Ubuntu Now Calls Google Docs the Standard
Posted on 07. Feb, 2010 by Daniel Cawrey in News
Ever used OpenOffice? I remember submitting a document once using the open format, only to find that the person I sent it to could not open it in Microsoft Word. That pretty much killed the deal for me, but a surprising development for users of Ubuntu Netbook Edition (formerly known as Ubuntu Netbook Remix) is that no longer is OpenOffice their defacto productivity suite, as the powers-that be for the Linux OS built with netbooks in mind is replacing it with Google Docs.
There’s no question about Google Docs’ importance in the software scene. They have captured a pretty big audience, even getting play as not only Google’s own corporate standard for a Microsoft Office replacement, but they have also gotten Genetech on board and almost all of the 16,000 people who work there use the Premium Edition of Google Docs for all of their work. This is interesting to note since for the Premium Edition Google charges a $50 licensing fee for each user.
Microsoft must be feeling a little weak in the knees over this. There was once a time where if you used one Microsoft solution, the common thinking was that you would use many other offerings that they had. Now that Google plans on releasing their own operating system, further promoted by Google Chrome’s emergence in the browser market, anything that they can offer in terms of applications has the potential to be successful. Just as long as they offer a solution that is just as good as their competitors, mind you.
You can check out Google Docs right here.
5 Responses to “Ubuntu Now Calls Google Docs the Standard”
Leave a Reply
porto
08. Feb, 2010
Seriously? You couldn’t just tell open office to use doc format? There is a strawman here, but I can’t tell if you are strawmaning open office or your own deductive capabilities.
jjc
09. Feb, 2010
“could not open it in Microsoft Word”
yep a well known microsoft word and microsoft user problem
not an open office problem
Eric
11. Mar, 2010
Yeah I have to say it’s pretty ridiculous to expect a propietary software designed by a company oriented on making profit; to support a software format that is created by a not-for-profit organization, and is open source. Furthermore the fact that you couldn’t deduce a basic problem like software formats in advance should really discredit any reliability on your part as a write for a technology website. Finally; your title is entirely misleading, Google docs is the standard for Ubuntu Netbook Remix, not the standard desktop Ubuntu. Why? Well, let’s see here. Let’s give the basic definition of a netbook: Small, portable, and generally always connected to the internet for internet-oriented activities. It is not oriented to do any other thing, as it’s too underpowered to efficiently do much else anyways. Whereas the normal desktop edition, designed for full powered desktops and laptops is still with Open Office, as it is open source, free, and is practically the standard for Linux documents.
Please; do us all a favour and refrain from making such misleading and misinforming articles in the future. Thanks.
Muhammad Faisal
12. Mar, 2010
I have been using open office for years and have never had that problem. It gives you the option of saving your document as a .doc or .docx which are the standard MS Word formats. Like I said, I do a lot of proof or clients and have never have never had any compatibility issues.
Using Open Office for free is a lot better than shelling out hundreds for Microsoft.
Freeware
11. Dec, 2010
Dear author, if you can’t use the obvious “Save as…” -> “.doc” feature of the OpenOffice.org suite, I doubt of your sufficient technical knowledge to write technical articles like this.
Regarding the Ubuntu’s switch to Google Docs – it’s well known and reported that during the recent couple of years a lot of Ubuntu developers were hired to develop what we all know now as Chrome OS. Thus Ubuntu gets huge money from Google in the scope of this project. No surprise that Google convinced them to switch to Google Docs.
Welcome to 1984!