Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals
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@travisdh1 said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@stacksofplates said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
So installation is not a feature, they're both pretty much the same.
It's a huge feature. That it is built into most OSes, and that we can install with just a command line from Windows (Chocolatey), and in all OSes get auto-updates that "just work"... it's a whopping feature.
That you even have to go somewhere to get MS Office is more work than installing LibreOffice. That's big IT time, over and over again to deal with.
You can install most versions of MS Office with Chocolatey now. Found it the other day and rejoiced that I no longer have to deal with ODT.
Make a thread with instructions!
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@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@travisdh1 said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@stacksofplates said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
So installation is not a feature, they're both pretty much the same.
It's a huge feature. That it is built into most OSes, and that we can install with just a command line from Windows (Chocolatey), and in all OSes get auto-updates that "just work"... it's a whopping feature.
That you even have to go somewhere to get MS Office is more work than installing LibreOffice. That's big IT time, over and over again to deal with.
You can install most versions of MS Office with Chocolatey now. Found it the other day and rejoiced that I no longer have to deal with ODT.
Make a thread with instructions!
You are slightly less excited than I was, lol.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@stacksofplates said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
Forked so that you guys can have your discussion our of nowhere about a perceived resentment to closed source solutions based, I presume, on the fact that some of us don't like one or two pieces of software that happens to be closed rather than on anything stated. The original topic was about IT professionals vs. people who hire IT professionals and don't do any IT themselves, but somehow this thread on software got added to it. So it's forked so now you can talk about this perceived resentment.
The original post was about IT buying vs doing. Purchasing software to ease IT burden is 100% related to that. Not sure why you keep saying this.
Because that's not what is being discussed. It's about having "someone else" make the IT decisions, including the decisions to buy software. Software might ease IT burden, or make it worse. It software isn't "doing IT". And it's buying "IT", not "IT tools" being discussed.
It's directly related because you don't have to be an IT professional to purchase O365 and understand it provides many advantages like email, OneDrive, messaging, office suite, etc all in one package. You will still need to buy IT labor to run it, but alot less labor than separate custom solutions and a somewhat predictable monthly bill for service and labor.
Also Office 365 is more widely supported by other companies providing IT. Which is huge if relationships ever go sour.
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@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
It's directly related because you don't have to be an IT professional to purchase O365
How is O365 IT? It's a product or service, but it's not IT. IT is the overseeing of business infrastructure. I covered this, a bit already, buying a product, like a plunger, and hiring a plumber are two different things. Entirely.
The thread was solely about IT, not IT products. The decision to buy O365, the planning around it can be done blindly, or with IT evaluating it. The question isn't about O365, but the decision process around deciding on it.
I think my point is being made for me. You can see that what is the core function of IT... the designing of the infrastructure of business, the evaluation of needs, the alignment of tech to the business' goals... is so foreign that we can't even discuss it without turning our attention to "products" rather than the act of doing the thing IT is there to do.
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@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
Also Office 365 is more widely supported by other companies providing IT. Which is huge if relationships ever go sour.
This is related to the evaluation process, which is great, but the original question was about "doing the evaluation" or "buying the evaluation."
Actually, I like how that is phrased. I'm going to copy that over there.
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@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
You will still need to buy IT labor to run it, but alot less labor than separate custom solutions and a somewhat predictable monthly bill for service and labor.
Sure, that later stage of the IT. But it takes way more IT skill and experience to evaluate products, services, approaches, alignment with needs, etc. than to operate a product. Especially one like O365 where there is loads of documentation and often SaaS behind the scenes doing a lot of the hard stuff.
To properly compare and think about costs, long term labor, lock in, formats, end user support, and all of the kinds of things that we have discussed... all of that should be stuff being considered before choices are made. And honestly, understanding it and putting it all together is much, much harder than logging into O365 and provisioning some users. That why one piece is a senior IT role and the other is often a helpdesk one (assuming helpdesk is roughly entry level in the org.)
This is what my original thread was about. Not outsourcing products or buying products. But rather making the decision of what to buy and/or do vs buying the decision of what to them buy and/or do.
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No resentment from me when it comes to purchasing software, I have more of resentment for those who buys or suckered into expensive or cheap ass software.
I'll provide FOSS as an option if it makes sence.
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@black3dynamite said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
No resentment from me when it comes to purchasing software, I have more of resentment for those who buys or suckered into expensive or cheap ass software.
