jenkers
msg:1232907 | 9:28 am on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
very interesting - I've lately been making some noise about OpenOffice within the company I work in as maintaining MSOffice costs us a fortune and OpenOffice more than adequately meets most of our users needs. The version 2 beta is excellent also.
With G behind this it would really re-inforce any argument that this is a quality product with enterprise potential.
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mrMister
msg:1232908 | 9:30 am on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I think Google will be leading the next computing revolution. It's clear in my eyes that they're getting ready to pump out a fully featured web service based application environment. As an aside, I'm not sure about that Sun bloke though. He seems on cloud cookoo land to me. 20 floppy disks? Even Windows only came with 14 if I remember, though I don't know anyone taht didn't opt for the CD-ROM version ;-) And who goes to yahoo.com for software at the moment? We services are still something of a plaything, I can't imagine anyone using Yahoo! Mail for any serious use. However it's early days yet and the potential for a computing revolution is certainly there. It's just going to take some bright ideas, smart programmers, and plenty of capital to back it up. Now can anyone name a company that has all three? ;-)
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TinkyWinky
msg:1232909 | 9:37 am on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Wow - seems a logical progessiona. Not sure how I feel about this though - and that's without considering the potential security issues. IMO a lot of Microssoft's critics are there because of their Monopoly over computing habits today - which is exactly why quite a few are revelling in their search not gallopping up behind Google and Yahoo. Where Google are the current leaders in Search (despite seeming to be making more and more errors with 301, sandboxing and overall quality), surely adding more and more products that tie in users is exactly the problem with Microsoft? I for one will never go with companies that try to bully there way to your £ (or $ then) - for a start they become incredibly arrogant to the point of thinking they are omnipotent (Take Tesco in UK retail and their recent stealth increases in insurance and financial products to make them far from good value!). I bet Sun are keen to go with this - check out their 2yr financials - harldy something to shout about :¦ So an interesting one, but for now I am not convinced and will stay with MS Office. I am sure I will not be the only one.
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Brett_Tabke
msg:1232910 | 11:46 am on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
HolaMola! I would think they are saddling up in Redmond about now. Office has been Microsofts one major cash cow for years. This is the main event. Would this be G's foray into a full desktop app? Or is this just ground work for a web based client.
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RailMan
msg:1232911 | 12:03 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
convincing businesses to switch hardware to *nix and run *nix based software will be a challenge the end users (staff) may not feel comfortable with the new software - they will want retraining - the costs involved could be a major deterrent for many businesses disagree? well, *nix PCs with office software have been around for a long time ....... but they haven't really dented microsoft's profit line yet .......
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LinkBuilder
msg:1232912 | 12:10 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Google office is comming.
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weeks
msg:1232913 | 12:24 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Nothing on NYT or WSJ on this yet. A tip of the hat to reporter Stephen Shankland and CNET News.com (and WW).
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mattglet
msg:1232914 | 1:09 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
They were rolling the announcement on the bottom scroller during Good Morning America today (Google announcing partnership plans with Sun Microsystems today).
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davec
msg:1232915 | 2:03 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
| disagree? well, *nix PCs with office software have been around for a long time ....... but they haven't really dented microsoft's profit line yet ....... |
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OpenOffice runs perfectly on Windows based machines as well, you don't need to switch OS to use it. d
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carguy84
msg:1232916 | 2:20 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
| maintaining MSOffice costs us a fortune |
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Eh?
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Brett_Tabke
msg:1232917 | 2:27 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Ya, we are a small shop ourselves and our MS office investment is easily $10k total. We often install OpenOffice on new machines anymore. Works great under windows as well as our Linux based people. > OpenOffice runs perfectly on Windows based Ya, it works excellent here. We find the word processor actuall works with more formats than anything else out there. We also like the print to PDF option. It easily replaces office. Be sure to check out the NEW Release 2.0 candidate - it addresses every single NIT I had with v1.
[openoffice.org...]
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lajkonik86
msg:1232918 | 2:29 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
in my experience open office is a real pain.
I tried it and it created problems with image files, which somehow got corrupted. Also microsoft office is the programing I have always used and, which my university expects me to use and teaches me how to use. Furthermore Microsoft Office 2003 costs 26 euros for students. Eventhough I like google I don't have much hope for open office.
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ronin
msg:1232919 | 2:38 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I've used OOo (OpenOffice.org) to run my operations since April 2003. Mostly I use Calc (equivalent of Excel) and Writer (equivalent of Word). Never had a problem with either.
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brakthepoet
msg:1232920 | 2:48 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
>>maintaining MSOffice costs us a fortune
>Eh? Licensing Microsoft Office in a Windows Terminal Server Environment [microsoft.com]
Microsoft licenses its desktop application products on a per-computer basis. ... Therefore, in a terminal server environment, you must acquire a license for all devices that will be running a Microsoft software application product (for example, Office) from the terminal server.
[Emphasis added] |
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We're a small business, also, and I doubt that we could successfully pass MS Office costs to our customers, and I know we can't absorb those costs. OpenOffice may have its warts, but it's effective enough to do what we need. >> Microsoft Office 2003 costs 26 euros for students That's fine if you're going to be a student for the rest of your life, but it won't keep a disgruntled employee from reporting your business to Microsoft for unlicensed or inappropriately licensed software.
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walkman
msg:1232921 | 3:10 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
if you're large corp, why woud you take the chance? You have to train everyone, deploy, worry about compatibilty, etc. etc. Stick with what works, keep MSFT and count it as the cost of doing business. I'm sure this will hurt MSFT, as even 5% counts, but not that much. Small corp maybe, but they often pirate anyway, depending how much they use. This is what I think they think ;)
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joeduck
msg:1232922 | 3:16 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Looks like more chairs may be flying at MS HQ. As Google's growing ISP plans dovetail with these office suite plans we could see major changes happen fast in favor of Google control of the desktop environment.
