Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - OpenOffice vs. MSOffice: Cutting Through the FUD

WillyPete · 07-12-2005, 02:26 PM

I think a lot of folks miss the important issues.

Money.

Having worked in a Legal firm, I can tell you that their income is determined mainly by the amount of paperwork done.
These documents are prepared by well trained secretaries and paralegals who have grown up with a certain set of tools. To retrain them is expensive and time consuming.
When you are paying £600 and hour to your lawyer, you don't want them getting used to new software on YOUR time.

Most documents versioning and archiving systems are aimed at MS products, for typical reasons. I don't know enough about OO to claim that there isn't one for it.

Formatting is a big issue, predictably when passing docs back and forth between law firms who have their own strandards and software versions.
After a number of to-and-fros, enough formatting problems arise that the document will corrupt and it's spawned an entire industry of document formatting software that will strip formats and re-jig a ddcument to a companies standards.
Add in that OO is just another such formatting deviation, then it's not surprising all these firms dance to the same tune without being told.

Now, the companies that make money from producing documents, they spawn a reliance on the same software for any other company that wants their money.
The smaller co.s that can't get stockholder money, that's their market and whatever the big boys play with, that's what they want to use too. Remember when someone would call up and ask you to send your Lotus Notes doc in a word or text compatible version and you lost all that hard work with the pretty borders? No wonder everyone jumped ship. It's peer pressure.

And as for keeping their formating under wraps, that's what got them their in the first place. Everyone did the same: Notes, Word Perfect. It's just that now, MS is the only one left that everyone thinks it's a conspiracy.
So a group of well-intentioned people decide to set up standards to avoid this in the future with ideas like xml standards for documents and the evangelists suddenly grab this flag and wave it as evidence that MS is guilty of non-compliance.

That's like you americans telling us brits that we drive on the wrong side of the road.
Our rule comes in from the ancient practise of keeping passing horsemen and pedestrians to your right so that you could draw your sword if they decided to attack. (Most people being right-handed)
Would we be considered non-compliant for keeping with an outdated idea?

07-12-2005, 02:26 PM	#22 (permalink)
WillyPete Addict	I think a lot of folks miss the important issues. Money. Having worked in a Legal firm, I can tell you that their income is determined mainly by the amount of paperwork done. These documents are prepared by well trained secretaries and paralegals who have grown up with a certain set of tools. To retrain them is expensive and time consuming. When you are paying £600 and hour to your lawyer, you don't want them getting used to new software on YOUR time. Most documents versioning and archiving systems are aimed at MS products, for typical reasons. I don't know enough about OO to claim that there isn't one for it. Formatting is a big issue, predictably when passing docs back and forth between law firms who have their own strandards and software versions. After a number of to-and-fros, enough formatting problems arise that the document will corrupt and it's spawned an entire industry of document formatting software that will strip formats and re-jig a ddcument to a companies standards. Add in that OO is just another such formatting deviation, then it's not surprising all these firms dance to the same tune without being told. Now, the companies that make money from producing documents, they spawn a reliance on the same software for any other company that wants their money. The smaller co.s that can't get stockholder money, that's their market and whatever the big boys play with, that's what they want to use too. Remember when someone would call up and ask you to send your Lotus Notes doc in a word or text compatible version and you lost all that hard work with the pretty borders? No wonder everyone jumped ship. It's peer pressure. And as for keeping their formating under wraps, that's what got them their in the first place. Everyone did the same: Notes, Word Perfect. It's just that now, MS is the only one left that everyone thinks it's a conspiracy. So a group of well-intentioned people decide to set up standards to avoid this in the future with ideas like xml standards for documents and the evangelists suddenly grab this flag and wave it as evidence that MS is guilty of non-compliance. That's like you americans telling us brits that we drive on the wrong side of the road. Our rule comes in from the ancient practise of keeping passing horsemen and pedestrians to your right so that you could draw your sword if they decided to attack. (Most people being right-handed) Would we be considered non-compliant for keeping with an outdated idea? Last edited by WillyPete; 07-12-2005 at 02:28 PM..