Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] School use of OpenOffice.org
Out of curiousity, how many of you are currently using OpenOffice.org as the main Office Productivity software in your schools and colleges, and are there any major issues popping up about using this software? I'm at Cass Business School in London, and I'm hoping to expand on this to see how the software would fare for businesses and organisations in London. _________________________________________________________________ Stay in touch with absent friends - get MSN Messenger http://www.msn.co.uk/messenger
--- Paul Jensen
Out of curiousity, how many of you are currently using OpenOffice.org as the main Office Productivity software in your schools and colleges, and are there any major issues popping up about using this software?
What kind of issues are you expecting? Are you referring more to compatability with MS-Office? While I am not using it in schools, I have deployed it in University, and I have to say that by and large, the use between the two (OO.o and MS-Office) is really good such that there really is no difference. The only thing I will say for OO.o is that it does require a P500+ (or equivilent) to run, since anything less takes an age to load. -- Thomas Adam ===== "The Linux Weekend Mechanic" -- http://linuxgazette.net "TAG Editor" -- http://linuxgazette.net "<shrug> We'll just save up your sins, Thomas, and punish you for all of them at once when you get better. The experience will probably kill you. :)" -- Benjamin A. Okopnik (Linux Gazette Technical Editor) ____________________________________________________________ Too much spam in your inbox? Yahoo! Mail gives you the best spam protection for FREE! http://uk.mail.yahoo.com
On Thursday 13 May 2004 17:57, Paul Jensen wrote:
Out of curiousity, how many of you are currently using OpenOffice.org as the main Office Productivity software in your schools and colleges, and are there any major issues popping up about using this software?
My school has taken away the LEA service contract for the local primaries (currently 6, soon to be 10) and all of them have a mixture of OO and M$. The network manager tells me that the students there prefer using OO and the staff are rapidly warming to it. The network we offer them is Netware with M$ clients but we are all hoping that it will soon be Netware and KDnetwarEian. As ot us, we have tried it on the network but (so I have been told) it was problematic as far as defining the place on the network to store files or somesuch.
I'm at Cass Business School in London, and I'm hoping to expand on this to see how the software would fare for businesses and organisations in London.
_________________________________________________________________ Stay in touch with absent friends - get MSN Messenger http://www.msn.co.uk/messenger
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Dear all, My company recently installed Star Office into a cambridgeshire school with great success. The only problem that we found is that some LEA's and softwrae "houses" produce "helpful" programs for teachers but only allow it to work with Excel (the macros do not correspond). The school then had to purchase M$ office suite just to get this other program to work. Regards Ian
-----Original Message----- From: Paul Taylor [mailto:ptaylor@uklinux.net] Sent: 13 May 2004 20:44 To: suse-linux-uk-schools@suse.com Subject: Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] School use of OpenOffice.org
On Thursday 13 May 2004 17:57, Paul Jensen wrote:
Out of curiousity, how many of you are currently using OpenOffice.org as the main Office Productivity software in your schools and
colleges, and are > there any major issues popping up about using this software? > My school has taken away the LEA service contract for the local primaries (currently 6, soon to be 10) and all of them have a mixture of OO and M$. The network manager tells me that the students there prefer using OO and the staff are rapidly warming to it. The network we offer them is Netware with M$ clients but we are all hoping that it will soon be Netware and KDnetwarEian. As ot us, we have tried it on the network but (so I have been told) it was problematic as far as defining the place on the network to store files or somesuch. > I'm at Cass Business School in London, and I'm hoping to expand on this to > see how the software would fare for businesses and organisations in London. > > _________________________________________________________________ > Stay in touch with absent friends - get MSN Messenger > http://www.msn.co.uk/messenger
-- De omnibus dubitandum
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Hi, Our experience is that some of the kids don't like OO.o - prefering for no good reason 'Word'. The spreadsheet is as good as that other product - except maybe in the text formatting area. Macros are a problem. The presentation graphics tool is excellent and very easy to learn. The biggest problem is that it is a different vehicle to drive - especially as the menu structure is, by default, more logical - please can someone tell me why MS put page layout in the file menu where it does not belong? The kids keep winging about not being able to find it! The staff also complain because it is different. Again, no good reasons for dislike are ever offered. On the matter of machine speed and memory - the more the better - and even if you are not running LTSP it might be worth considering an application server for OO.o. We successfully use 100MHz clients to run the X session. We also run OO.o on our remaining MS machines - the major advantage of this is that it will sucessfully read file formats from all breeds of MS Office - something that, in my expereince, MS Office fails to do reliably. On the plus side, the performance of OO.o in our MS machines makes the Linux boxes look very fast :-) - as does the comparison between MS IE and the LTSP/Mozilla combination. ===== rgds, Richard Rothwell -------------------------------------------------------------------- rind (n) acronym for 'rind is not defined' ____________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Messenger - Communicate instantly..."Ping" your friends today! Download Messenger Now http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com/download/index.html
--- Richard Rothwell
Our experience is that some of the kids don't like OO.o - prefering for no good reason 'Word'. The
Hehehe, that would be a "I don't like it 'cos it looks different." type of scenario. Kids!
