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Microsoft vs. Open Office: Getting to the Bottom of It, Once and For All
10-24-2010, 06:28 PM
Alright, I know this argument is old, but there's something new that I've noticed recently that supports my side of the argument that it's Open Office that screwing things up.
Whenever I open a document last saved under a Microsoft product it parses just fine under Open Office.
However, I make a slight change - a space here, a corrected spelling there, it doesn't matter, then save the document under Open Office, then exit the program.
Next, open the document, in Open Office and find that font sizes, indentations, and even font encodings themselves where italics or bold text is used are all kinds of messed up. Same if opened under a Microsoft product. This is easily repeatable and happens whenever I save under RTF file format. Haven't tested Microsoft Office DOC format yet, but Open Office ODT seems to work just fine (of course it should), but then not everyone uses DOC and/or ODT, hence my preference for RTF which should parse the same no matter what you're using.
If anyone is interested in taking a closer look, then I can provide you with raw TXT files from saves of RTF files made in Microsoft Write and Open Office Writer. Just post your email here and I'll fire it off to you.
EDIT: A little research goes a long way to answering questions.
Turns out that this has been a long-standing issue for the folks at OOo, but it could be said that Microsoft is to blame as well for keeping RTF a proprietary format (!!) and forcing others to reverse engineer the damn thing whenever they come out with a new version of the file format. Primarily they're having issues with in-line images inserted into RTF files, but apparently the issue also extends to general formating as well.
It's actually kind of a touchy subject judging from the commentary. There are some that are demanding that the issue be given a much higher priority as it would make OOo much more promotable at all levels, but there are others that think it is simply too much trouble to be bothered with as it would suck up too many resources to figure out the issue. Personally, I'm shifting more of my blame Microsoft for not making the format an open one in the first place - how can it be a universal format when you keep it to yourself?
That said, anyone know of any official channels that can be used to effectively ring MS's clue bell? Because I can't see any reason why RTF should remain a closed format.
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It might just be OpenOffice being confused by changes in control codes and the like between whatever version of the .rtf specification it uses, and whatever version MsOffice uses. You got to remember that .rtf isl a Microsoft specification.
In anyways, I'm not worried. I use .odt format, since OO and MsOffice are usually able to read it. Just about anything can read it these days, and usually handle it better than a .doc. That, and I like how Openoffice handles equations added to documents... that was great in college. And I could just dump the document out as a .pdf when done, so I didn't need to worry about compatibility.
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If MS Office can handle .odt files without add-ons, then I see no reason not to just go ahead and use them, myself. I have several computers at home and one has Office 2000, one has Office 2003, and the rest have OpenOffice.
Here's my question:
Has anyone got a Calendar and Contacts management program that will synch with mobile Outlook, on a PDA or smartphone?
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Note also that just as with the .doc formats, Microsoft changes the RTF specification with every major version of Word, autobreaking anything that uses the earlier versions.
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
paladindythe
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Bob Schroeck Wrote:Note also that just as with the .doc formats, Microsoft changes the RTF specification with every major version of Word, autobreaking anything that uses the earlier versions. It's just that MS Office has converters built-in, right?
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Presumably.
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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The why of it is simple -- Money, dear boy. RTF is closed, therefore, if you want to have hassle-free RTF usage, you must use Microsoft products.
Personally, I'd say don't use RTF. I'm not sure why you would want to when you have other, less problematic, more reliable, and more robust solutions available to you, that are in fact cross-compatible in ways that RTF is not and never will be.
ECSNorway: I -think- Google Calendar can, and I think Gmail can for contacts. I haven't tried it, however.
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Please excuse me, but I'm a bit confused. .doc and .rtf are both document file types, and are both owned by Microsoft, are both kept proprietary, and are both linked to MS Office, right?
So... Why are there two of them?
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paladindythe
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Jorlem Wrote:Please excuse me, but I'm a bit confused. .doc and .rtf are both document file types, and are both owned by Microsoft, are both kept proprietary, and are both linked to MS Office, right?
So... Why are there two of them? Basically they came up with RTF first. Once upon a time, when Office was in its infancy, RTF was a lighter weight file-type, without lots of 'stuff' describing the document (just look at the difference in sizes between a one page RTF and DOC file). Nowdays, it really doesn't matter, but back then it did. Microsoft has made a business out of reverse compatability (try to run a 10 year old piece of software on a modern Mac...), so I guess it's a habit to keep it around. (Besides, wordpad--which is distributed with Windows--uses RTF and word uses doc)
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If you run MSOffice 2007 or 2010, don't use DOC (or XLS, or PPT) anyway. Use the XML versions (DOCX, XLSX, PPTX). They're lighter (by sometimes a massive margin, especially with Excel) and OO has no issues with them.
