Darkcoffee@sh.itjust.works
on 23 Feb 2025 13:38
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It means it’s time for businesses to figure out how to use LibreOffice
callcc@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 13:46
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Came here to answer this :D surely didn’t read that article
Sunshine@lemmy.ca
on 23 Feb 2025 13:47
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It would save them so much money!
Theoriginalthon@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 14:07
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I forced it on our office over maybe 15 years ago, I’ve finally just about stopped receiving complaints. The vast majority of the push back was document compatibility, but not in the way you think.
The problem was the original document was created by a fucktard or opened by one, so many people don’t know how to correctly format a document using styles, know how to use page breaks, line breaks, etc etc. that’s us recieving documents and creating documents.
To be fair I didn’t initially fully understand this as well, but it literally took me 4 hours to read the manual.
Other problems include Microsoft’s fuckery using a supposedly open standard and allow proprietary code/content within the same open standard.
melroy@kbin.melroy.org
on 23 Feb 2025 14:21
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And don't get me started with special macros and basic code that only works in ms office.
Theoriginalthon@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 14:35
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Databases basically built inside excel 😐
Screen_Shatter@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 14:58
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Or Access, which is the real reason my office will never switch. It’s an ever growing mountain of labor to transfer that to something else
melroy@kbin.melroy.org
on 23 Feb 2025 16:47
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yea who ever things that is a good idea, while we have MariaDB, PostgreSQL and Valkey should be fired.
neon_nova@lemmy.dbzer0.com
on 24 Feb 2025 07:11
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I just don’t know how to use databases like those, so I just use excel for my small business.
melroy@kbin.melroy.org
on 24 Feb 2025 17:02
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Then pick one DB and learn about it. The internet is full of documentation, tutorial, hands-on examples and even youtube videos.
neon_nova@lemmy.dbzer0.com
on 25 Feb 2025 00:00
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I know that I should, and I’m technical enough to understand it. But the point I was making is that many people are not even close to technically proficient to learning it.
I’ve heard it said that Excel is the second best program for everything. DB? Excel. CRM? Excel. Word editor? Browser? Calendar? Doom? Yup, you guessed it.
Just like Outlook, which my users essentialy used as a file storage… Sadly I’m not joking that when the first SSDs came out I had a user who I installed an SSD in his PC just to put his stupid PST files on, because having them on a HDD would cause his Outlook to have a meltdown.
I’m so happy I don’t have end users any more…
AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 16:32
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The number of people who move text around by adding spaces is too damn high!
Theoriginalthon@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 18:09
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Who needs align right when you can just hold the space-bar till it’s there, or if you are a pro tab then space for perfect alignment
Ageroth@reddthat.com
on 23 Feb 2025 18:59
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I have spent the last several weeks re-creating documents like this there were developed and maintained by one guy for 38 years.
There’s a half page drawing done in word that is lines and boxes and text all as text and positioned with spaces and tabs. I think I took a screenshot of it and just made it all one picture
cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de
on 23 Feb 2025 20:24
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Did they learn to type on a typewriter?
gedaliyah@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 14:26
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Or OnlyOffice. It lacks a lot of features but is an easier sell in a lot of cases because of the much more modern interface.
MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone
on 23 Feb 2025 16:15
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Libreoffice with the ribbon interface looks about the same to me.
OnlyOffice is basically an electron browser app IIRC which is why the performance is so poor.
gedaliyah@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 20:00
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It’s a trade-off for sure, but they’re both free/FOSS. So it’s worth test driving both.
I used primarily open office and Libreoffice 10-15 years ago and it was dated then but competitive. Trying it this year left me feeling like it hadn’t gotten much interface work in that time.
I really wish the team would invest in a serious overhaul that’s long overdue. The back end, especially when it comes to huge files, outperforms onlyoffice by a mile. But for me, only office is faster to use because the navigation is so much easier.
chrstph@discuss.tchncs.de
on 24 Feb 2025 19:11
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onlyoffice was on my list, but the privacy rating was a dealbreaker for me.
gedaliyah@lemmy.world
on 24 Feb 2025 19:44
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Wow, that’s super disappointing but not incredibly surprising. The developers don’t seem as transparent as other projects I’ve interacted with.
