How Linux works:
"To get A, perform task B, which will allow C to emulate D, then compile E and F to create a tool that you can then run to work on getting A."
Five years ago, true, but it's no longer the case now. There are native Linux apps for just about everything. MS Office is lacking because MS doesn't want to give any support to Linux. There are alternatives though.
I've actually seen Linux people being canned at companies because they were spending too much time screwing around with their machines and not enough time just USING a premade tool to get billable work done.
Those folks would be canned for doing the same thing with Windows, Mac, or Sun.
Until you can walk into any major chain store and buy a universal office app that install with a quick, easy wizard installer, it's not ready for the mainstream.
Maybe not for mom and pop user, but for the business world, so much stuff is customized, not being able to buy it off the shelf at Best Buy means nothing. Very little on my computer right now is COTS.
If your hobbyist app does anything that makes it unreadable to a client...you just lost a contract and it'll go to someone who has no such incompatibility issues.
Sorry, not true in my experience. Even with mainstream apps, incompatible documents get created. There's a bit of give and take until a common format can be agreed upon. I work with odd, nonstandard formats all the time. It's no big deal to have a customer ask for a different format because it isn't compatible with their systems. This isn't limited to Office apps either. There are all sorts of file formats that must be transmuted into something else for customers or service providers.
A large portion of what I pass around is in formats other than those supported natively by Office. When was the last time you used Word to view a syslog file 500meg in size? Or run a query against a RADIUS accounting logfile? Dumped many LDAPs to Excel lately? Maybe you use Powerpoint to configure that VPN.
Chris