Another Office Alternative

MiTEG writes "The Washington Post has an article on a cheaper alternative to Microsoft's Office Suite, ThinkFree Office. Currently selling for $50, their product also includes a one year subscription to Cyberdrive, a 20 MB web file-storage service. While it's no StarOffice, this glowing review may help people realize that Microsoft is not the only option." 'Glowing review' probably isn't the right term to use, since the reviewer found quite a few faults.

I'm underwhelmed

[RatOmeter]

"Less than glowing" review is right. To paraphrase the reviewer, it's buggy and slow.

My experience with Java, the language this app was written in, is limited to a little experimentation, web-based javascripts and using Limewire (the Gnutella client). Limewire is also an app that I would describe as buggy and slow, with emphasis on slow.

Does anyone else have an opinion on the suitability of Java in medium (Limewire) to large (thinkFree's product) desktop applications?

Office

[tbx2000]

I dont fancy their chances of success. Its gonna be pretty hard to charge for an inferior office package, just ask the many fallen along the wayside in the past (smartsuite anyone?)
The real competetion to the Microsoft juggernaut in this sector has gotta be opensource, and more importantly, free (as in, free beer :) and good. No point in raising awareness of a Microsoft compeditor, if the compeditor doesnt have a good supporting case. It only makes M$ look good.

Another victory for Cheap Software

[Anomolous Cow Herd]

Yeah, it's a shitty Office knockoff that'll probably install spyware on your computer, but it COSTS LESS THAN OFFICE! Finally, we can cripple ourselves with an inferior knockoff, still pay money, still use Windows and still not have the source to fix things when they go wrong. And they will go wrong.

Honestly, are you alleged "professionals" here so poor that you can't even be bothered to pay for quality word processing software?

Re:I'm underwhelmed

[RatOmeter]

"Javascript really has very little to do with Java" That pretty well shows the limit of my knowledge of Javascript :|

I have to agree with you on the "buggy" issue; I didn't mean to imply that Java code was inherently more buggy. One feature I really admire, is the portability of code... Sun has done a great job of keeping that feature in line.

Another poster said that GUI's are probably the slowest part of a desktop Java app. I've seen things that may support that position. If true, wouldn't that be the fault of the Java Runtime Engine?

File formats are more important

[cheekymonkey_68]

I wish that the industry would get together an agree a usable file format that would be supported by all document processors even if they just settled on some SGML based format such as Xml.

Hmm imagine if every word processor used Xml for storage...that would be miles better than having every business use Word.

Look at WordPerfect, look at Lotus Word,they were both excellent word processors and the market leaders and look where it got them...

Microsoft eroded there market share using its by now commonly known tactics.

The problem is, right now we have Word and Pdf as being the only file formats of choice that are universally accepted.

Pdf is ok, but again the file format itself is proprietary

Word is especially bad not so much for its bloat, but for the bugs that never get fixed and worse of all Microsofts habit of changing the format frequently

ThinkFree is bad marketing

[Bakajin]

In addition to buggy software they are going to suffer from a marketting angle. If you have to pay for software, even if only a little, does "ThinkFree" really rub you the right way? And it doesn't have a great ring, nothing as simple as "Word", encoraging as "WordPerfect", or powerful as "StarOffice".

Also, the article said it lacks "the feature that flags possible misspellings". Does this mean no spell checking at all!? Or just the inline checking as you type? Lacking something as simple and basic as a spell checker is almost unforgivable. If it lacks as-you-type checking, I wonder if that could be a patent issue. I wouldn't be shocked.

Looking ahead...

[jonathan_atkinson]

"...help people realize that Microsoft is not the only option."

Yet when Microsoft moves Office XP to a subscription-based model (yes, yes, I know the XP subscription plan has been delayed in the USA [com.com] [strange looking URL, but it does work], but it IS avaliable in other [microsoft.com] countries [microsoft.com]), like ThinkFree already uses, I'm sure Slashdot will be the first to proclaim it as the beginning of the end.

--jon

Re:I'm underwhelmed

[RatOmeter]

I'm beginning to see the light. 'til now, I'd only seen a very few (or recognized as such) real Java desktop apps. Poking around at Swing Sightings [sun.com], I was surprised to find quite a few Java/GUI apps that look like fairly heavy hitters. I still have some reservations about the throughput of a busy Swing desktop application, but now I'm going to shut up until I've tried out a few more (IDEA [intellij.com] looks good).

The crux of the matter

[Eric Damron]

"While it's no StarOffice, this glowing review may help people realize that Microsoft is not the only option."

I guess that is the crux of the matter. Since StarOffice is superior, why would I pay for the Think Free Office suit unless Sun's new pricing scheme makes is a lot more expensive?

The real things to consider are functionality, interoperability and price.

Microsoft Office is known for having a lot of functionality. In my opinion it has WAY more then I need. For example, I hardly ever need to write a virus to destroy the piece of mind of the average computer user. I find that now days the entertainment industries are doing an adequate job by sending there paid flunky Politicians like Sen. Hollins and friends to screw over the American people. It would be a good thing to remove that man from the equation. (Vote him out. No violence please.) But I digress.

StarOffice also has a lot of functionality and again, probably more than I need. If the price of StarOffice does not become prohibitive then really the only thing that concerns me is the interoperability issue.

Unfortunately in order to be competitive an office suite must interpolate with what most people use. Whether official or unofficial there usually is a standard that most people use. One of the biggest issues that I have with Microsoft is that they try to set standards that are proprietary. If you will not or can not be compatible with that standard then you can't compete. Further, the only way that Microsoft can set proprietary standards is through the use of their Monopoly power. Times have changed and we need new laws that require that standards be open so that no large corporation can leverage their Monopoly power in the way that Microsoft does. Hmmm.. I seem to have digressed again.

So, to sum it up. Unless StarOffice is way more expensive or the Think Free Office suite is superior in interoperability then I think I'll just continue to use StarOffice. Oh yeah... And Microsoft is an evil Corporation and Sen. Hollins is an asshole thinking only of his corporate benefactors and needs to go.