This is the same as me. I have a thing for "doing good IT work, and evaluating the needs as is our career path, and picking the right solution for the task at hand." Many times, that's CSS, many time that's OSS.
But it sure feels like if you ever end up choosing OSS, even just once in a while, that you are branded as a crazy person who won't consider anything else.
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@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
@IRJ said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
So you have to go to your NTG or whatever IT labor you use and open your pockets at $150-300 an hour when you have an issue.
The obvious examples would be things like Windows or MS Office vs. Ubuntu or LibreOffice.
I seriously have to question if people who like LibreOffice actually use it for business. It is terrible at so many things. This is coming from someone who has used an Ubuntu workstation with LibreOffice for the last 6 years while working for multiple companies. Microsoft Office is 1000x better, and makes collaboration much easier. I have spent so much time trying to get LibreOffice to work or read MS office documents (that everyone else uses), and there has been nothing but issues. Not to mention LibreOffice is slower than MS Office by a good margin. If you work with big documents, LibreOffice is a dog.
I like both but I'm not exactly a power user when it comes to using Office products like LibreOffice or Microsoft Office, so my use of them works pretty well but if Microsoft made a desktop version for Linux, I'll probably buy it.
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@black3dynamite said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
@IRJ said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
So you have to go to your NTG or whatever IT labor you use and open your pockets at $150-300 an hour when you have an issue.
The obvious examples would be things like Windows or MS Office vs. Ubuntu or LibreOffice.
I seriously have to question if people who like LibreOffice actually use it for business. It is terrible at so many things. This is coming from someone who has used an Ubuntu workstation with LibreOffice for the last 6 years while working for multiple companies. Microsoft Office is 1000x better, and makes collaboration much easier. I have spent so much time trying to get LibreOffice to work or read MS office documents (that everyone else uses), and there has been nothing but issues. Not to mention LibreOffice is slower than MS Office by a good margin. If you work with big documents, LibreOffice is a dog.
I like both but I'm not exactly a power user when it comes to using Office products like LibreOffice or Microsoft Office, so my use of them works pretty well but if Microsoft made a desktop version for Linux, I'll probably buy it.
I wouldn't here, but I have loads of customers for whom MS Office on Ubuntu would be an acceptable compromise as often their only Windows dependency is MS Office and only that because of some automation from some other application.
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@stacksofplates said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
GNOME would crash and they'd have to hard reboot. You're looking at this through a person who understands these things, not the normal office worker who has no experience with it.
Windows crashes pretty constantly, and provides no insight to the user or even the IT person investigating why.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@black3dynamite said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
@IRJ said in When Does It Stop Even Being IT: Buyers vs Doers:
So you have to go to your NTG or whatever IT labor you use and open your pockets at $150-300 an hour when you have an issue.
The obvious examples would be things like Windows or MS Office vs. Ubuntu or LibreOffice.
I seriously have to question if people who like LibreOffice actually use it for business. It is terrible at so many things. This is coming from someone who has used an Ubuntu workstation with LibreOffice for the last 6 years while working for multiple companies. Microsoft Office is 1000x better, and makes collaboration much easier. I have spent so much time trying to get LibreOffice to work or read MS office documents (that everyone else uses), and there has been nothing but issues. Not to mention LibreOffice is slower than MS Office by a good margin. If you work with big documents, LibreOffice is a dog.
I like both but I'm not exactly a power user when it comes to using Office products like LibreOffice or Microsoft Office, so my use of them works pretty well but if Microsoft made a desktop version for Linux, I'll probably buy it.
I wouldn't here, but I have loads of customers for whom MS Office on Ubuntu would be an acceptable compromise as often their only Windows dependency is MS Office and only that because of some automation from some other application.
If there is a desktop version of MS Office for Linux (actually only Excel), we would remove Windows OS from our office desktops and laptops (30 workstations).
We use LibreOffice on other 25 POS PC's, but on them, we need Windows for POS software.
So - we gladly buy MS Office where we need it, but I would be happy that we don't need WIndows because of all troubles with updates -
In our case, we still use old MS Office 2010. We do not have troubles with it. We don't pay for it monthly. We can buy additional licenses for 50 EUR (used, we're in EU). Also we can't replace it with LibreOffice without huge costs (macros...)
