal databases because you have the entire DB crammed into one nice little portable package. You can take the file and open it in anyone's Access, and it will work.
Postgres certainly has a far more powerful DB engine than Access, but you don't have the file portability. It would be truly great if someone worked up a real Open Source equivalant to Access.
When someone cuts-and-pastes the entire freeking article into a post, it is a copyright violation and REDUNDANT. NOT informative, interesting, or insightful. Please mod accordingly!
I can't believe that post got 5 "up" mods. Please use your points for people who have something to say!
Metamoderators: please check this kind of thing as Unfair.
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Indeed. StarOffice/OpenOffice is useless in real life office work, because it does not export/import Word or Excel files 100% reliably.
Gaaaaa! I really hate it when people say that! As long as we say that the Office format is THE standard and the only acceptable way to transfer documents, Microsoft has won!
Because of its closed nature, it's unlikely that any competitor will ever do MSO files perfectly.
But there's NOTHING saying we can't try to make the OOo format the standard! In fact, I believe that will happen. Governments and companies simply need to DECIDE that an open file format is to their advantage (and it really is, for many reasons), and start switching to OOo for internal use. Then, as other entities decide the same thing, they will be able to use OOo for more and more communication. Eventually, MS Office will have to deal with OOo formats. Then WE have won!
In fact, it's somewhat amusing that MSO does not do OOo formats now. Back in the early 90s, there was a huge race among office suite providers to be compatible with each others' file formats. Now that MS has a virtual monopoly, it would HURT them to include OOo file format compatibility, so they probably won't do it until they have to.
What are you going to do if a nasty exploit was found in, say, glibc?
You should be compiling stuff like Apache from source anyway, so that's no problem. But if it's a big monster system-critical package like glibc, you'll have to get the SRPM, patch it yourself, and build another RPM. It can be done, but it might take a few hours of work when all is said and done.
Of course, unofficial support might continue, by community members releasing fixed SRPMs. But do you want to count on that?
Wait, I don't think brokerages make their money on the spread. They make money on COMMISSION.
> Actually Bill Gates used to own almost 50% as AFAIR.
You sure about that? IIRC he held about 19% several years ago. Or are you talking like in 1987 just after it went public?
Their high end Linux server is hosted in the US (San Diego I think, but could be wrong). That's what I have.
Yeah they're somewhat new. It's been good so far. We'll see how it goes!
Co-location is OK for some people, but overkill for most, as I found out.
I had a colocated box for the last two years but just gave it up in favor of a virtual server from 65535.net. Costs about a third of my colo, does everything I need, and you don't have to worry about being responsible for the physical hardware.
Extra disk space is $3/GIG per month IIRC. Not bad.
Is there any reason NOT to declare i386 support dead? No one is going to compile newer software for a 386 (bloat, etc) and older compilers work fine for older software.
In my view, filters are NOT an acceptable long term solution. The spam is still getting sent. Mail servers still have to deal with it. Parts of the world with low bandwidth and high costs will still pay MONEY for it directly (and the rest of us will still do so indirectly).
Yes, SMTP needs to be replaced.
Why would Bill want to buy Lindows? He won't be able to stop desktop Linux by buying one company. There's also Xandros and Lycoris, and to a lesser extent Mandrake and Red Hat. He'd have to buy all those and more to stop even the existing players from selling desktop Linux.
Then there's ArkLinux, which is probably where the *real* future of Linux on the desktop lies. And it's an open source community project, so it can't be bought!
Actually, if it's a single Hotmail address they're using, it should be easy to simply get MS to shut the address OFF! Then all their work is for nothing!
But like a previous reply said, reporting to the FBI might also be a good idea.
... the freeking thing. I've been waiting for the next stable release to switch to it full time. It's always "any day now".
:)
Yes, I hope they change the name, but I'll take it however I can get it.
Actually I can see a real case of possible confusion. You know when you have PHP scripts and they hit a DB error, it will say something like "$whatever is not a valid PostgreSQL result identifier."
... when it actually refers to the backend database!
Replace PostgreSQL with Firebird.
Now recall that the application the user is using when he sees this is a web browser.
