On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 19:08:00 -0500, -hh wrote:

> I have a colleague who's done some amazing stuff in Excel using Visual
> Basic Script (VBS); the PC I had at the time would fail just trying to
> load the files; his beefy machine he had would take literally hours to
> crunch through a set. A quick search shows that I still have an older
> copy: it takes up 14.34GB on disk. Youch.

How much data was involved, really? I suspect a more sensible app would
deal with the same data much more efficiently and easily.

On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 18:50:42 -0500, -hh wrote:

> There also was Encapsulated Postscript (EPS) too...

PostScript was a big deal, back in the day when desktop/workstation
machines had more primitive graphics stacks. EPS was a way of embedding
such graphics in a form that they could be sent to a printer that
understood PostScript, from a machine which did not.

Think of PDF as being the PostScript graphics model without the actual
PostScript programming language.

On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 22:30:53 -0600, Char Jackson wrote:

> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 19:08:00 -0500, -hh <recscuba_google@huntzinger.com>
> wrote:
>
>>I have a colleague who's done some amazing stuff in Excel using Visual
>>Basic Script (VBS); the PC I had at the time would fail just trying to
>>load the files; his beefy machine he had would take literally hours to
>>crunch through a set. A quick search shows that I still have an older
>>copy: it takes up 14.34GB on disk. Youch.
>
> I assume you meant to say VBA, Visual Basic for Applications, which is
> built into each of the major MS Office applications?

Possibly, but there was a VBScript.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VBScript

I used JScript which was similar to JavaScript but Microsoft didn't want
to butt heads with Sun. They had been down that road with Visual J++. You
could use either with Windows Script Host.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Script_Host

and make COM calls against the applications that supported it. For example
I used it in conjunction with EagleView (now Pictometry). Given the
latitude and longitude of an incident I could create a URL referencing the
EagleView server, instantiate a connection to IE, and call the
NavigateTo() function with the URL. The relevant page would come up in IE.

It was a long way around the barn but it was easier than trying to
incorporate COM into an existing application. That was a very simple use
but you could make calls to any functionality exposed as COM. That whole
technology goes back to OLE and DDE.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_Linking_and_Embedding

Very powerful but as it was designed to work with VisualBasic the data
structures were the wierd Basic things like BSTRs.

On Mon, 30 Dec 2024 04:55:20 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

> PostScript was a big deal, back in the day when desktop/workstation
> machines had more primitive graphics stacks. EPS was a way of embedding
> such graphics in a form that they could be sent to a printer that
> understood PostScript, from a machine which did not.

And then there is Ghostscript... One of our applications that prints
reports sniffs at the document to determine if it's PS, then checks the
configuration of the printer to see if it can handle PS. If not, it spawns
Ghostscript to massage it into something the printer can handle. Great
fun.

CrudeSausage <crude@sausa.ge> wrote:
> Le 2024-12-21 à 03:52, Mr. Man-wai Chang a écrit :
>> On 20/12/2024 9:03 am, CrudeSausage wrote:
>>> <https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-365-users-
>>> hit-by-random-product-deactivation-errors/>
>>>
>>> ​Microsoft is investigating a known issue triggering "Product
>>> Deactivated" errors for customers using Microsoft 365 Office apps.
>>>
>>
>> It's not about "owning the software", but whether it requires a real-
>> time online account to work. The usual words are "standalone" and
>> "offline". :)
>
> The moment you require an online account to verify if you are the person
> who bought the software, you don't own it.

You've never "owned" software, afaia. At best, you own a licence which
allows you to use the software within the terms of the licence. If you
break the terms then you can lose the right to use the software.

Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> On 2024-12-29 07:58, rbowman wrote:
>> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 01:43:11 +0000, Ant wrote:
>>
>>> What do you use to edit/create documents and spreadsheets with others?
>>
>> I don't. Anything I create is done with Vim. For external use we have tech
>> writers that make it pretty. My attempts to edit RFPs with LibreOffice
>> don't work well, so I either use Vim and reference the sections or print
>> relevant pages and use a pen.
>
> Amazing that none of you has mentioned latex. You can edit documents
> with vi.

Writing direct latex is quite a learning curve. I prefer markdown for
simple documents which can be converted to pdf or docx as needed with
pandoc.

Markdown is also great for embedding interpretable code which can be
evaluated when knitted or compiled. Perfect for writing data reports as
part of a workflow.

Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
> On 2024-12-28 15:12, Joel wrote:
>> Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>>> On 2024-12-28 14:34, rbowman wrote:
>>>>
>>>> You do realize there is a whole world outside of Office?
>>>
>>> Yeah, it sometimes pains me that it is brought up as often as it is as
>>> some sort of must-have piece of software. It suggests that people don't
>>> do much other than open up Word and Excel.
>>
>>
>> Yes, they get these people to buy a laptop every three years, to keep
>> up with M$'s grotesque OS's bloat, so that they can have their pretty
>> Office apps. It's unbelievable. The value I'm getting from my
>> computer is beyond what they could know.
>
> I was telling my wife the exact same thing. We're not doing much more
> than we were in 2008, yet a 2008 machine would be incapable of handling
> today's software (unless it's running Linux). At some point, people need
> to wake up and realize that the exponential increase in speed isn't
> offering any real benefit to users who are doing anything other than
> video editing or gaming.

In a domestic setting, that's true. Much less so professionally. A 2008
machine wouldn't be able to run Teams, for example. Or manage the majority
of creative, technical or scientific tasks we take for granted nowadays.

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
> On 29 Dec 2024 19:44:19 GMT, Mark Lloyd wrote:
>
>> On 29 Dec 2024 00:53:43 GMT, rbowman wrote:
>>
>> [snip]
>>
>>> Is that progress? Beat's me. I was at a museum that had a display of
>>> the development of household labor saving devices. It noted that when
>>> housewives received all these new time savers they tended to find new
>>> things to spend the saved time on.
>>
>> Including ridiculous standards for "clean".
>
> The need to instantly refrigerate everything is the one that gets me. For
> one reason or the other I've had periods without a refrigerator. A dozen
> eggs sitting on the counter won't hatch or go bad for a week or two.

Depends on the ambient temperature. Which is the benefit of refrigeration;
lifetime of food is more predictable.

-hh <recscuba_google@huntzinger.com> wrote:
> On 12/29/24 4:00 PM, rbowman wrote:
>> On 29 Dec 2024 16:39:41 GMT, Frank Slootweg wrote:
>>
>>> And of course I still get the occasional .doc[x] attachment from
>>> someone who only *needs* a note-taking program, but only *has* (or knows
>>> how to use) Word. Luckily my current Windows 11 seems to grok such
>>> files, at least I didn't have to install LibreOffice since I got it,
>>> over two years ago. Knock on wood.
>>
>> That's my annoyance with Excel. Any xls document I've ever gotten was a
>> freeform notepad with handy rows. I can't recall ever getting a xls where
>> there were any manipulations on the cells. When all you know how to use is
>> a hammer...
>
> That's a very common 'organizer' use case.
>
> I have some analytically based Excel stuff; it can get involved to build
> in certain types of logic (like "last entry" instead of "MAX"). Ditto
> for cell formatting which doesn't break from "divide by [no data]". I
> don't know how many cells it is, but a couple are over 1MB in size,
> including one with 21 tabs plus links to pull in data from other
> spreadsheets.
>
> I have a colleague who's done some amazing stuff in Excel using Visual
> Basic Script (VBS); the PC I had at the time would fail just trying to
> load the files; his beefy machine he had would take literally hours to
> crunch through a set. A quick search shows that I still have an older
> copy: it takes up 14.34GB on disk. Youch.

Sounds horribly inefficient and virtually impossible to debug. I'd bet a
decent python script would do it in minutes, with a tiny footprint and be
reliable.

Joel wrote:
> "I obviously have some emotional issues."
>
>

https://postimg.cc/dh0Q46jq

Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> On 2024-12-29 21:41, Frank Slootweg wrote:
> > Carlos E.R. <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
> > [...]
> >
> >> Amazing that none of you has mentioned latex.
> >
> > This isn't that kind of group!
>
> Latex is software :-P

Obviously, but as you used all lowercase, it screamed for a pun. And
of course, it's 'LaTeX'.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LaTeX>

On 2024-12-29 21:49, Joel wrote:
> sticks <wolverine01@charter.net> wrote:
>
>>>> "Precious hardware"
>>>>
>>>> That's funny
>>>
>>> It's my baby, yes, I have an emotional attachment to my computer, I
>>> assembled it. M$ crapware, other than such for Linux, can step off.
>>
>> Fine, you obviously have some emotional issues. I don't really give a
>> shit what you call or how you feel attached to your computer. Have at
>> it weirdo. I'm still laffing at you.
>>
>>>> --
>>>> I Stand With Israel!
>>>
>>> "That's funny."
>>
>> Now that you Linux guys have completely taken a shit on the win11 group,
>> you're now stooping to commenting on sig files. I manage to only use 4
>> words to get my point across. You on the other hand have written a
>> short essay for yours. Kinda fits your character.
>>
>> FWIW, I got no problem with the way the normal people talk about Linux
>> here. One of our favorites in this group regularly uses it for things
>> and shares his experiences. He even manages to point out the flaws and
>> problems with the various microsoft operating systems. Everybody
>> appreciates the education a handful of people in these groups give us.
>>
>> What they don't do is rave on an on about how horrible microsoft is at
>> every chance they get and advocate Linux above all else in a fucking
>> windows newsgroup. We're here to learn about Windows 11 and if Linux
>> can be of use in sorting things out great. But you can take your Linux
>> pom poms and wear yourself out in your advocacy group. It's just
>> getting a little old around here IMO. Other than that....Fuck Off!
>
>
> "You obviously have some emotional issues."

