Hello
Just to answer very quickly to your message. While we don't really want to
keep comparing ourselves to AOO, because it's fruitless and does not focus
on gaining new users at all, I'm not too worried by the version numbering.
AOO 4.0 will have the Symphony interface, and what this means is that it
will bring a whole new different set of bugs. So my question would rather
be: is IBM ready to support users with bugs matching the OpenOffice.org
bugzilla reports and the Symphony bugs? That's a tough one, because AOO
might seem to be more conservative now -wait until they get their new
interface. Don't get me wrong, it's a good thing for everyone, as it will
bring clear product differentiation. But the support question will be
crucial and it's not being answered today.
As for TDF/LO not looking as professional compared to AOO, maybe it's a
matter of perception as you pointed out, but I think it's a meme that needs
to be killed, as it's been spread all over the place for ideological
reasons. This being said you will find 2 schools of thought here. One that
says that LTS style releases or less frequent releases provide more
stability and that more frequent releases provide more stability and
quality. OpenOffice.org (the old project) followed the former path and our
experience is that it was problematic and it often failed to deliver the
expected quality. Patches would wait one year, sometimes up to three years
to be included. TDF made the other choice. So far we're happy with it but
it does confuse a few professionals. I'm pointing out professionals here,
such as you, Marc, etc. Because users usually don't care, and service
providers with a larger size or linux distributions are usually very happy
with this model. I think the perception might be significantly changed when
we'll be able to provide incremental updates for each branch. Most of the
notion that our two branches create confusion or lack of readability will
fade away, we'll have two branches, one older ("LTS"???) and another one
which is more recent, and there will just be "updates". But I am afraid
this mechanism might take longer than 6 months...
best,
Charles.
2012/6/6 webmaster-Kracked_P_P <[email protected]>
>
> If the last version of each line 3.4.6 and then 3.5.6 were kept in the
> support loop for a bit longer than just a few months, that would help some
> people. I know each line keeps getting better and better, by the time the
> .4 version is out, but I have been seeing references to AOO 4.0 as if they
> will be skipping over the 3.6, 3.7, etc., etc.. So if people see the
> original OOo version, now AOO, at 4.0 and LO is at 3.6 or 3.7, LO will look
> behind them.
>
> So we need to get people use to the fact that we are doing a different
> version numbering, and we are also supporting our earlier lines for longer
> than the 2 or 3 months it seems now. I do not know how to really explain
> my fears that people will start thing TDF/LO is not as professional as AOO
> seems, or LO is not something business users should use but AOO is.
>
> Also how many "normal" people would even get what a LTS version is all
> about?
>
> I do not think our developers should slow down the pace, but it does no
> good to have a new version needing to be installed every month or two, if
> business users will thing that LO is putting out buggy products just to
> keep a release schedule. MSO can get away with it, LO cannot.
>
> We have been told that there will be a version/line in the future that
> will not need to have a full install for every new version coming out, but
> some "patch" release changing a .3 to a .4 version. Hopefully that will
> happen before the end of the year. If not by then, hopefully it is as soon
> as possible after that. That will help all of us get business users to
> except a rapid deployment schedule if all they have to do is install a
> patch, like they now do with MSO.
>
>
>
> On 06/05/2012 04:55 PM, Tom Davies wrote:
>
>> Hi :)
>> Thanks :) I think that reinforces what Marc Pare is saying about needing
>> more than a month or so support. Also it seems the overlap period will be
>> far greater, unless they switch to only doing LTSes every 4 years to be
>> more in-line with MS.
>> Regards from
>> Tom :)
>>
>> --- On Tue, 5/6/12, Craig Olofson<[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> From: Craig Olofson<[email protected]>
>> Subject: Re: [libreoffice-marketing] Re: Of "business ready use" and bugs
>> in LibreOffice and a LibreOffice LTS
>> To: [email protected].**org <[email protected]>
>> Date: Tuesday, 5 June, 2012, 21:46
>>
>> Fyi
>>
>> Canonical changed LTS support for the desktop from 3 to 5 years, starting
>> with 12.04, to better accommodate their OEM customers.
>>
>> Normal Ubuntu releases are supported for 18 months. Previous Ubuntu LTS
>>> (Long Term Support) releases are supported for 3 years on the desktop and 5
>>> years on the server. Starting with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, LTS releases will be
>>> supported for 5 years on both the desktop and the server.
>>>
>> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/**Releases <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases>
>>
>> hth,
>> -Craig
>>
>> On 06/05/2012 01:42 PM, Tom Davies wrote:
>>
>>> Hi :)
>>> Ubuntu LTS lasts for 3 years (for desktops) but are released every 2
>>> years.
>>> This gives orgs the 1 year of testing they need before migrating from
>>> the previous LTS and moving to the new one. If they gave 3 years support
>>> and released every 3 years then orgs would have a 1 year gap running an
>>> unsupported LTS while they were still testing the new one. Now i
>>> understand why the 1 year overlap is so important to Ubuntu.
>>> Regards from
>>> Tom :)
>>>
>>> --- On Tue, 5/6/12, Marc Paré<[email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>> From: Marc Paré<[email protected]>
>>> Subject: [libreoffice-marketing] Re: Of "business ready use" and bugs in
>>> LibreOffice and a LibreOffice LTS
>>> To: [email protected].**org<[email protected]>
>>> Date: Tuesday, 5 June, 2012, 21:23
>>>
>>> Hi Charles,
>>>
>>> Le 2012-06-05 09:12, Charles-H. Schulz a écrit :
>>>
>>>> Thank you for bringing that up, it's an interesting discussion. Here's
>>>> what I think reading your message. You're asking in fact two questions.