I always install from their github, which I speculate (assume? hope?) does not include these trackers because they would be visible. Is there any way to reliably find out?
WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works
on 24 Feb 2025 23:26
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app manager can scan the APK for trackers and other program libraries. it won’t work reliably though if the app has been obfuscated
I really don’t like Microsoft, but the two products I think Microsoft got mostly right are Microsoft Office and Visual Studio. I really can’t find comparable products.
Open office and forks feel like Microsoft Office 97. While usable, it takes me twice as long to do things. I would almost prefer to use a LaTeX editor over word. Excel? Idk
From a business perspective, it doesn’t make sense to switch to libre office. W10 support also ends 10/25. It is highly irresponsible for an IT department to continue to use EOL products so they should be changing to W11 and new Microsoft office
For individuals, I mean…. I just installed a W10 VM to give me more time to find a Linux compatible alternative to turbo tax and to use visual studio so idk
Screen_Shatter@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 15:01
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Freetaxusa.com does pretty much what turbo tax does. Federal filing for free, pretty sure they just charge $15 for state. If your taxes are too complex for freetaxusa you probably shouldn’t use turbo tax anyway.
Another vote for Freetaxusa. TurboTax might be marginally easier to use, but it is far more expensive and Intuit is a horrible company. If you hate filing taxes (because of the complexity), that is because Intuit and H&R Block lobby congress to keep things complicated so they can sell you their products.
Xbeam@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 15:07
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To replace TurboTax I reccomend freetaxusa.com.
Works exactly like TurboTax without giving any money to Intuit. Federal filing is free but you do have to pay to file state taxes through them ($14.99). It will ask several times if you want to buy their audit protection but you can just select no and keep going.
So I did consider that before going with the VM. My big issue with that is that it looks like a lot of sensitive information is stored online, whereas TurboTax stores my information on the local machine and only transmits as needed.
Any feedback to the contrary would be appreciated
ParetoOptimalDev@lemmy.today
on 23 Feb 2025 16:33
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Sounds… typical. The last one is really why I don’t like TurboTax to begin with. But I don’t know how to find a tax consultant so… TurboTax it is for me
Darkcoffee@sh.itjust.works
on 23 Feb 2025 15:18
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Visual studio code has vs codium, which is a free and open source alternative. I’ve tested it a bit and it’s really nice! But yeah, not vs
Yeah I tried vscode but it’s just similar enough to vs yet different enough to be frustrating
LPThinker@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 20:15
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If you’re in any of these states:
Alaska
Arizona
California
Connecticut
Florida
Idaho
Illinois
Kansas
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
Oregon
Pennsylvania
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Washington state
Wisconsin
Wyoming
You can use the IRS’ new Direct File service. It’s what we should’ve had ages ago, letting citizens file their taxes directly without a for-profit middle man. There are still a couple of scenarios they don’t support, since it’s still in development and is only in it’s second year of use, but in my experience it’s already competent and helpful.
And, as a bonus, you don’t have to give any money to Intuit/TurboTax to keep lobbying the government to make our tax code as arcane as possible so that people need their services to file taxes.
My experience was with C#. What’s your language and which IDE do you use?
WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works
on 25 Feb 2025 05:16
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nowadays I use Java, Rust, Python, for these I use IDEA, RustRover and Pycharm. but when I used C# and C++, I didn’t like VS, and instead used Reshaper and CLion
There is also only office looks modern behaves almost like Microsoft office.
palordrolap@fedia.io
on 23 Feb 2025 13:57
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I can see a lot of smaller companies (and maybe one or two reasonably big ones) opting for air-gapped networks of old operating systems and older versions of Office. A fool's errand, sure, and for a number of reasons, but it's cheap, and upper management likes cheap.
Stovetop@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 14:16
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Problem for them is under the current subscription model, the apps need to periodically phone home to check the license status or else they cease work.