It's very, very possible that people will occasionally see messages about "Firebird errors" on a web page
Right. What will you expect to happen when you type ? What will do? Which project would you expect to find when searching for Firebird?
The Mozilla people are probably legally OK, but they made a HUGE mistake here, and for the interests of the Open Source community as a whole, need to admit their error and fix it.
Considering how many Federal charges could be brought against him, I would guess he would never come anywhere near the FBI, FTC and FDA offices.
Actually, "penis enhancement" products are TOTALLY unregulated in the USA. You could take whatever powdery substance you can find, get it encapsulated in a "pill", sell it as a "penile enhancement", and you would not be committing any crime!
Sorry, I'd have to agree with grandparent. Two reasonably well known open source products should NOT have the same name. Lame, lame, lame.
:)
I'll still use it though!
> And remember, 100 USD monthly in India ~ 3-4000 USD monthly in USA.
On average, maybe, but not for the people who will be buying this.
Haven't seen it happen on RH9 ... yet.
:) I planned to do so, but I tweaked my RH8 so much I'm afraid an upgrade would screw me up.
Cool, maybe that's the excuse I need to upgrade.
Interesting. I *am* using Red Hat 8, and *sometimes* I may have experienced your text-erase thing. I think that might only happen when Mozilla is unusually busy, like with an intensive Flash animation or something.
As others have mentioned, Ctrl+PgUp/PgDn cycles through the tabs.
But often when I press those, or Ctrl-T to open a new tab, it often does the action more than once. Sometimes up to five times!
Like, I'll press Ctrl-T and up to five new tabs will open. Or, if I have 4 tabs open, and I press Ctrl-PgUp, it will cycle through ALL of them and go back to where I started!
It seems quite random. Sometimes it will correctly only do it once. Sometimes twice.
It has happened at least since Moz 1.2, and maybe earlier, and also in Phoenix.
And those two operations are the ONLY keys that do anything like that. Even Ctrl-W (close a tab) has never registered more than once (thank goodness!!!).
> It's already being developed...http://www.koffice.org/kexi/
Huh, cool, I wasn't aware of that. If this CQL++ does roughly what the Access engine does and can be seamlessly integrated into Kexi, that could indeed fit the bill!
...when and only when a couple appropriate neurons spark inside the skull of an appropriate entrepreneurial computer manufacturer and he/it/they start producing a "ready to go Linux system" which comes with all the software people will likely need and markets the heck out of it.
As long as people have to choose to wipe 'Doze of their box and fiddle with Linux CDs, and getting everything to work right, there won't be much incentive for it to happen. But when a consumer-savvy manufacturer steps in, makes it all just work, provides decent hardware and decent tech support, and sells it all for less than an equivelant 'Doze system, we'll be getting somewhere!
I have written up a Proposal for such a system. Come on computer manufacturers, listen up!
ok, true.
But due to the architecture of OOo, I think it would be a LOT more difficult than it was for Mozilla. Could be wrong though.
Maybe someone will cut out all the source code for open office except for the word processor, and complie THAT puppy. Then do the same for the spreadsheet... bam, smaller programs that load in a reasonable amount of time.
That might help some, but then you'd lose the integration.
Also, I don't believe OOo loads all the modules when you start it. Most of the functionality is in dynamically loaded shared libraries.
Overall, if small and light is what you want/need, I'd say use AbiWord and Gnumeric. Maybe KOffice.
I do it with PostgreSQL under Red Hat 8, and it isn't hard at all.
The problem is, it really isn't the same thing as Access. Access is nice for small personal databases because you have the entire DB crammed into one nice little portable package. You can take the file and open it in anyone's Access, and it will work.
Postgres certainly has a far more powerful DB engine than Access, but you don't have the file portability. It would be truly great if someone worked up a real Open Source equivalant to Access.
When someone cuts-and-pastes the entire freeking article into a post, it is a copyright violation and REDUNDANT. NOT informative, interesting, or insightful. Please mod accordingly!
I can't believe that post got 5 "up" mods. Please use your points for people who have something to say!
Metamoderators: please check this kind of thing as Unfair.