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surfin2u
msg:1232923 | 3:16 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I wonder what advantage google sees in expending energy in an attempt to weaken Microsoft Office's dominance with an open source free product? It's clear that weakening Microsoft has been an important goal of Sun's for many years, although they've yet to really get anywhere with it.
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mattglet
msg:1232924 | 3:33 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
| I wonder what advantage google sees in expending energy in an attempt to weaken Microsoft Office's dominance with an open source free product? |
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The more you can get Joe Public to realize that you really don't have to use Microsoft for office applications, the easier time you'll have convincing those same people that you really don't need Microsoft as an OS.
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jimbeetle
msg:1232925 | 3:34 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Wow! Just looked at a price for the 2004 Office upgrade for the standard edition -- $239! And that's after folks bought an earlier edition for around $400. I wonder what the total current upgrade cost is for someone who got into Office at the beginning and has gone through the 7 or 8 editions. That's a very significant revenue stream -- without much downside -- that's at risk for MS. <aside>The only thing I can find on number of floppies is Office 8 (beginning of '97). It took 45 of those little suckers just for Word, Excel and PowerPoint.</aside>
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surfin2u
msg:1232926 | 3:44 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
| The more you can get Joe Public to realize that you really don't have to use Microsoft for office applications, the easier time you'll have convincing those same people that you really don't need Microsoft as an OS. |
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That makes sense from Sun's perspective, but I don't see how this does much for google.
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mack
msg:1232927 | 3:47 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I use OpenOffice on my Linux machines and have played with it on my Windows PC also. One problem I see is that users will need to re-trained to use the new applications. Say you have an office with 30 employees all getting along with MS office. Would the cost of training the users how to get the most from the new software not actualy cost more than the MS liscence fee?
Opensource is great, but there are always costs. From a personal user point of view, it may be a lot simpler. OO=free MS office=$$ This one will definatly be interesting. Microsoft and Google are heading for a showdown. MS are goign for what has always been Googles cash stream (search) Google on the otherhand seam to be heading deep into MS territorw with Desktop applications. The grass is always greener on the other side. Mack.
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Beagle
msg:1232928 | 3:55 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
| >> Microsoft Office 2003 costs 26 euros for students That's fine if you're going to be a student for the rest of your life, but it won't keep a disgruntled employee from reporting your business to Microsoft for unlicensed or inappropriately licensed software. |
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I think lajkonik86's point dealt with working at a university - I do, too, and now that students are basically required to have laptops, an inexpensive system that they can all use is important; there are a lot more students here than there are faculty and staff. MS also has nice licensing arrangements for educational institutions. Of course, if you educate someone using MSOffice, they'll most likely continue using it afterward, so giving colleges favorable licensing arrangements is a good marketing move. I was thinking about downloading OpenOffice to use on my home computer, as I've never been a big MS fan. But I have more difficulty trusting google than I do MS, so I doubt if I'll be doing that now. If I do any university-related work on my home computer (which, of course, I do), I can pick up a CD of MSOffice at the reference desk to take home and load onto my home computer -- all part of the licensing agreement.
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LeoXIV
msg:1232929 | 3:58 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I bet Microsoft had suspected something, hence this heavey advertisement for Office in major magazines and other media...
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gopi
msg:1232930 | 4:02 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
This comment on slashdot says it well i think...
IT admins everywhere with a few shiny new "Google 2U OS" boxes on the network serving up core desktop office apps to the entire office of several thousand people will surely be jumping for joy in 5-10 years
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TypicalSurfer
msg:1232931 | 4:10 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
How will they make money from this? Ads in the "wizard window"? Will the google version be phoning home as you compose things and flash ads at you? I like that they are promoting Open Source stuff but why would I use the G version versus something else?
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mack
msg:1232932 | 4:12 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I think a lot of this entire debate will relly on what comes shipped with MS Vista. We are already pretty sure there will be several versions. Will MS Office be more like a part of the OS or, as it has been up until now a stand-alone application. If the top end version of Vista comes with the Office suit built in then why would a user want to change. Another thing MS have done over the past few years is strike up deals with lots of major manufacturers whereby they ship Office with their systems. MS Works for example ships with quite a lot of new systems. I know it isn't as good as the full blown MS office suit, but for a personal user it will do. Many PC companies also ship Office as an optional extra. It has to be really worth it for the manufacturer to ship free software, The markup these companies make from shipping Office has to be quite an incentive. Mack.
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rogerd
msg:1232933 | 4:14 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
>>We're a small business, also, and I doubt that we could successfully pass MS Office costs to our customers If you look at the annual cost of MSOffice per employee, I doubt that any business would get really excited about a lower cost alternative UNLESS it offered lower support costs or better functionality. Face it, if you are paying an employee tens of thousands of dollars to work for you, what's a couple of hundred to keep them productive? One additional visit per year by a support tech would wipe out any potential savings from "free" software. "Better" is the only way to win that contest, and due to the pain of changing software, "much better" is probably the only thing that would work. Really, though, we'll have to see the specifics of the announcement before debating the viability of any possible products...
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HawaiianArt
msg:1232934 | 4:36 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
Here is the page for the live webcast in 45 minutes.
[wcdata.sun.com...] Have fun.
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xeal
msg:1232935 | 5:10 pm on Oct 4, 2005 (gmt 0) |
I guess I missed the live webcast, because I'm late and it says "This event is not on air at this time."
Does anybody know if there is somewhere I can get the news conference in its entirety?
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