The alternative is paying Microsoft for an expensive perpetual license of the last set of offline-only apps, which are from 2021.
ramble81@lemm.ee
on 23 Feb 2025 16:07
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I mean has a word processor really changed much since 2021?
Stovetop@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 16:31
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I think the question is more “Will Microsoft ever make an offline release again?”
I’d say yes given that Office 2024 (perpetual) and the LTSC versions have already been released. Trying to find the FAQ again where they said they reconsidered and will still release perpetual offfline versions.
MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone
on 23 Feb 2025 16:17
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At that point I’d just use one of the tools to bypass checks. Would still have legitimate licenses and everything.
MonkderVierte@lemmy.ml
on 23 Feb 2025 14:06
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But all of that is just delaying the inevitable. Sooner or later, you’ll have to move to Windows 11 if you want to keep your PC secure and protected and reliably run the applications you need, including Office.
Lol, no.
PattyMcB@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 14:31
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I wonder if this also means that specialty license of 10 that isn’t stopping support. I was considering using that before going to 11. The name escapes me of what it was, though.
venotic@kbin.melroy.org
on 23 Feb 2025 18:02
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laughs in Office 2007 and laughs even harder in LibreOffice
SavageCoconut@lemmy.world
on 24 Feb 2025 17:58
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I still install Office 2007 in older machines. It may not have the newest features but still does the job and it’s enough for most people.
Also, laughs harder-er in Google Workspace 😂😂😂
WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works
on 24 Feb 2025 23:20
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google workspace? why would you upload your (and others?) documents to google? that’s no better than microsoftcs online office
qwestjest78@lemmy.ca
on 23 Feb 2025 18:46
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Oh no, we’ll have to use something other than terrible, AI ridden MS office? How terrible
shellington@lemmings.world
on 23 Feb 2025 18:59
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LibreOffice FTW screw Microshaft!
kepix@lemmy.world
on 23 Feb 2025 20:51
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365 is not equals office ltsc. fuck off with the clickbait titles.
Octagon9561@lemmy.ml
on 24 Feb 2025 01:36
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What if you pay for ESU?
Kng@feddit.rocks
on 24 Feb 2025 07:34
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Windows 10 will become unsupported but I still anticipate it working fine even without updates. I suspect office will work the same on existing machines.
You can safely use Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC or Windows 10 IoT LTSC perfectly safely until 2032–as that’s when the LTSC will stop receiving updates.
But the versions will always work. They simply won’t be protected against new threats or bugs.
r_deckard@lemmy.world
on 25 Feb 2025 06:05
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You will continue to receive Windows Defender updates. I have a Windows 8.1 tablet that keeps updating Microsoft Defender antivirus. It’s only used to connect to RTSP streams for music.
LovableSidekick@lemmy.world
on 24 Feb 2025 19:46
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To me it means letting people know that Mint is free and comes with Libre Office, also free.
threaded - newest
It means it’s time for businesses to figure out how to use LibreOffice
Came here to answer this :D surely didn’t read that article
It would save them so much money!
I forced it on our office over maybe 15 years ago, I’ve finally just about stopped receiving complaints. The vast majority of the push back was document compatibility, but not in the way you think. The problem was the original document was created by a fucktard or opened by one, so many people don’t know how to correctly format a document using styles, know how to use page breaks, line breaks, etc etc. that’s us recieving documents and creating documents. To be fair I didn’t initially fully understand this as well, but it literally took me 4 hours to read the manual.
Other problems include Microsoft’s fuckery using a supposedly open standard and allow proprietary code/content within the same open standard.
And don't get me started with special macros and basic code that only works in ms office.
Databases basically built inside excel 😐
Or Access, which is the real reason my office will never switch. It’s an ever growing mountain of labor to transfer that to something else
yea who ever things that is a good idea, while we have MariaDB, PostgreSQL and Valkey should be fired.
I just don’t know how to use databases like those, so I just use excel for my small business.
