It’s basically an abysmal text editor combined with the worst page layout software the world has ever seen. Creating documents with it very much resembles masturbating with a blender.
Who knew being a monopoly and anti competitive would be so profitable.
So many open source options out there that if you think MS word is the only options out there then you’re not looking hard enough.
Do you really think the multi billion dollar company I work for is going to switch?
You ain’t paying. Why do you care?
Editing PDFs is not a feature the format natively supports (or supported?).
To me the crappiest “feature” is that M$ intentionally disregards their own document standard to EEE the ecosystem and vendor-lock their consumers.Want to edit the header just on page 6? Or feel like being sexy and having a single page in landscape or a different size?
Easy! Just make a bunch of separate documents, export them as PDFs, and merge them in Adobe Acrobat.
I agree lots of things about word sucks. But FYI single page landscape is achieved by using two section breaks. It’s not ideal, but its somewhat understandable given how styles are prioritized. I’ve tried others that work well, but they also suffer on things that word does well that we take for granted.
The way it should be handled is to just let me rotate a single fucking page. It’s 2025 and there is zero excuse for that bullshit.
Like I said, I agree it sucks. I’ve had the exact same thought many times.
I felt so happy to remember this >20 year old image when I saw the title of this post. I remember finding it very funny back then. Anyway, what’s the appraisal? Daddy needs a new pair of shoes.
would you send that to my mom please?
This why LibreOffice called out Microsoft for using “complex” file formats to lock in Office users
You using complex file formats for vendor lock in
Me using complex file formats because my code base is shite.
We are not the same
My favourite feature is the insanely counter-intuitive indenting and bullet points.
Used Microsoft Works in the early 2000’s. Only discontinued in 2009 apparently.
At one point, Microsoft was maintaining three different word processors.
- Word, the top of the line component of the flagship Office product
- Works, their “for home and small business” product that was honestly good enough for basically everyone, to the point you have to ask why anyone would buy Office, which is almost certainly why Works got canned, and
- Wordpad, because a GUI OS is basically useless without a rich text editor.
Where does Microsoft Write enter the equation?
Let me Wikipedia that for you…It was rolled into Wordpad circa Windows 95, and that write.exe is present in newer versions of Windows but it’s basically just a link to Wordpad.
According to Wikipedia, MS Write uses .wri files, which can be opened by LibreOffice 5.1 and later but not by any Microsoft software from Windows XP Service Pack 2 or later.
I was just being silly.
Well tough shit, I learned something anyway.
We all did!
If my memory serves, Write supported full text justification, but Wordpad only supported left, center and right justification. So any easy win for Write imo.
The real miracle isn’t Word’s features, it’s how it’s still the default after decades of collective pain.
Same reason Windows is still the default on desktop: EEE and vendor-lock.
Word is the proof that God exists and he’s still real fuckin’ pissy about that apple.
You can get word for apple
If you don’t use \LaTeX, that’s on you.
I expected Lemmy to be less repost-obsessed than Reddit yet here we are.
word documents are compatible with open office and I’ve been able to switch to open office at home with no impact on my ability to save them as .doc files and use them at work or school.
Never understood the attraction. It sucks.
I’m old enough to remember Microsoft Works.
I miss the simplicity of those days…
I member Corel Word-perfect…
I remember WordPerfect when it was still a DOS program. The simplicity of “this format code affects all text after it” was elegant.
And then we got Word foisted on us, with “this format code (which you have no way of viewing) affects the block of text before it” so if you accidentally delete or move that format code then you screw up a seemingly random bunch of text. And here we are.
I dunno, having two different word processors was kind of confusing
Three. Wordpad also existed.
Apple‘s office suite is the closest thing to it we have today I think.
