Hey y’all, today I experienced another push for Linux from our friend Microsoft.
5 minutes ago, I wanted to use the timer app on Windows, so I could manage my work/break schedule, and this fucker showed up.
Yes, that’s a prompt to sign in with a Microsoft account to use the clock. If you close it, it pops up 30s later. Clicking “Don’t sign in” or closing the process responsible for displaying it is useless, and guess what… IT PAUSES THE TIMER WHEN IT SHOWS UP.
I guess this is another thing added to the super long list of things which will eventually make me switch my main workstation to Linux once win10 is discontinued.
/endrant
Hope y’all are having a great day :3
Windows is a platform for Office. Linux is not a supported platform for Office. Most businesses will not migrate their desktops off Windows because they will not migrate their workforce off Office.
Beyond that, Windows is not as important to Microsoft as it used to be. The real money makers are Azure and Office. With Azure, they do not care if you run Linux. They even have their own distro ( Azure Linux — previously CBL Mariner ).
Azure is the future ( even for Office ).
Since Windows is less strategic, Microsoft is looking to milk it as a cash cow while they can. So, Product Management is tasked with finding new ways to monetize it. Data is worth a lot of money. The best way to farm data from users these days is to frame it as security ( or AI ).
Expect a lot more SIngle Sign On. Expect a lot more AI. Expect a lot more cloud integration. Expect all of these to focus on data harvesting.
A bit later, expect “services” for Linux that attempt the same. Like Google on Android. This is harder though as Windows does not have monopoly control over Linux as a platform. I am sure they are having many meetings about how to change that.
Which is so weird, because office is crapware. It’s terrible software. The only reason businesses use it is because other businesses use it. Nobody will switch, because everyone would have to switch. It’s a self-reinforcing tragedy.
If so then all the other offerings are even worse crapware.
In my experience Microsoft Office opens twice as fast reliably than LibreOffice (when I terminate the process responsible for keeping it ready it takes about the same amount of time but it’s no slower importantly).
Microsoft office is simply the best. It’s a fact. It can do tons of things that Libreoffice and OpenOffice cannot. It has tons of advanced features, it’s just a superior office suite.
Comparing LibreOffice to Microsoft Office is like comparing a Lexus SUV with the full package of options installed compared to a basic fleet Ford sedan. Yes both can do very basic things and if you just need to type some things or do very basic spreadsheets then they’re interchangeable.
But ask some slightly advanced things like sortable tables (Excel does easily) and suddenly only MS office can do that and the LibreOffice people tell you to pound sand and use a database which doesn’t make sense for a lot of tasks when you may just be preparing some data for example for a presentation or some quick financial work (I’m talking about stuff for myself, not a professional accountant), etc. Take a look at design options in MS Word compared to LibreOffice writer. Both have title and header styling options but the MS office ones simply look more professional, cleaner, and they have more options you can easily tweak. If I’m presenting a report I absolutely want to do it in MS office because I can make it look neater and nicer with less effort.
Businesses use it because 1) they’re used to using it, it’s a standard among businesses and the public, and it’s maximally compatible with files created by it so interoperability isn’t an issue as long as you too use it, 2) it’s the best. It has more options than others, it can do more things. It has more depth. It has extensive support and documentation and it has good integration between the different pieces of software.
It’s like comparing GIMP to Photoshop. Sorry. I think FOSS is a great philosophy and I hate Microsoft and Adobe as much as anyone but in practice Photoshop is miles and miles beyond GIMP in capabilities. And this is coming from someone who has GIMP installed and not Photoshop (because PS is expensive).
The extended suite of MS office has always been meh. But it doesn’t matter. Word, Excel, PowerPoint all work great and are exceptional tools at the top of their class. Could they be better? Yes. But they don’t have to be the best possible, they just have to be the best compared to other offerings by a country mile and they are if your needs are any more complex than the occasional letter to grandma.
Does that mean I think people should pay for MS Office? Not when there are ways to get it free with no cracking or risk.
Saying that it’s better than FOSS programs isn’t saying much. Software built over 40 years by a trillion dollar company is better than free stuff built by volunteers in their free time? Well that’s not surprising. What is surprising is how awful Microsoft software is considering the resources they’ve thrown at it. It’s not good software. But, no company is going to invest the resources in a competing suite of programs because of the market dominance that Microsoft has. That very same dominance is why they’re fine with releasing things that are just good enough, rather than actually good.
But look at programs where Microsoft wasn’t thoroughly entrenched already. Software like Zoom or Slack is a billion times better than Teams. Teams is the worst piece of shit I’ve ever used. We switched to it a few months ago and it has negatively impacted everyone’s productivity and collaboration. Everyone that has to use it hates it. But C suites make the decisions about what we use, not the people who actually use it, so we’re stuck with this garbage for who knows how long.
Excel is the backbone of so many businesses though!
Could you elaborate on why is it crapware? What should people and buisnesses use instead in your oppinion?
Have you ever used Outlook, or Word, or Teams, or anything by Microsoft that isn’t Excel?
Yes, I used Word and Teams a lot, Access is a piece of shite, that much is for sure