Removing OpenOffice Math from the Office menu
Henrik Nilsen Omma
henrik at ubuntu.com
Sun Feb 19 17:44:46 GMT 2006
Hi,
I tried writing some simple equations in OpenOffice Math today to be
used as examples in example-content [1]. First of all, it isn't very
good :( It's functionality is quite primitive, it's very sluggish and
its markup is dreadful. I haven't written equations in MS-Office for
years, but I seem to remember that even 10+ years ago MS-Word had a
better equation editor than this. In fact, didn't OpenOffice 1 have
something better? Can't remember. Anyway, enough ranting about the
program itself; not much we can do about it now. If you want to do any
serious work with equations you'll need to use LaTeX or LyX.
My real point is that we should remove it as an independent option from
the Office menu for the following reasons:
* The most practical way to include equations in your text documents is
to work in a text document in Writer and then choose Insert -> Object ->
Formula. You then get a new toolbar and a working area that lets you
enter an equation into your document. AFAIR this is also how it works in
MS-Office.
* You would never want to create a separate formula document. You would
enter one into an existing document as described above. I know you _can_
save it as a separate file, but the formula editor doesn't seem to cope
with plain text very well, so you wouldn't want to for any practical
purpose.
* In the File -> New menu formula isn't listed either, so it seems OOo
itself doesn't consider it a proper document type that you would want to
create.
* Finding Writer in the Applications -> Office menu is too difficult as
it is. Most people who are exploring the system for the first time are
going to look for Writer first (where is my Word? ... ) Perhaps the
items should be in the same order as in the File -> New menu and have
the same icons.
- Henrik
[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DapperExampleContent
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