There are good open source tools out there...I use several and am thankful for them. Sometimes they are the best, most flexible tool available. OTOH, we need to remember that this is not always the case. OpenOffice/LibreOffice is a poster child of this situation. It still does not have a built-in remove duplicates function. Extensions aren't a reliable solution as they come and go. Remove duplicates is a very easy to use feature, accessible to users of many skill levels. It is found in MS Excel and Google Sheets. Yes, there are ways to create similar functionality via formulas, but nothing as accessible as highlight cells and click on a 'Remove Duplicates' button. A few web searches show users were looking for this feature back in 2010, and I am sure it was requested before that time too. >From the perspective of advanced spreadsheet users, the lack of something that works like the Excel Tables functionality is a big gap. This is a very powerful alternative to traditional Row#-ColumnX referencing. It allows for easier and more reliable analysis of datasets by making formulas, references more dynamic than is possible with traditional RC referencing. It fills a gap between traditional spreadsheets and databases (spreadsheet formulas and cells provide a more of a 'visual' way to work with data in contrast to SQL). --- On open-source issues: The issue with open-source solutions is not with the underlying architecture (MacOS, iOS, and Android are all Unix-like under the hood) or with the philosophy. The issue is with: 1.) presentation (UI usability, which includes how performance scales across various hardware and missing but basic features, and UI stability, which includes how the system behaves with runaway apps) 2.) hardware and accessory compatibility. IMO, this seems to be a noticeably lesser problem than in the past. Also, many accessory devices are manageable via browser-based UIs over networks rather than needed USB connections and matching drivers. 3.) Whether discoverable application software is available that can do *everything* the person regularly did while using the prior solution. Obscure, nondiscoverable software adds friction. Renaming software between every distro adds friction. Should users need to relearn the name of all their common tools for each distro? I have seen browers renamed, file managers renamed, even calculators renamed. Some things shouldn't be renamed. To get a person to replace an existing solution, the new solution must be equal or better than the old solution in every way that matters to that user. Or the person must be willing to accept whatever the compromises are with changing solutions. [I see parallels to how people evaluate moving from a gasoline car to an all-electric car. Moving to a short-range electric vehicle requires more compromises than moving to a long range Tesla Model 3 (which has Linux running its UI), backed by the national Tesla vehicle charging network. Network effects in real life.] --- On performance: My experience with Android is it does a very good job, on par with Windows, in dealing with processes that become very memory or CPU hungry. The systems tend to stay responsive (may lag slightly, but usable), and recoverable (task managers can still be brought up), even under extreme memory and CPU pressure. I have yet to find a desktop Linux distro that can do nearly as well. Chrome and Firefox both easily get into 100% CPU usage and high memory usage situations that I don't experience on Android or Windows. If anyone knows of a distro that does as good as a job at maintaining resource control and desktop responsiveness under heavy load as Android or Windows, I would love to hear about it. On Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 16:58 Iznogoud <iznogoud at nobelware.com> wrote: > Unfortunately only some bleeding-edge segments of the US government have > embraced Linux (I am thinking 3-4 letter agencies). The mainstrea rests on > mostly Microsoft products and unfortunately the Windows OS flavours. I am > guessing that there is a healthy amount of lobbying to keep things this > way. > > The open-source alternatives should be lobbied for in governments, and the > barrier has to be overcome. It is not just that the responsibility rests on > the Linux community to make it look and act more like Windows, it is that > the investment has to be made by people to get out of their comfort zone > and learn new things. So, it is both. Perhaps we can find creative ways to > reel them in, educate, and make them preach this gospel. Food for thought. > > Not sure if there is a class in junior-high that is about computers and > includes some aspect of familiarizing kids with non-popular types of > computing. Maybe there should be some command-line work, like when I grew > up. > > _______________________________________________ > TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota > tclug-list at mn-linux.org > http://mailman.mn-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://mailman.mn-linux.org/pipermail/tclug-list/attachments/20200724/78348de6/attachment.htm>