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@DustinB3403 said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@stacksofplates said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
GNOME would crash and they'd have to hard reboot. You're looking at this through a person who understands these things, not the normal office worker who has no experience with it.
Windows crashes pretty constantly, and provides no insight to the user or even the IT person investigating why.
THis is ridiculous, but my Gnome literally crashed while I was reading this, LMAO. But it was only a flicker. Thankfully Gnome crashes are often missed if you don't happen to be looking at the screen at the time. It tends to recover well.
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@Mario-Jakovina said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
In our case, we still use old MS Office 2010. We do not have troubles with it. We don't pay for it monthly. We can buy additional licenses for 50 EUR (used, we're in EU). Also we can't replace it with LibreOffice without huge costs (macros...)
Well, that is also bad IT practice. The software is not longer supported, doesn't have any further security updates. The fact it has worked is great but the major Windows 10 Updates since 1703 with Office 2010 have been a pain.
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@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
You will still need to buy IT labor to run it, but alot less labor than separate custom solutions and a somewhat predictable monthly bill for service and labor.
Sure, that later stage of the IT. But it takes way more IT skill and experience to evaluate products, services, approaches, alignment with needs, etc. than to operate a product. Especially one like O365 where there is loads of documentation and often SaaS behind the scenes doing a lot of the hard stuff.
To properly compare and think about costs, long term labor, lock in, formats, end user support, and all of the kinds of things that we have discussed... all of that should be stuff being considered before choices are made. And honestly, understanding it and putting it all together is much, much harder than logging into O365 and provisioning some users. That why one piece is a senior IT role and the other is often a helpdesk one (assuming helpdesk is roughly entry level in the org.)
This is what my original thread was about. Not outsourcing products or buying products. But rather making the decision of what to buy and/or do vs buying the decision of what to them buy and/or do.
So are you saying that for each customer you have you wan to manage their NextCloud instance, all their Linux machines and the syncing issues that might arise and not even counting the countless issues I encounter with people working with Libre Office or OpenOffice and their Java dependency.
So if you wanted to have an efficient setup you would use Office 365 to take care of the documents in Sharepoint (Centralized File Server if you would like to compare), Give the users their own One Drive with both Web and Local Office software and you wouldn't touch the server or the clients for updates unless they disable it. That would have also included OneNote to take notes, Teams to collaborate and so many other options. So That in itself makes a company spend less and actually if you want to do IT work for Microsoft or another cloud vendor and just do what you call "IT" Then go for it but lets not pretend that hosting your systems is cheaper and less problematic.
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@dbeato said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@scottalanmiller said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@IRJ said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
You will still need to buy IT labor to run it, but alot less labor than separate custom solutions and a somewhat predictable monthly bill for service and labor.
Sure, that later stage of the IT. But it takes way more IT skill and experience to evaluate products, services, approaches, alignment with needs, etc. than to operate a product. Especially one like O365 where there is loads of documentation and often SaaS behind the scenes doing a lot of the hard stuff.
To properly compare and think about costs, long term labor, lock in, formats, end user support, and all of the kinds of things that we have discussed... all of that should be stuff being considered before choices are made. And honestly, understanding it and putting it all together is much, much harder than logging into O365 and provisioning some users. That why one piece is a senior IT role and the other is often a helpdesk one (assuming helpdesk is roughly entry level in the org.)
This is what my original thread was about. Not outsourcing products or buying products. But rather making the decision of what to buy and/or do vs buying the decision of what to them buy and/or do.
So are you saying that for each customer you have you wan to manage their NextCloud instance, all their Linux machines and the syncing issues that might arise and not even counting the countless issues I encounter with people working with Libre Office or OpenOffice and their Java dependency.
So if you wanted to have an efficient setup you would use Office 365 to take care of the documents in Sharepoint (Centralized File Server if you would like to compare), Give the users their own One Drive with both Web and Local Office software and you wouldn't touch the server or the clients for updates unless they disable it. That would have also included OneNote to take notes, Teams to collaborate and so many other options. So That in itself makes a company spend less and actually if you want to do IT work for Microsoft or another cloud vendor and just do what you call "IT" Then go for it but lets not pretend that hosting your systems is cheaper and less problematic.
Likewise let's not pretend that Office 365 'just works' or requires a small amount of support. It's very trite to act like NextCloud is hard and has all these problems. I'm not fooled, I support customers on both and trust me, Office 365 is the one that makes me more money. Neither is problem free. IT is hard, it takes work. But all the acting like Office 365 is stable, safe, or easy.... lol. That's just crazy.
