this post was submitted on 07 Jan 2024
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Privacy
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Due to its proprietary nature, finding software that can properly read those files can be tricky.
LibreOffice is the usual go-to for folks wanting an office suite, that respects privacy, and FOSS. It can read docx files, but it can mess up formatting. Still, for many it’s the preferred choice. It’s got the best reputation.
Now if formatting REALLY matters, take a look at OnlyOffice. It handles those MS formats so much better. It’s not a bad suite, but it’s hard to beat the good reputation Libreoffice has gained.
Docx is not a proprietary format, it's a standard, it's called Office Open XML: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_Open_XML
And M$ published its specifications, so Libreoffice devs could support it. But here comes the funny part: M$ (deliberately?) doesn't follow the specification it published. So the formatting problems of LibreOffice come from M$, because they don't follow their specs, but M$ can just do whatever they want because of its market share.
I read this story a long time ago, and I'm paraphrasing, but on this wiki page you can read a lot of controversies related to this format: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standardization_of_Office_Open_XML
It's a "standard" only in the sense that Microsoft took the MS Office binary file formats (which are basically just writing the internal state of Word/Powerpoint/whatever to disc), serialized it to XML, half-assed some bullshit documentation for it, and bribed the standards body to rubber-stamp it. It's still, at it's core, basically defined by whatever nonsense Microsoft's implementation does.
Aren't the specifications also insanely long and complicated for good measure?
Yeah, wiki says it's 6000 pages. But that's not that long compared to other similar file standards, and it also contains pptx and xlsx.
For comparison PDF standard is about 1000 pages, HTML (without CSS, just pure HTML) is 1500 pages.
Not only are they insanely long, MS strategically doesn't follow its own specs in places so other software using the specs "fuck up formatting" even if they follow MS's specs perfectly.
M$ is the best abbreviation for Microsoft yet
Oh this is helpful
Yeah another person said it gets funky with formatting but that’s not a huge deal for me as the most complex formats for the class syllabus I like to just have a copy but probably nothing I can’t do by saving it as a pdf
And like I said in those comments my own documents aren’t complex mostly just using tab and enter to make my documents more readable for myself
You don't use complex formats you say... just don't forget that LibreOffice thinks bullets points are "complex formats":
What OS are you using?
Also didn't see your bottom question at first but I'm on windows and edit documents both on my home laptop and one I bring to my classes which is why being able to play nice with proton drive is a must for me.
So why not simply use MS Office? Way less hassle to deal with. Licenses are available for cheap on eBay or pirated form reputable sources.
I was planning on using MS Office originally when writing the posts but 1) I didn't know if it was going to work after my subscription expired, and 2) I wanted to see what else is out there
Seriously, download MAS and choose Ohook. Enjoy your permanently serialized and activated MS Office. :)
Ah I see good to know. For me formatting issues aren't a super big deal and sounds like it's outweighed with its reputation here. I guess if it does become an issue I can simply hop over to open office but I'll cross that bridge when I get there
LibreOffice and OnlyOffice will certainly be better than OpenOffice.
How does that work if you save the docx in OOXML Strict instead of OOXML Transient? I'm not sure about the current 365 rollout but OOXML was developed by MS due to the EU nearly 20 years ago to support interoperability but their default saving format was always OOXML Transient which is OOXML + MS Proprietary format. OOXML Strict should be an option and save the docx in OOXML only format.
Frankly, the anti-trust regulators should've required MS office to save to OpenDocument by default instead of any version of OOXML, strict or otherwise, nearly 20 years ago.
It works even worse.
So in the description you said edit, but here you say read (syllabus). If just reading is the requirement, there was a word reader, not sure if it is still available. I also believe once subscription expires, you still will be able to view, just edit.
Also what's wrong with your school requiring word document and not providing a free license for the software? My college at least provided free license during my class.
As other alternatives I don't have better than libre office (at the time I was using, libre office didn't exist and I used OpenOffice, I still was using it, primarily, because of using Linux on my laptop) and submitted my work as PDF and didn't have problems, but my class were requirements in computer science so I'm sure I wasn't the only one doing it.
Yeah that’s my bad I just couldn’t think of an example where there was formatting in the document
Yeah I’m definitely going to try libreoffice