Comment of the Day October 5, 2005 - Do for Linux what you did for Mac

For them to keep ignoring us.

Maybe the Linux Community will go away. Maybe people will simply keep using the most insecure operating system in history...

I keep running into people I wouldn't suspect of switching, and they're switched -- it's slowly happening, in other words.

The more Microsoft keeps their "crown jewels" hugged tightly to their chest, the more people feel squoze toward Linux.

I must confess to being a bit puzzled by the persistent "Microsoft Office On Linux" rumors, desires, whatever.

If you really have to use MS Office, use Windows. If you want to use Linux, but OpenOffice just won't do, for whatever reason, use Crossover.

If Crossover doesn't work quite well enough (and it is ***FAR*** from perfect), does anyone really expect that MS's own version of Office for Linux is going to be any better? If so, you should think again. Even if they really wanted to, MS could never make Office work as well on Linux as it does on Windows. If they did want it to work as well, they would have to be ready to invest a large extra dollop of resources. And if and when they do a port, you can bet that they *won't* want it to work as well.

Office on Linux is cancer. ;-)

I gotta go with you on this. I DO own crossover and DO have MS office xp installed. I rarely use it anymore. Once I learned how to install and utilize the zillion templates available for OpenOffice (mainly for invoices) I had almost forgot about it until I read this.

Your analogy to cancer is good...Once ANY native MS app gets into Linux, we're screwed. Many tout the "Linux Lab" running at Redmond as MS trying to coexist with us. Their looking for weaknesses folks...someway to comprimise the Linux system. And no, I don't see flying saucers out my back door or think outrageous thoughts about the grassy knoll. I have simply seen MS exploit every weakness it could in their competitors.

they are taking us apart to see how to break us. Co-opting windows software into Linux would be the first step.

I don't think they're ignoring Linux. I think they're building a stack of patents that they can use to disrupt Linux and Open Source development. But maybe I just need to loosen my tinfoil hat.....

dt: good point -- losen that tinfoil hat and that point won't show as much (okay, I'll admit it, I couldn't resist the pun).

Anyway, I think you're right, they've got this enourmous legal team, tons of cash and lots of motivation to start using this kind of attack. Over and over they've been patenting the dumbest of stuff.

Question is, will it work?

Answer (not so humbly): they will turn at that point from being a software company to a huge version of SCO.

Sounds like the premise to an article. I think I'll get it out on the wire sometime in the next couple of days.

--FeriCyde

I have a question. I don't pretend to know the answer. It's something that has been puzzling me for some time.

MS is not the only company that stands to lose from OSS's success. MS is not the only company stocking up on patents.

Why have we not yet been attacked?

I agree that the potential threat is real. But it seems odd that no one has actually used those patents against us.

That's good, of course. But it makes me a bit nervous not to know *why*.

Steve: Chaos theory provides the answer. It refers to an apparent lack of order in a system that nevertheless obeys particular laws or rules:

People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

helios --

I'm embarrassed to say that I've managed to miss finding OpenOffice invoice templates!!!

Maybe it's because I take the OO that came with SuSE and don't visit the OO site, or maybe it's because my poor old addled brain has trouble with the OO site, but....

Where are they? The invoices I've been sending out are crap. I wouldn't mind something that looks more professional than I do.