Let's see, just this week one customer had to hire someone to sit in their office and train them how to use it because the end user experience was too much to handle, one (very large) had to hire us to fix their hundreds of broken accounts, another (yesterday) brought us in because it was hacked and shut off on them, another paid us to fix their system at a registry level because their install was corrupt, another brought us in to fix their install because they had accidentally clicked on a link on Microsoft's own site and it corrupted their Office install and they couldn't get it back...
Sure, if I was only focused on how much money I could get from clients and didn't care about evaluating their needs, I could just push O365. It pays the IT bills like nobody's business. But I can't wear by IT hat and do good by my customers if I don't take into consideration that it generally costs them more to license OR support O365 than it costs to have us run something else for them. That's right BOTH parts cost more, in most cases. That doesn't mean that it isn't the right tool for a lot of customers, but I sure don't look the other way and pretend it's a solid, stable product just so that I can bill more hours. They pay me to tell them like it is and do a real evaluation.
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@dbeato remember internally we moved away from O365 because it was faster to build a new platform of our own and migrate than to wait while MS fixed an account outage. It was literally easier to get to something else than to stay. The cost savings was just a bonus (a big bonus.)
We were so glad, we had not realized how much unnecessary work and problems we were having being on O365. I feel like everyone that claims that it "just works" has stopped evaluating and just imagines that it is easier because they are paying so much that they are terrified to check if the emperor is really clothed or not.
We run NextCloud internally, and most of our customers are on O365. I can tell you, when it's MY money on the line, I'm not tempted, not one bit. I'd be a freaking idiot to move my own company to O365. Maybe people are comfortable doing it when it's other people's money, but how many people recommending it are also willing to put their money where their mouths are and pay for that for dozens of staffers out of their own pocket rather than just getting paid hourly for when things fail.
It's very, very different when you feel the pain of the licensing cost and the pain of the outages and the pain of the training, rather than benefiting from the extra work it generates.
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@dbeato said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
Well, that is also bad IT practice. The software is not longer supported, doesn't have any further security updates. The fact it has worked is great but the major Windows 10 Updates since 1703 with Office 2010 have been a pain.
Windows 10 Updates are huge pain for us unrelated to Office 2010.
I know most of you here will say that using Office 2010 is bad practice.
What would be good practice in our case?
Buy Office 2013. seven years ago, then Office 2016, now 2019 or move to O365 and spend additional money monthly?
Or leave MS Office completely which is most expensive for us (at least for now)?
(Online only is not acceptable for us)I don't see that we suffer from "bad practice" of not buying newer versions of Office
We do slowly move our Excel-VBA solutions to other solutions (custom apps...) but we do it when we make new versions of solutions, not just to move from Office ASAP -
@Mario-Jakovina said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
@dbeato said in Resentment to Purchasing Software - Split From Unrelated Topic on IT Professionals:
Well, that is also bad IT practice. The software is not longer supported, doesn't have any further security updates. The fact it has worked is great but the major Windows 10 Updates since 1703 with Office 2010 have been a pain.
Windows 10 Updates are huge pain for us unrelated to Office 2010.
I know most of you here will say that using Office 2010 is bad practice.
What would be good practice in our case?
Buy Office 2013. seven years ago, then Office 2016, now 2019 or move to O365 and spend additional money monthly?
Or leave MS Office completely which is most expensive for us (at least for now)?
(Online only is not acceptable for us)I don't see that we suffer from "bad practice" of not buying newer versions of Office
We do slowly move our Excel-VBA solutions to other solutions (custom apps...) but we do it when we make new versions of solutions, not just to move from Office ASAPThis might be out of the subject of the topic and can be forked if needed. However do you think running Windows XP is a security Risk? Do you think running Windows 7 is a security risk any longer? If the answer to both it also makes it the same for Office 2010 then with the end of life ending on 10/13/2020. That is 10 years of the software being supported.
The best practice would have been to move to the Office 365 plan that includes Office either the Microsoft 365 Apps (if you want only the application) or Office 365 Business Standard. That way your systems are updated throughout that whole period.
If you wanted to move away from Office you would have done so a while ago since a higher cost at the beginning of a migration is expected but the longer you run with a newer platform you probably would benefit of what your company is looking for and which is why they are looking for custom apps.
