Charlie StrossMay 20

Welp, I have just cancelled my Microsoft Office 365 recurring subscription.

Two reasons.

1. I only ever use it to check tracked changes to the copy edits on novels—once a year—which my publishers process in Word. As of this month, LibreOffice is good enough for the job (just tested at book length).

2. CoPilot in Office would open me up to accusations of breach of contract—my book contracts warrant that they're all my own work: CoPilot brings that into question.

So good riddance to Office365!

Show threadMichael Lucas May 20

@cstross

I'm testing LO for highly formatted tech ebooks, and rocketing towards that same decision at ~.7C.

Show threadgemelenMay 20
@mwl @cstross
Not sure it's that much relevant, but LaTeX support in the LibreOffice helped me to go through the uni years as an applied mathematics student without ever touching MS Word and MathType or equivalents. 20 years ago already.
So, I highly recommend grasping it for whatever challenge of writing and editing you have. Maybe it'd be even easier to use than you think.
Show threadCharlie StrossMay 20
@gemelen @mwl I have zero use for equation writing and LaTeX is absolutely horrible for everything else.
Show threadMichael Lucas May 20

@cstross @gemelen

I could, in theory, benefit from LaTex for super-highly-formatted tech books.

But some POD printers don't work with the PDFs produced.

Which POD printers? No freaking clue. IngramSpark provides zero feedback or debugging. They just pull my book from distribution globally until I "fix the problem."

A book that was fine for years can get its first order in Malaysia, or Guam, and boom! Firmware that hasn't been updated since Clinton was president shuts me down worldwide. (Yes, B&N experimented with POD in the 90s and those machines are still in use. Fourth-hand.)

If it happens too often, Ingram will drop me entirely.

Not worth it.

Show threadJack Yan (甄爵恩)May 21

@mwl Does Bookvault work with old PDFs? I tend to find them pretty good, but I know not everyone does. Happy to take a look at your file to see if I spot anything. (Not a tech expert but I have worked a bit on pre-press stuff.)

@cstross @gemelen

Show threadMichael Lucas May 21

@jackyan @cstross @gemelen

You need to use the 2001 or 2003 PDF standards, so yes.

Show threadJack Yan (甄爵恩)
@mwl Just to clarify, was this answering my Bookvault question (in which case, thank you) or yes to me taking a look at the file (still happy to)?
May 21 at 2:06amWeb
Show threadMichael Lucas May 21
@jackyan The Bookvault question
Show threadJack Yan (甄爵恩)May 21
@mwl Great, thank you.