[Tfug] OpenOffice annoyances

[Jeremy D Rogers]

Claude, I agree totally. I have the same situation where collaborators
need to send me docs and receive docs and as much as I love Latex,
most others will not be using it. It's especially a problem when all
colleagues seem bent on using track changes and notes. I found that
the only opensource program that handles these 'features' at all is
OOo.
Complaint 1: OOo only displays notes/comments when you mouseover, and
there seems to be no way to print them. This makes it very easy to
miss them altogether.
Complaint 2: Images often shift around. I think this is mostly MS's
fault as the way in which images are anchored is absurd. There are far
too many options, many of which conflict with each other, so the
precedence is left ill defined.
Complaint 3: How the f*** do I change the data range for plots without
creating a whole new plot?
Complaint 4: No matter what, it's still an MSoffice clone. If OOo was
made to work exactly like MSoffice, it would still suck, but as it is,
we now have to learn how to use two crappy office suites with double
the nuances and tricks.

I'm sure I could continue to add to the list indefinitely, but those
are the ones that bother me right now. Tips are welcome. Including
other software recommendation, but like I said, I haven't seen
anything that even knows what to do with things like comments/notes
and track changes other than OOo. I know abiword didn't like them last
time I tried.

One thing I do try to do some is to export to PDF (either with OOo or
with latex) and send my collaborators pdf files. Those of them who
actually have paid for adobe software seem to be able to add comments
and notes on the pdf and send it back to me avoiding MSword
altogether, but it isn't terribly convenient for them.
JDR

On 8/21/07, Claude Rubinson <rubinson at u.arizona.edu> wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 05:24:02AM +0000, Predrag Punosevac wrote:
> > If you just want to read .doc files people are sending to you I
> > would strongly encourage to use antiword program.
>
> No, as I said, I'm collaborating with people using MS Word (i.e.,
> writing, editing, and revising).  And, in this case, I don't care
> about whether the app is lightweight or not. (Frankly, this is
> something that I rarely care about anymore.  My ThinkPad, which is
> hardly state-of-the-art, is plenty powerful for pretty much anything
> that I throw at it.)  Rather, I care about getting the job
> done--ideally without them having to care that I'm not using Word.
>
> My experience in the past has been that OOo has the best compatibility
> with Word.  And, in this case, it's doing the job just fine: I'm
> wondering if I can fix some of the interface issues.
>
> Claude
>
> _______________________________________________
> Tucson Free Unix Group - tfug at tfug.org
> Subscription Options:
> http://www.tfug.org/mailman/listinfo/tfug_tfug.org
>