this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2023
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Even with an open format MS Office and LibreOffice and others have compatibility issues. Microsoft keeps certain features kind of exclusive to their solution and then there's the bigger picture called the Microsoft ecosystem. They are now very focused on that and that's really hard to beat.
This is true. But in reality, it still works.
And yes, the expansion of their Ecosystem is an issue. But to be honest: the cloud version works, and if I get a docx that is broken in Libreoffice, I use 365. At least I have this option.
It's a complicated topic with no real solution
The only real solution was to get something like Wine or some type of virtualization working better. We will never be able to beat Microsoft, their formats and ecosystem the alternatives will always lag behind in features and the web version isn't feasible for everything and everyone.
There is one alternative: anti monopoly legislation. Maybe, some day, if the EU gets their heads out of their asses, throw their privacy braking chat monitor out of the window, and start thinking again. In 30-40 years maybe
That's a very hard topic, how can you legislate features? The thing about ecosystems isn't just about Microsoft blocking others like they did in the past, ecosystems bring a TON of new issues, even if everything is open and based on open standards the open solutions might not implement all features. Also, where's the line? Simply opening a Word doc on LibreOffice and it works just fine, or also allowing for remote data served from Microsoft servers? Even if Microsoft allowed that data access from their severs wouldn't that turn LibreOffice into a client such as MS Office? What happens if Microsoft shutdowns or changes their API?