I don't use office software that much. I used to though. When I used msoffice a lot open office seemed cumbersone. now that I don't use it much its msoffice that seems cumbersome.
I’m of the opposite view on this. Been using Libre some years now but had to use Word for a bit on friend’s computer --ewww! Nothing was where I expected it or even where I remembered it from years ago, the drawing program just sucks. I’m thinking people just get used to using what they’ve been using and feel that it’s the ‘correct’ way. (I have that feeling too when I have to do anything on an iPhone)
Missing half the UI on resize is not something to get used, neither is the bad performance. Also the non-scaling ribbon titles are just a UI error. There is little debate to have.
Well I also had the same UI experience under Windows and to be fair disabling Skia and setting everything else also follows seems to work very well. No more glitching around.
Options > View
[x] Use hardware acceleratio
[ ] Use anti-aliasing
[ ] Use Skia for all rendering.
Disabling the Java Runtime Env. under Advanced also makes it go faster.
It’s funny to me how windows users expect package management from each and every individual application instead of expecting that to be a basic function of their operating system.
There is a package management in the OS called Windows Store, but LibreOffice charges money for it. Since it is such a popular software with likely some security exploits I don’t think it is very responsible to avoid this topic for so long.
The windows store is really just a single application repository though, not a full featured package management system e.g. one that updates the operating system itself or allows alternative repository sources.
Function. In this case it’s not just a matter of definitions because the windows options do not offer the same utility and convenience I’ve come to expect from a package manager for the last decade or more. It’s a bit like me asking for a chocolate chip cookie and someone handing me a handful of chocolate chips and a cup of flour and wondering why I look disappointed.
I expect a package manager to handle all of my packages, be they system or third party. I also expect to be able to add repositories from developers for apps I need to be more up to date than the default system versions. This functions to also allow applications to be managed that aren’t in the default repositories at all. I expect to be able to handle all updates with a simple command and be able to schedule those updates for when it suites my convenience, not when the operating system developers see fit. Those are the things I mean when I call something a package manager.
Windows Update does the system in the background. Microsoft distributes their apps through Windows Store and so can third parties sign up there in principle, it has restrictions unfortunately, but to say there is absolutely nothing is not quite correct. And by this point so many apps have their own integrated updaters it is to be expected. I understand it is nothing like Linux still.
I know how it works. And I’m saying it doesn’t work for me. Ubuntu has an app store too and it fails for the same reasons the Windows store fails. Only windows and Mac users expect such a fragmentary and redundant system of what you call “integrated” updates.
If you have to use Windows, the Chocolatey package manager knows about most great foss apps in the base config, including LibreOffice. You can first ‘choco install libreoffice’ and later ‘choco upgrade all’ to keep apps updated.
I rarely need to spin up my Windows vm, but after discovering Chocolatey it’s been much more pleasant keeping those apps updated. Same idea as homebrew for macOS; providing *nix-style pkg management. Enjoy!
I have a feeling you are overthinking the Matrix key system.
create account
create password you store somewhere safe
copy the key and store somewhere safe
when signing on a new device, copy-paste the key
Basically it’s just another password, just one you probably can’t remember.
Most of the client apps support verifying a new session by scanning a QR code or by comparing emoji. The UX of these could be better (I can never find the emoji option on Element, but it’s there…). So if you have your phone signed in, just verify the sessions with that. And it’s not like most people sign in on new devices all the time.
SoftMaker Office is the best alternative, but most people don’t consider it, because the full version costs money.
For some reason everyone expects alternatives to MS Office to be exactly as good and 100% compatible while at the same time being free of charge.
I have tried Softmaker Office and unfortunately its font rendering/kerning is the worst, (printing unaffected). MS Word, LibreOffice are running around it in circles. I assume a high DPI display would minimize these woes in the future. I worked around it by using Roboto at 11 pt, makes it bearable. But aside from that it checks all the marks for an Office program. I wonder how far its spreadsheet program will take me. Cannot imagine it coming anywhere close to Excel for highly advanced usage.
I tried to use Calc and whatever the PPT one is called and both were incredibly laggy, even when I tweaked the hardware settings. And then there was a bizarre weird thing or two like the insert symbols not working in ribbon view.
And ribbon view didn’t really improve the fast response I need, like being able to type 5cm scaled for huge image, instead I would still need to open the settings and do many clicks for the same result.
So I just stick to that old 2007 office I still use. Oh gosh, did I mention the crashes yet?
I updated my post that it is indeed the renderer behaving badly. Your experience with the crashes makes sense, if something as basic as the renderer is all over the place. Thanks for the warning, will definitely avoid LibreOffice, even if it has the feature set I am looking for. Shame most paid software is subscription only which I do not condone.
I don’t have any of those problems but I use office suites very rarely and and I’m on linux.
About the autopudate, you should use winget instead of having each app check for updates or having to it yourself for every app.
I do think libreoffice looks old and has room for improvement, just not so enough for me to look for an alternative. I have read that onlyoffice looks better, but I have never tried it.
