Nick @ The Linux ExperimentFrench authorities declare the use of Microsoft Office and Google Docs illegal in schools and education markets, as they don’t follow GDPR and might disturb later competition by making students used to these proprietary solutions.
Looks like it only applies to Office365 online and Google docs, not the installed MS Office suite. The fact that these companies are US based means there is no guarantee that student’s data isn’t accessed by the US government, which seems to be the main issue.
ratatop
Amsel/Professor Pootis@glaber @thelinuxEXP I already do this if we use MS Office, but we use google docs mostly and I can't really get around that.
Pol Roca
Keith Milner@polroc
That's a really difficult one.
MS Office is bad because it traps you in a dreadful ecosystem through the myth of "compatibility" which they reinforce by making their products deliberate obscure.
Google doesn't do that, but they do trap people in their ecosystem by making it actually bloody good, and difficult to replicate in any other way.
@ProfessorPootis @glaber @thelinuxEXP
@polroc
Of course, as tools like Next loud catch up, that may change. But I find it hard to completely criticise a service that's popular because it's good and that is incentivised to continue to improve.
@ProfessorPootis @glaber @thelinuxEXP
Of course, as tools like Next loud catch up, that may change. But I find it hard to completely criticise a service that's popular because it's good and that is incentivised to continue to improve.
@ProfessorPootis @glaber @thelinuxEXP
Oh, I know, I know.
Personally, I switched to LibreOffice and storing my documents in XML open formats long ago.
I am a translator, I work with CAT software like OmegaT, and I do really value the flexibility of all the open/free aspects of these tools and formats. At least for offline edition.
However, as you mention, the features of the Google Suite are extremely valuable for corporate, team work, and hardly replicable in any other fashion. Their win, may we like it or not! 😉
@polroc
What I truly do not understand is companies continuing to use MS 360, even switching to it from Google Workspace. It's a truly awful and second rate product from my experience, and everyone.I know who is forced to use it complains about it.
What I truly do not understand is companies continuing to use MS 360, even switching to it from Google Workspace. It's a truly awful and second rate product from my experience, and everyone.I know who is forced to use it complains about it.
Joel de Bruijn@Majik @polroc I dont promote neither, but because of completely different reasons, stemming from difference in business model :
- MS: applications + services for Office collaboration, security, OS and Identity. Trapped because its a vast convenient ecosystem, with propietary fileformats being a minor actor but monopolism and data-sovereignty are the main concerns.
To replace it one needs not only LibreOffice and NextCloud but couple of more things.
https://m365maps.com/Microsoft-365-Education-A5.htm
- Google: everything must happen in the browser to accomodate mayority of users who need "just simple mail, storage, wordprocessing and spreadsheeting".
But using student and staffdata to profile people and using that in their vast advertisement ecosystem is the main concern. They promise not to do that but they mix up services in which a person is a mere customer and a business/school worker. So one cant enforce them not use data from one context in another.
Mahesh Shantaram 
@Majik @polroc Not me. After 15 years of using Google's tools, last year I got access to Microsoft's entire Office suite thanks to my university. I was wowed by the superiority of every product, e.g. MS PowerPoint blasts G'Slides out of the game. But then, Outlook is a shit email client for someone who's comfortably settled into Gmail for two decades.