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paladindythe Wrote:Jorlem Wrote:Please excuse me, but I'm a bit confused. .doc and .rtf are both document file types, and are both owned by Microsoft, are both kept proprietary, and are both linked to MS Office, right?
So... Why are there two of them? Basically they came up with RTF first. Once upon a time, when Office was in its infancy, RTF was a lighter weight file-type, without lots of 'stuff' describing the document (just look at the difference in sizes between a one page RTF and DOC file). Nowdays, it really doesn't matter, but back then it did. Microsoft has made a business out of reverse compatability (try to run a 10 year old piece of software on a modern Mac...), so I guess it's a habit to keep it around. (Besides, wordpad--which is distributed with Windows--uses RTF and word uses doc)
Ah, thanks. That makes sense.
Quote:If you run MSOffice 2007 or 2010, don't use DOC (or XLS, or PPT) anyway. Use the XML versions (DOCX, XLSX, PPTX). They're lighter (by sometimes a massive margin, especially with Excel) and OO has no issues with them.
What if I'm running MSOffice 2003?
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Stand between the Silver Crystal and the Golden Sea.
"Youngsters these days just have no appreciation for the magnificence of the legendary cucumber." --Krityan Elder, Tales of Vesperia.
Stephen Mann
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RTF all the way
10-25-2010, 05:27 PM
I work in the online education field. We tell all our faculty and students (from 30 campuses) to send all their attachments in RTF since it's a universal format. With all the myriad of word processors that students and faculty will be using, it comes down to two universal formats - plain text and RTF.
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RTF is a very strong 'de facto' universal standard, but it is, de jure, a propietary, closed, unreliable format.
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Wiredgeek Wrote:RTF is a very strong 'de facto' universal standard, but it is, de jure, a propietary, closed, unreliable format. And, if what Bob said is correct, RTF changes with every major Microsoft release. A format that changes that often is hardly a "standard".
Open Document Text (ODT), on the other hand, is the ISO standard document file format. It should be supported by all modern standards-compliant text processors.
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Jorlem Wrote:What if I'm running MSOffice 2003?Quote:Excuse me for being flippant, but I have the same response I held back from Bob, and the same response I give to people who still use XP:
Don't you think it's time you upgrade?
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jpub Wrote:Don't you think it's time you upgrade? Eventually.
When I can afford to.
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I don't believe in being flippant when someone's asking a valid question, so I'll answer the "what if I'm using Office 2003" bit honestly here.
First, this: Office Compatibility Pack
Then, this:: Instructions for ODT support
I myself am still using Office 2000, as noted previously. I don't feel the need to upgrade just for shiny bells and whistles, especially not at the price point Microsoft wants.
--sofaspud
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Somewhat related - is there an add-on for OOo that gives me smooth scrolling? Because having the whole page jump fifteen or twenty lines is pretty damn jarring when I'm in the middle of reading something - especially at a page break.
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There is -- or was -- an open bug report about smooth scrolling in OpenOffice as of May, this year. It's been semi-broken for a long time, in the sense that it never seems to work quite how people want it to, or has CPU utilization out the wazoo while running, or your graphics drivers make it go wonky, and so on.
So in that vein, no, I don't know of an addon that fixes it; my guess would be that anyone interested in creating said addon is waiting for the core team to fix the bug(s) first.
--sofaspud
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jpub Wrote:Excuse me for being flippant, but I have the same response I held back from Bob, and the same response I give to people who still use XP:
Don't you think it's time you upgrade? My employer just upgraded my workstation... to Windows XP. (Yep, I was still running Windows 2000 at work this calendar year.)
Some of us don't have a choice in what we run...
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them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."
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Which is the case with Peggy. We bought Office 2003 to be compatible with what she has to use at work. And because she hates the ribbon interface, too, but that's just a bonus for her.
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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She'd better get used to the ribbon interface, because that's the way MS is going for all their apps.
I sympathize, I really do. You're talking to a guy who spends an hour every time I get a Win7 machine making the desktop look/feel mostly like my WIndows XP one did, including getting rid of much of the 'enhanced' taskbar functionality, and bringing back the Quicklaunch bar.
I personally LOATHE the ribbon interface, but since my workplace has an 'upgrade soon after release' policy (why not, as it costs us $0 in media/software costs beyond what we already pay in Client Access Licenses) I've had to deal for 3 years.
Still loathe it, but I can use it.
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