spreadsheet is as good as that other product - except maybe in the text formatting area. Macros are a problem. The presentation graphics tool is excellent and very easy to learn.
The spreadsheet is just as good, if not better than the MS equivilent. While it is not applicable here, the interfaces for other languages (ruby, for instance) and the scripting support for it, surpasses Excel in this instance.
The biggest problem is that it is a different vehicle to drive - especially as the menu structure is, by default, more logical - please can someone tell me why MS put page layout in the file menu where it does not belong? The kids keep winging about not being able to find it!
Having just completed a unit in HCI, I can come to the conclusion that it is a load of horse manure, and things such as menu layouts, and the whole concept of GUIs is nothing more than personal preference.
The staff also complain because it is different. Again, no good reasons for dislike are ever offered.
Give the staff more time to adjust. They will do, eventually.
On the matter of machine speed and memory - the more the better - and even if you are not running LTSP it might be worth considering an application server for OO.o. We successfully use 100MHz clients to run the X session.
That's not so bad for LTSP. -- Thomas Adam ===== "The Linux Weekend Mechanic" -- http://linuxgazette.net "TAG Editor" -- http://linuxgazette.net "<shrug> We'll just save up your sins, Thomas, and punish you for all of them at once when you get better. The experience will probably kill you. :)" -- Benjamin A. Okopnik (Linux Gazette Technical Editor) ____________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Messenger - Communicate instantly..."Ping" your friends today! Download Messenger Now http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com/download/index.html
Ian Great to hear from you again ! Have you tried OpenOffice (freely downloadable and distributable from www.openoffice.org )instead of StarOffice. It is supposed to be compatible with Word, Excel and PowerPoint, but I don't know about the macros. Regards, Grahame ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ REFURBISH AND REUSE IS BETTER THAN RECYCLE Grahame Leon-Smith, Chairman of Trustees Tel +44-1932-874303 Fax +44-1932-874068 FREE COMPUTERS FOR EDUCATION Registered Charity No. 1059116 PLEASE VISIT OUR WEB SITE AT < http://www.free-computers.org> and for further information just send a blank email to: < mailto:free-computers-news-subscribe@yahoogroups.com> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -----Original Message----- From: Ian Birdsey [mailto:ian_birdsey@blackboard-associates.com] Sent: 14 May 2004 08:00 To: Paul Taylor; suse-linux-uk-schools@suse.com Subject: RE: [suse-linux-uk-schools] School use of OpenOffice.org Dear all, My company recently installed Star Office into a cambridgeshire school with great success. The only problem that we found is that some LEA's and softwrae "houses" produce "helpful" programs for teachers but only allow it to work with Excel (the macros do not correspond). The school then had to purchase M$ office suite just to get this other program to work. Regards Ian
-----Original Message----- From: Paul Taylor [mailto:ptaylor@uklinux.net] Sent: 13 May 2004 20:44 To: suse-linux-uk-schools@suse.com Subject: Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] School use of OpenOffice.org
On Thursday 13 May 2004 17:57, Paul Jensen wrote:
Out of curiousity, how many of you are currently using OpenOffice.org as the main Office Productivity software in your schools and
colleges, and are > there any major issues popping up about using this software? > My school has taken away the LEA service contract for the local primaries (currently 6, soon to be 10) and all of them have a mixture of OO and M$. The network manager tells me that the students there prefer using OO and the staff are rapidly warming to it. The network we offer them is Netware with M$ clients but we are all hoping that it will soon be Netware and KDnetwarEian. As ot us, we have tried it on the network but (so I have been told) it was problematic as far as defining the place on the network to store files or somesuch. > I'm at Cass Business School in London, and I'm hoping to expand on this to > see how the software would fare for businesses and organisations in London. > > _________________________________________________________________ > Stay in touch with absent friends - get MSN Messenger > http://www.msn.co.uk/messenger
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participants (6)
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Grahame Leon-Smith＠FreeComputers -
Ian Birdsey -
Paul Jensen -
Paul Taylor -
Richard Rothwell -
Thomas Adam