Then pick one DB and learn about it. The internet is full of documentation, tutorial, hands-on examples and even youtube videos.
I know that I should, and I’m technical enough to understand it. But the point I was making is that many people are not even close to technically proficient to learning it.
I’ve heard it said that Excel is the second best program for everything. DB? Excel. CRM? Excel. Word editor? Browser? Calendar? Doom? Yup, you guessed it.
Just like Outlook, which my users essentialy used as a file storage… Sadly I’m not joking that when the first SSDs came out I had a user who I installed an SSD in his PC just to put his stupid PST files on, because having them on a HDD would cause his Outlook to have a meltdown.
I’m so happy I don’t have end users any more…
The number of people who move text around by adding spaces is too damn high!
Who needs align right when you can just hold the space-bar till it’s there, or if you are a pro tab then space for perfect alignment
I have spent the last several weeks re-creating documents like this there were developed and maintained by one guy for 38 years.
There’s a half page drawing done in word that is lines and boxes and text all as text and positioned with spaces and tabs. I think I took a screenshot of it and just made it all one picture
Did they learn to type on a typewriter?
Or OnlyOffice. It lacks a lot of features but is an easier sell in a lot of cases because of the much more modern interface.
Libreoffice with the ribbon interface looks about the same to me.
OnlyOffice is basically an electron browser app IIRC which is why the performance is so poor.
It’s a trade-off for sure, but they’re both free/FOSS. So it’s worth test driving both.
I used primarily open office and Libreoffice 10-15 years ago and it was dated then but competitive. Trying it this year left me feeling like it hadn’t gotten much interface work in that time.
I really wish the team would invest in a serious overhaul that’s long overdue. The back end, especially when it comes to huge files, outperforms onlyoffice by a mile. But for me, only office is faster to use because the navigation is so much easier.
onlyoffice was on my list, but the privacy rating was a dealbreaker for me.
Wow, that’s super disappointing but not incredibly surprising. The developers don’t seem as transparent as other projects I’ve interacted with.
I always install from their github, which I speculate (assume? hope?) does not include these trackers because they would be visible. Is there any way to reliably find out?
app manager can scan the APK for trackers and other program libraries. it won’t work reliably though if the app has been obfuscated
f-droid.org/…/io.github.muntashirakon.AppManager
just read that the company behind only office seems to be linked to/owned by a russian company (new comminication technologies)
I really don’t like Microsoft, but the two products I think Microsoft got mostly right are Microsoft Office and Visual Studio. I really can’t find comparable products.
Open office and forks feel like Microsoft Office 97. While usable, it takes me twice as long to do things. I would almost prefer to use a LaTeX editor over word. Excel? Idk
From a business perspective, it doesn’t make sense to switch to libre office. W10 support also ends 10/25. It is highly irresponsible for an IT department to continue to use EOL products so they should be changing to W11 and new Microsoft office
For individuals, I mean…. I just installed a W10 VM to give me more time to find a Linux compatible alternative to turbo tax and to use visual studio so idk
Freetaxusa.com does pretty much what turbo tax does. Federal filing for free, pretty sure they just charge $15 for state. If your taxes are too complex for freetaxusa you probably shouldn’t use turbo tax anyway.
Another vote for Freetaxusa. TurboTax might be marginally easier to use, but it is far more expensive and Intuit is a horrible company. If you hate filing taxes (because of the complexity), that is because Intuit and H&R Block lobby congress to keep things complicated so they can sell you their products.
To replace TurboTax I reccomend freetaxusa.com.
Works exactly like TurboTax without giving any money to Intuit. Federal filing is free but you do have to pay to file state taxes through them ($14.99). It will ask several times if you want to buy their audit protection but you can just select no and keep going.
So I did consider that before going with the VM. My big issue with that is that it looks like a lot of sensitive information is stored online, whereas TurboTax stores my information on the local machine and only transmits as needed.
