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On 11/4/15 5:43 PM, Cley Faye wrote:
2015-11-05 1:28 GMT+01:00 Ken Springer <snowshed1@q.com>:

If you want to go head to head with with MS or Corel, then you'll have to
fix the problems your uses have with the program.


​It's been pointed out already, and I'll reproduce it here:

If this is a bug your options are:
1. Fix it yourself;
2. Pay for a fix;
3. Find a friend/family member to fix it;
4. Wait patiently until a volunteer *chooses* to fix it.

​
​Really, as with any opensource project, every resource is finite,
including dev time.

Are you saying commercial enterprises don't have finite resources?

What get prioritized by the main devs is (in no
particular order, this is a general remark not specific to LibreOffice)
bugs affecting a very large part of the userbase, trivial issues to fix
(those are rare!), and things that devs are interested in. This also mean
that problems users have with the program do get fixed (just check the
bugtracker).

You have to identify the members of the userbase. Are they ordinary individuals for whom the bugs may or may not be trivial? And they have the time to spend looking for workarounds. Or, are they a commercial individual/entity that is competing with other individuals/entities in the market place? That's a place were time *is* money. And I believe they want a product that works, not a product that needs work.

While some bug may be deemed trivial by the devs or some system, that bug may not be trivial to the user.

Beyond that, asking for an opensource project to dedicate resources to fix
a minor issue that is unnoticed by almost everyone (or, in the case of this
thread, something that is not even a bug in LibreOffice) is not reasonable.
If one encounter a particularly nasty issue and can't raise interest in it,
there are companies that can fix them for a price. It have happened before,
and I don't doubt that it will continue to happen.

Which is fine, but not my point. Commercial entities know their survival is based on meeting user needs, not the needs of management of those entities. It's a fundamentally different viewpoint.

Note that I'm not even touching the subject of those big corporations
reactivity with minor issues; commercial products might have more
ressources, but I'm sure there's a fair number of minor bugs that have left
some users disgruntled ;)

Which is why I'm leaving Libre Office for the 2nd time. The deal breaker was finding out that in 5.x, once again LO could not print Avery labels. There has to be something out of kilter in the development process for this to reoccur. If people are going to trust any product in the market place, they have to have faith that problems fixed remain fixed.

When it comes to LO, I no longer have that faith. I can't go tell people to use LO for their word processing needs, when a basic function today includes printing mailing labels, when it's broken again. I'll just find a different suite that doesn't exhibit the problems I notice.

FWIW, I always look for open source or free software that meets my needs. And I will continue to do so. LO just won't be one of those sources that I'll support or recommend.

--
Ken
Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 36.0.4
Thunderbird 31.5
"My brain is like lightning, a quick flash
     and it's gone!"


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