Mailinglist Archive: opensuse (3506 mails)

["Jeff Rollin" <jeff.rollin@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 05/09/06, John E. Perry <j.e.perry@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> suse@xxxxxx wrote:
> >
> > Personally, I don't buy the claim.  Windows is MS's cash cow, porting
> > their apps to linux at this point seems backwards to me.  But then, it's
> > MS, so who knows what goes on through those greedy little minds?
> >
>
> Bear in mind that they ported Office to the Mac, thus killing a couple
> of good suites that had been keeping Mac users happy.  Why not try the
> same with linux?


Is it me, or have they taken steps to make sure that  the Mac version of
Office is not as capable as the Windows version? And haven't they done this
just when it looks like Mac market share might creep up to nearer 10%?

Also, since to run Mac OS and compatible software you (still!) have to
purchase Apple hardware, arguably they aren't in exactly the same market.
Linux and Windows, by comparison, both run on generic x86 hardware (and any
hardware the developers choose to port them to).

Someone said MS Office was an enterprise-class suite.  My experience has
> been that it had several defects that would have kept me from using it
> except that it was required by the suits at my employers.  It's full of
> features, some nice, but also bugs, some irritating.  And, of course,
> until Word 97, you couldn't stop buying new versions because they broke
> your old documents unless you used the converters, which _usually_
> worked ok, with only a bit of repair needed.  But all the other suits
> were "upgrading", so yours had to...


<holds head in shame> Twas I. Anyway, the fact that enterprises use it a lot
more than anything else is probably nearer the mark.

I wonder why MS stopped making new versions incompatible with old versions?


Good question.

Jeff Rollin

Proud Linux user since 1998