Any feedback to the contrary would be appreciated
You shouldn’t trust TurboTax so much.
washingtonpost.com/…/turbotax-privacy-tax-return-…
They also keep trying to trick you into giving consent:
moneytalksnews.com/are-turbotax-and-hr-block-shar…
They also lobby to keep taxes complex.
propublica.org/…/inside-turbotax-20-year-fight-to…
Sounds… typical. The last one is really why I don’t like TurboTax to begin with. But I don’t know how to find a tax consultant so… TurboTax it is for me
Visual studio code has vs codium, which is a free and open source alternative. I’ve tested it a bit and it’s really nice! But yeah, not vs
Yeah I tried vscode but it’s just similar enough to vs yet different enough to be frustrating
If you’re in any of these states:
You can use the IRS’ new Direct File service. It’s what we should’ve had ages ago, letting citizens file their taxes directly without a for-profit middle man. There are still a couple of scenarios they don’t support, since it’s still in development and is only in it’s second year of use, but in my experience it’s already competent and helpful.
And, as a bonus, you don’t have to give any money to Intuit/TurboTax to keep lobbying the government to make our tax code as arcane as possible so that people need their services to file taxes.
Apparently my state is lagging behind the times
OneNote is honestly a really awesome product as well. Especially for use with a pen.
I hate every minute I need to use VS. Jetbrains IDEs work infinitely better for me
My experience was with C#. What’s your language and which IDE do you use?
nowadays I use Java, Rust, Python, for these I use IDEA, RustRover and Pycharm. but when I used C# and C++, I didn’t like VS, and instead used Reshaper and CLion
There is also only office looks modern behaves almost like Microsoft office.
I can see a lot of smaller companies (and maybe one or two reasonably big ones) opting for air-gapped networks of old operating systems and older versions of Office. A fool's errand, sure, and for a number of reasons, but it's cheap, and upper management likes cheap.
Problem for them is under the current subscription model, the apps need to periodically phone home to check the license status or else they cease work.
The alternative is paying Microsoft for an expensive perpetual license of the last set of offline-only apps, which are from 2021.
I mean has a word processor really changed much since 2021?
I think the question is more “Will Microsoft ever make an offline release again?”
I’d say yes given that Office 2024 (perpetual) and the LTSC versions have already been released. Trying to find the FAQ again where they said they reconsidered and will still release perpetual offfline versions.
At that point I’d just use one of the tools to bypass checks. Would still have legitimate licenses and everything.
Lol, no.
I’ll keep on using Google docs like I do now. BAM
You have the same options you always had. Upgrade to Windows 11, switch to Apple, switch to *nix.
I just nuked windows off my last computer and went pure Linux.
Fuck windows for doing that; I unintentionally switched to MacOS
I wonder if this also means that specialty license of 10 that isn’t stopping support. I was considering using that before going to 11. The name escapes me of what it was, though.
laughs in Office 2007 and laughs even harder in LibreOffice
I still install Office 2007 in older machines. It may not have the newest features but still does the job and it’s enough for most people.
Also, laughs harder-er in Google Workspace 😂😂😂
google workspace? why would you upload your (and others?) documents to google? that’s no better than microsoftcs online office
Oh no, we’ll have to use something other than terrible, AI ridden MS office? How terrible
LibreOffice FTW screw Microshaft!
365 is not equals office ltsc. fuck off with the clickbait titles.
What if you pay for ESU?
Windows 10 will become unsupported but I still anticipate it working fine even without updates. I suspect office will work the same on existing machines.
You can safely use Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC or Windows 10 IoT LTSC perfectly safely until 2032–as that’s when the LTSC will stop receiving updates.
But the versions will always work. They simply won’t be protected against new threats or bugs.
You will continue to receive Windows Defender updates. I have a Windows 8.1 tablet that keeps updating Microsoft Defender antivirus. It’s only used to connect to RTSP streams for music.
To me it means letting people know that Mint is free and comes with Libre Office, also free.
LibreOffice works on MacOS too!
Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC and/or Windows 10 IoT LTSC end of life: 2032.
We good.
Office is not supported on those platforms at all so won’t make a difference to your support.