Problem for the Day

[Dave2002]

I'm on Mojave, but I think most of my apps have now been upgraded to 64bit and I was contemplating moving up to Catalina when I started hearing about Big Sur. I will probably be replacing at least one of my machines soon, so that will take care of upgrades. It's printer software (and drivers) I'm more concerned about. A trip to Currys looms (Actually, I've bought at PC World and Currys without a problem - but always in-store).

I think you may have already migrated to MS Office 2016 or thereabouts, but if you haven't you should know that MS Office 2011 won't work on Catalina. That's a real shame for anyone who has a valid licence. One suggestion I had was to revert everything - using the backup - but I think this is going to have to happen sometime anyway, so reverting would be even more work. People who haven't already committed to Catalina should be aware of this, and think hard before clicking on any install button.

Otherwise it sounds as though you'll be OK, and the new machine(s) could be helpful too.

[french frank]

Yes, I'm on 2016. But they're ending support for that soon.

[Padraig]

Thanks for the advice. I restarted overnight, and here I am.

[Dave2002]

Yes, I'm on 2016. But they're ending support for that soon.

Did you get the full licence? I really dislike this move towards subscription models. It's possible that MS will remove the option to have an outright licence. Arguably the subscription model is not so bad if shared with family members, but for individuals who are not relying on the software for paid work I feel that subscriptions are the thin end of a rather nasty wedge.

I was once at a meeting I think chaired by someone who'd been at the Wharton School, and we were asked to consider various business strategies. Several emerged, but one struck me as devious and greedy. Several of us said it wasn't good, but the chair said it was OK - it would lead to better revenue. If we assume that "business is business" and "anything goes", then that's what we'll get.

[french frank]

Did you get the full licence?

Yes, I bought it with the new laptop, for three machines. I think it can be transferred to a new machine if removed from an old one. I keep getting notifications for Office 365 but don't see any need to change, and no, I don't like the idea of subscriptions. May even try fathoming Pages and Numbers which I haven't so far managed to do. :-)

[Dave2002]

May even try fathoming Pages and Numbers which I haven't so far managed to do. :-)

I've never really managed to get on with Numbers. It could just be unfamiliarity, or other bias, but I don't think it is. However I did use it a week or so back, and it wasn't quite as bad as I feared.

I have seen really good results with Keynote as a presentation tool compared with Powerpoint - but I think it requires a lot of work. The presentation I saw was extremely good - much better than anything I've been used to from Powerpoint.

For text I find that OpenOffice Writer is pretty good. Pages isn't bad, but probably not as intricate as Word/OpenOffice. I think it can give very good results, but may be a lot of work.

Where you need MS Office generally is when you are exchanging files with others - though for text I still tend to work in OpenOffice, and then convert to Word at the last step if I'm exporting to someone else.

[cloughie]

Now my problem for the afternoon - now sorted - was the non-receipt of an email. I was asked by the sender ‘Was I on her safe sender list?’ Not have a clue that such a thing existed I said so. It appears that most of the group she had emailed did not receive and hadn’t heard of the safe sender list either. Just wondered if other ‘boarders’ know of them or use them.

[Frances_iom]

these private lists of those they will accept mail from have been around for a long time especially amongst Americans - I often run into it as the way my website is set up I have a single email address which is receive only thus outgoing mail from me is received on a different address - catch is once the generally old + worried intended recipient never looks at their reject list and believes I haven't responded to their query re Manx history etc.