I’m waiting for the PineNote to be out of the development edition so I can get one. I do have an older kindle that I jailbroke a while ago and disabled OTA on. It still sucks, but it is better with KOreader.
reMarkable is also a good device, very light and you can enable SSH/root access with a simple toggle on settings. There are also entire repositories of software for it toltec-dev.orggithub.com/Evidlo/remarkable_entware
Do you have one? I’ve seen them used, and I think they’ve got a lot of potential. If I could use handwriting recognition to work with my Workflowy notes and edit markdown shut up and take my money. However a quick look at the Toltec stuff tells me it’s mainly terminals, kernel managers and Doom. Am I missing something?
Package list at bin.entware.net/armv7sf-k3.2/ and toltec-dev.org/stable/. Personally for me Syncthing is the most important thing I’ve running there to quickly sync files. After all we’re talking about a ePub/PDF reader not an Android tablet.
Even thought it won’t ever be an android tablet with hundreds of applications, I like the fact that they actually don’t make you go through the nine circles of hell in order to SSH as root, compile code and install stuff on a device you bought. They don’t also include spyware like Google does. :)
I hear the ReMarkable 2 lacks Bluetooth, so if you want to type you have to buy their keyboard which is $299 here in Canada. Altogether that makes it $768 plus tax, which is pretty steep for what it is.
That is, until the community reverse engineer the communication between the tablet and keyboard. It’s through the 5 pins, serial iirc? The complicated part would be to produce/find a decent keyboard
Bringing things out of “early access for developers and enthusiasts only” isn’t something Pine64 does. They’ve got a laptop, phone, watch, tablet, ereader, and probably shit I’ve missed, none are ready for prime time and never will be.
While there aren’t any new releases at this point, you could use Obtanium and point it to the repos for the apps you use. That way, you’d get notified once the releases start and you’d get them right from the developers.
I am not one of these people who’s constantly surveilling RAM. But I look at it occasionally and I don’t really see anything unexpected in your screenshot. Maybe you could load up comparable non open source applications doing the same task and show the comparison? How does Safari or Edge do if you create a comparable session?
Right now on my linux computer, Firefox is using 1 GB of RAM. I have lots of tabs open so that’s typical. Sometimes it is higher. You are using logsec, zotero and libreoffice which suggests you are conducting research and writing. So I will guess you also have lots of tabs. And maybe browser extensions? The zotero web clipper that looks at every page you load to see if it is scrapeable? Maybe a markdown clipper doing same thing?.. And there is a good chance those other applications are working with a lot of data like your whole citation database, whatever you are writing etc. Do you have any of those zotero extensions that do all kinds of fancy stuff to the items you add? Not to mention Thunderbird and whatsapp. It is a lot of stuff for the computer to do.
In firefox (and presumably librewolf) you can go to about:processes to see exactly what is going on. This page with your thread is using 59 MB. Also you can go to about:unloads which has a rudimentary method to remove background tabs from memory. With only 8gb of RAM you should make a habit of this. You can also get extensions with more sophisticated unloading methods and that might be worthwhile for you.
All that said, I think an 8GB RAM machine is likely under-powered for your task. To be fair I am making assumptions based on the applications you have open. because when I have those sorts of applications open, I am typically being quite demanding of the computer. Opening documents, converting filetypes, scraping metadata, OCR, passing information between applications, interacting with databases, drafting documents, searching email archives… and lots of tabs.
I am really surprised that Apple would sell a laptop-type device with only 8gb in the modern era. I always think of them as expensive but good hardware (if you are using them the way Apple intends). If my assumptions about your work are correct, life will improve if you can scrape up some more RAM.
I like the idea, but you need a touch screen and support and you need a far, far better screen before it's in the neighborhood of actually realistic to use. It's not their fault that you can't just go buy a 300 PPI screen, but the end result is just not enough to actually be usable.
I had one of the early generation kindles for a while. There was a straighrtforward jailbreak to make it more sociable. The set it up with Calibre which was smooth once properly set up. There was (likely still is) a cool plugin that would get RSS feeds, generate an ebook and sync automatically over wifi per schedule. So then when I went out I would have everything to read fresh with zero effort. Which at the time was pretty impressive. Phone batteries sucked so they were not really viable for reading unless you could have them plugged in all the time. The kindle was magic in comparison.
Anyone who wants to dive into e readers should go to the E-Book Readers section of MobileRead Forums. There people are very serious about ebooks.
I was thinking of buying another ereader a couple years ago. I sort of assumed there would be some open-ish type options. But I didn’t find anything that suited me. I really liked eink and wish it was more widely used. I would love one of the phones with dual ekin/LCD displays.
All this to say I hope there is community uptake and participation in the project. I myself do not have a soldering iron and don’t really need an ereader. But I think it’s a cool contribution.
Kobo ereaders are very freedom respecting. You can run koreader or plato on it very easily if you are a little bit tech savvy. Just involves plugging in the reader to a computer and running a shell or powershell script.
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