LibreOffice Taunts Microsoft 365 With a Simple Calendar Joke
"LibreOffice works 365 days a year. Just saying."
LibreOffice's social media team posted a one-line jab at Microsoft 365's subscription model: the free, open-source office suite works 365 days a year, no subscription required. The post leans on the suite's long-standing pitch as the free and private successor to OpenOffice, run by a worldwide open-source community.
LibreOffice works 365 days a year. Just saying.
- fweimer
Well, OpenOffice wouldn't print on Tuesdays:
“
What a fascinating bug!! My wife has complained that open office will never print on Tuesdays!?! Then she demonstrated it. Sure enough, won't print on Tuesday. Other applications print. I think this is the same bug. Here is my guess:
Print to a postscript file. Observe the line:
%%CreationDate: (Tue Mar 3 19:47:42 2009)
Change "Tue" to anything else:
%%CreationDate: (XTue Mar 3 19:47:42 2009)
Save the file and it prints. Tools like evince work because they simply omit the "CreationDate" tag to begin with.
Now something odd happens when my cups script (I am using the Brother MFC420CN) copies the file to a temp file. Some of the code is rearranged, not sure how or why, but it uses a command called "file" to identify the file as "PostScript". This check would work on the original file you printed, but by the time it runs the check on the temp file, it misidentifies. Normally it would return:
PostScript document text conforming at level 3.0
But there is another check that happens before the PostScript check. If it finds "Tue" at the fourth byte of the file, it identifies it as:
Jan 22 14:32:44 MET 1991\011Erlang JAM file - version 4.2
So it's not a problem w/ openoffice.org, cups, or the brother printer drivers. It is a bug in the `file` utility, and documented at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/file/+bug/248619.
”
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/cupsys/+bug/255161...
- c0l0
That reminds me that my yearly donation[0] towards LibreOffice's stewards, The Document Foundation, is coming up in December. It's a wholesome tradition where you wire them the amount of EUR/US$/XYZ that Microsoft demands for a year of a personal Office 365(-ish, eh?) subscription[1] as a tex-deductible donation that will make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. I hereby invite you to join in! :)
[0]: https://www.libreoffice.org/donate/
[1]: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/buy/compare-all-microsoft-365-products (DO NOT REDEEM)
- jdlyga
If LibreOffice were good enough already, it would already be popular. It's the same with GIMP. On paper it's a Photoshop alternative, but we've all struggled with it. These projects need to take the same route as Blender did. Originally it was a clunky open source alternative, but it went through a complete UI transformation and now blows the competition away.
- kencausey
While true and a comment I support, it is worth noting that offline versions of Microsoft Office are and have been just fine, including the latest version of 2024 just updated this week.
- unpopularopp
Maybe someone can help but why does LibreOffice take 4-5 seconds to start on Windows? There are many reports of that [0] and otherwise I have zero problems with my system. This is the only application I use regulary which is actually noticeably slow to start. Even restoring a Firefox instance with hundreds of tabs and +20GB RAM committed is quicker (1s)
https://ask.libreoffice.org/t/why-does-libroffice-starts-so-...
https://ask.libreoffice.org/t/startup-time-open-libreoffice-...
https://ask.libreoffice.org/t/why-does-libreoffice-feel-slug...
- hk__2
I have LibreOffice installed but it’s so ugly and non-intuitive that I prefer to import my documents in Google Docs.
- sugarkjube
My locally installed ms office 2019 also works 365d/y.
My softmaker office suite also.
Anyway, I do admit I mostly use libreoffice nowadays, except for 1) communication with customers, and 2) a few excels libre can't handle.
I still have to find a good alternative for (local installed) outlook, I'm trying out thunderbird, but I'm not sure it would be able to replace outlook. I still have to try whether it can handle a 50gb imap inbox, and besides lacks a few essential features.
- krusty93
I don’t see the point in this: word and excel were working today. I don’t think LibreOffice provides email accounts and Teams equivalent, right?