>>>> One of which might already have been answered by a few of our corporate
>>>> members/sponsors.
>>>> * LTS obviously means long term support. Both "support" and "long term"
>>>> deserve careful consideration. I will in this email first focus on
>>>> the term "support". If we speak of support, we must think of a
>>>> support provider. In this case, does this mean we should think -as
>>>> TDF, as a project- of providing professional support to users
>>>> (obviously for a fee)? I don't think it's your idea, but I
>>>> thought I
>>>> would highlight the implications of such a matter.
>>>> * Have we studied what some of the existing support/service providers
>>>> on LibreOffice already offer? I am not so sure but I'm under the
>>>> impression that you can order support (and in this case a "LTS"
>>>> kind
>>>> of support) from Suse and Canonical (there are others) on one
>>>> specific version of LibreOffice. That is, these vendors have one
>>>> reference version of LibreOffice, say the 3.4.5, and they provide
>>>> support and services on it making it their de facto LTS version.
>>>>
>>> Yes, this is fine as they will guarantee that LibreNormal Ubuntu
>>> releases are supported for 18 months. Previous Ubuntu LTS
>>> (Long Term Support) releases are supported for 3 years on the desktop
>>> and 5 years on the server. Starting with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, LTS releases
>>> will be supported for 5 years on both the desktop and the server.
>>> Office will work on their systems and they will take care of any
>>> dependencies and network-ability. But I don't think they would undertake
>>> any code revision and code features into their LTS versions, not unless
>>> they have a large team of coders, which in this case would make them
>>> "competitors" to our work/product (read "fork"). This would take us back to
>>> the days of the many different versions of OOo -- the same situation that
>>> drew all of these different groups into one LibreOffice community.
>>>
>>> Leaving support/service providers to develop an LTS version, in my
>>> opinion, is not the right strategy to adopt.
>>>
>>> Back to your suggestion: do you mean we should relabel the older branch
>>>> "LTS", knowing that each of our releases in one branch really works
>>>> like a "service pack"? If we had the ability to provide incremental
>>>> updates (we will one day) we would have the feelings we have two
>>>> versions, and sometimes "maintenance updates". So at some point, say
>>>> the 3.5.4, we label it LTS, because we're close to open a new branch,
>>>> the 3.6, and we can suggest service providers to base their support
>>>> offers on this one for the time being. Did I get you right?
>>>>
>>> No. I suggest that at some point, the TDF/LibreOffice should designate
>>> an LTS version for large/small organizations/businesses. These would have
>>> developers oversee the fixing of bugs for a fixed term (let's say a 3 year
>>> period) after which time another LTS version would be designated. The LTS
>>> maintenance would NOT introduce any new functions to the distro but only
>>> service bug correction. IMO, if any business entity would like to add any
>>> new functionality, then this is where a support/service provider would step
>>> in and, hopefully, contribute any development of code back to the community.
>>>
>>> I don't really think this is a new concept as even Mozilla-Firefox
>>> offers its own "Extended Support Release (ESR)" version for corporate
>>> users[1]. When critical software packages are installed in large
>>> corporations, a lot of energy in investment of time, training and
>>> documentation is expended in order to get employees up to speed.
>>> LibreOffice certainly falls into this category (critical software --
>>> wordprocessing software). While Firefox ESR is being released initially for
>>> a period of approximately 1 year, IMO, I believe they will ultimately find
>>> that a longer term will be necessary for these large organizations. As for
>>> a version of LibreOffice LTS (or ESR), the impact of change for large
>>> organizations is even larger due to the amount of training of staff of new
>>> features (even more so in the educational field with the training of
>>> younger students).
>>>
>>> If we are looking to supplant MSO in the office place, we need to
>>> realize and accept the simple fact that the amount of software/network
>>> testing as well as (and even more importantly) the training of staff for
>>> large orgainizations is considerable. I sincerely doubt that a "one
>>> year"-term LTS for LibreOffice would suffice; one year is just about enough
>>> time to test out the suite before it is even installed; most organizations
>>> simply do not have the manpower to move any quicker.
>>>
>>> If we wish to compete in the large business market place we need to plan
>>> and develop more strategically with our releases. Developing an LTS version
>>> will fix this. Otherwise, the choice will remain MSO for office use, where
>>> MSO has a longer term of support with incremental changes for bugfixes and
>>> where LibreOffice will remain marginalized as an office suite.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>>>
>>>> -- Charles-H. Schulz Co-founder& Director, The Document Foundation,
>>>> Zimmerstr. 69, 10117 Berlin, Germany Rechtsfähige Stiftung des
>>>> bürgerlichen Rechts Legal details:
>>>> http://www.documentfoundation.**org/imprint<http://www.documentfoundation.org/imprint>Mobile
>>>> Number: +33 (0)6 98 65
>>>> 54 24.
>>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>>
>>> Marc
>>>
>>> [1] https://wiki.mozilla.org/**Enterprise/Firefox/**
>>> ExtendedSupport:Proposal#**Benefits<https://wiki.mozilla.org/Enterprise/Firefox/ExtendedSupport:Proposal#Benefits>
>>>
>>>
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