From koffice Mon Nov 04 09:51:53 2002 From: Seth Kurtzberg Date: Mon, 04 Nov 2002 09:51:53 +0000 To: koffice Subject: Re: [kde] KDE version of OpenOffice? X-MARC-Message: https://marc.info/?l=koffice&m=103640364614922 For another 2 cents, Excel does indeed have the functionality Piotr mentioned, and I agree that these are important features. It should be noted, however, that (1) many features in Excel (in particular those associated with scripting) are not what I would call "stable" either. I see bizarre behavior from Excel almost every day. And, although Excel has these features, it is in many ways a really poor program that would be much better off without so many bells and whistles but with a better core. Just as an example, Excel doesn't have a way to use formulas with relative cell references. (You can set an option that says "use relative cell references", but this only changes the way the equations are displayed, not the "real" equations, which can be easily demonstrated by inserting a row.) There is a real need for better functionality in this area. Gnumeric has some nice features but it also is missing necessary functionality. So, kspread people, don't give up! Your program will be used. On Mon, 2002-11-04 at 02:33, Philipp M=FCller wrote: > Hello Piotr, >=20 > I again add my comments about my personal view, especially with regard to > KSpread functionality. >=20 > We 4 core developers of KSpread have all normal work and we are using EXC= EL > extensively (at least myself, as I have a pure business administration jo= b).=20 > The reason I got involved in KSpread development was simply, that KSpread > was not maintained any longer by the original core developer. So it was i= n a > bad state and bugs weren=92t fixed (some months before 1.2 release). Near= ly at > the same time the other joined as well, fixing bugs and enhance basic > functionality. >=20 > I point this out, because you may have the wrong impression about the > developers of KOffice. We are not only some geeks who have fun to program= some > esoteric functionality, we are also simple office program users, willing = to help > bringing an office suite to KDE, which is competitive to all existing > programs and which we want to use ourselves. > But of course, we need time and aren=92t a huge programmer team, which ca= n > easily add big functionality. Additional, I don=92t care about how long i= t will > take, otherwise I would have given up already. I=92m only sure, we will r= each > this goal. >=20 > So the thing is, we are not missing focus, we are missing programmers and > supporters (e.g. anybody willing to enhance our homepage?) to bring KOffi= ce to > the corporate desktop _faster_. >=20 > > Just my cent, but I suspect that this is not about writing a letter, or > even > > a scientific paper, but rather about preparing complex (formatting, not > > content ;-) documents. OpenOffice, while clumsy, slow and memory hungry= , > has > > some features very often used by corporate people, and which are not > (well, > > of that what I know) available now, or even planned in near future for > KWord > > or Abiword. Some examples: > > > > - ability to track changes to documents (collaborative work) > > - interactive fields (for preparing forms) > > - drawing functions (for inserting scalable graphical elements directly > into > > document, without embedding or copying) > > - scripting language (and macro recorder in 643 build) >=20 > All of this functionality is well known by me and used daily at work. >=20 > > For most professional users (i.e. people who use office suite as their > main > > working tool) above functionality is not just bells and whistles... > > > > Besides, a lot of KOffice features are, well, experimental, despite the > fact > > that currently distributed release (1.2) is called "stable". For exampl= e > > zoom support in KSpread :-) (and yes, I know that it is being fixed) >=20 > This was a hit directly into my heart ;-). You don=92t know how much hass= le I > had with this simple realization. It was enabled, just because I wanted > feedback and it was the clear step in between to full zoom support (as it= is > nearly now in cvs). > Open Source is about release often, so you can make smaller steps in > functionality. Here it was that we needed to change the internal coordina= te system > from int to double. KSpread 1.2 was here 60% of this work done and I=92m = still > the opinion that it was good this way. >=20 > > OK - even I begin to feel that I am starting to troll, almost... >=20 > You are not trolling, as you make technical statements and you try to hel= p. >=20 > > But to do something constructive - three of my co workers, quite > interested > > in using open source office tools, proposed to prepare sort of "feature > > analysis" for KOffice. All of them are very heavy Microsoft Office user= s, > > working in a corporate environment and having at the same time some IT > > experience (one of them have been using Unix before even Linux was star= ted > >:-). >=20 > > They offered to work for some time with main KOffice components (starti= ng > > with KPresenter, and going through KWord and KSpread) and prepare sort = of > > corporate "wishlist", ranking various features into three categories - > > "critical" (meaning - indispensable for their organizations, or work), > > "desirable" (just normal wishes) and plain bugs, and explaining why > > particular feature would be necessary for their business needs. >=20 > > Would such analysis be useful to KOffice developers? Please let me know= , > and > > we can start preparing it (or not, if you think that it would be useles= s). >=20 > As for KSpread I can say, that such a list of missing functionality would= n=92t > help at the moment. Just have a look at our own TODO list in cvs: > http://webcvs.kde.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/koffice/kspread/TODO?rev=3D1.54&= content-type=3Dtext/x-cvsweb-markup > (the names here only says, when nobody else comes up, I will do when I ha= ve > time. If someone else wants to do it, feel free to join). >=20 > You can easily see, that we have enough todos and see the essential > functionality. > Lot=92s of tiny/big stuff is still missing there, but this is what we alr= eady > intend to do. > There is no problem adding more stuff here, but this doesn=92t help to > implement it faster. And I think your important point is _now_ and not in= some > years. >=20 > Currently we are still on the way to enhance the core, so new functionali= ty > (like autofilter), which should be easy to implement, has to wait until t= he > core is better. It doesn=92t help to add functionality on top of a core, = which > is in need to change. >=20 > But, if you like to help here, bug hunting is really a great help. > If I compare the bugs I fixed already in cvs with the bugs I found on our > bug tracking system, then I have the impression there are a lot of other = bugs > out in the release, but nobody tested/reported them. >=20 > More bug reports with good description is really needed. Such work from y= our > team will help KOffice the most. Best would be testing the compiled branc= h > KOFFICE_1_2, so we get bugs fixed until next bugfix release (which should= be > in some weeks). >=20 > OTOH, I wouldn=92t know what to do with a big wishlist, when I still have= to > focus my work on bringing the zoom support into bugfree state, which I as= sume, > will take me at least another 3 months (including the work on rich text a= nd > WYSIWYG). >=20 > Bugs are different, bugs must be fixed even in between and helps the curr= ent > release (upcoming 1.2.1) and the next. >=20 > Just one final word: > My comments regarding KSpread may sound a bit negative, but this is only = my > personal impression regarding corporate usage. For home/private purposes, > KSpread (and KOffice in general) is already fine to use. And this is wher= e we > can fully compete at the moment. > In the long run, _nothing_ will stop us from the corporate desktop!=20 >=20 > Philipp >=20 > --=20 > +++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more http://www.gmx.net +++ > NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f=FCr 1 ct/ Min. surfen! >=20 > ____________________________________ > koffice mailing list > koffice@mail.kde.org > To unsubscribe please visit: > http://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/koffice --=20 Seth Kurtzberg M. I. S. Corp 480-661-1849 Pager 888-605-9296, or 6059296@skytel.com ____________________________________ koffice mailing list koffice@mail.kde.org To unsubscribe please visit: http://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/koffice