Ignore him. Looking back, I had an emotional attachment to the Powerbook
G4 I used in the early 2000s and still remember my MSI GT72 very fondly.

Meanwhile, he wants to learn about Windows 11. Good for him. The rest of
us want to be educated on why a majority of AMD-powered computers in the
wild will be forced to suffer fTPM stuttering even three years after the
problem surfaced because Microsoft won't ease up on the TPM requirement
and manufacturers don't want to deploy an update for the machines
they've sold.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
Telegram: @AndrzejMatuch
Zephyrus G14 GA401QM on Fedora 41
KDE supporting member

On 2024-12-29 23:51, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 18:46:59 -0500, -hh wrote:
>
>> On 12/29/24 5:55 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>
>>> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 13:16:57 -0500, -hh wrote:
>>>
>>>> If I optionally choose to add photo editing, a new license for Adobe
>>>> Photoshop Elements is currently $70 for 3 years, which is ~$2/month.
>>>
>>> And you have to keep paying for the rest of your life just to retain
>>> control over your own work.
>>
>> That's only true if no non-Adobe apps can open Adobe's .psd file
>> format ...
>
> And assuming that Adobe doesn’t keep making tweaks to its proprietary
> format precisely to sabotage other apps’ ability to open the files
> correctly.

And nobody can deny that this issue remains as much of a problem in 2024
as it was in the late 90s. Corporations don't see a profit in supporting
open standards so they will allow their software to read them, but will
save in their own proprietary formats.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
Telegram: @AndrzejMatuch
Zephyrus G14 GA401QM on Fedora 41
KDE supporting member

On 2024-12-30 03:24, Chris wrote:
> CrudeSausage <crude@sausa.ge> wrote:
>> Le 2024-12-21 à 03:52, Mr. Man-wai Chang a écrit :
>>> On 20/12/2024 9:03 am, CrudeSausage wrote:
>>>> <https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-365-users-
>>>> hit-by-random-product-deactivation-errors/>
>>>>
>>>> ​Microsoft is investigating a known issue triggering "Product
>>>> Deactivated" errors for customers using Microsoft 365 Office apps.
>>>>
>>>
>>> It's not about "owning the software", but whether it requires a real-
>>> time online account to work. The usual words are "standalone" and
>>> "offline". :)
>>
>> The moment you require an online account to verify if you are the person
>> who bought the software, you don't own it.
>
> You've never "owned" software, afaia. At best, you own a licence which
> allows you to use the software within the terms of the licence. If you
> break the terms then you can lose the right to use the software.

It's pretty easy to own the software if you use open-source, to be
honest. You have access to the code and can do as you wish with it as
long as you agree to share your modifications with the people who
offered it to you. That's as good as it gets outside of producing your
own program.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
Telegram: @AndrzejMatuch
Zephyrus G14 GA401QM on Fedora 41
KDE supporting member

On 2024-12-30 03:24, Chris wrote:
> Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>> On 2024-12-28 15:12, Joel wrote:
>>> Andrzej Matuch <andrzej@matu.ch> wrote:
>>>> On 2024-12-28 14:34, rbowman wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> You do realize there is a whole world outside of Office?
>>>>
>>>> Yeah, it sometimes pains me that it is brought up as often as it is as
>>>> some sort of must-have piece of software. It suggests that people don't
>>>> do much other than open up Word and Excel.
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes, they get these people to buy a laptop every three years, to keep
>>> up with M$'s grotesque OS's bloat, so that they can have their pretty
>>> Office apps. It's unbelievable. The value I'm getting from my
>>> computer is beyond what they could know.
>>
>> I was telling my wife the exact same thing. We're not doing much more
>> than we were in 2008, yet a 2008 machine would be incapable of handling
>> today's software (unless it's running Linux). At some point, people need
>> to wake up and realize that the exponential increase in speed isn't
>> offering any real benefit to users who are doing anything other than
>> video editing or gaming.
>
> In a domestic setting, that's true. Much less so professionally. A 2008
> machine wouldn't be able to run Teams, for example. Or manage the majority
> of creative, technical or scientific tasks we take for granted nowadays.

A 2008 machine won't be able to run Teams, but that's not the fault of
the hardware as much as the bloated nature of Microsoft's software
itself. For what it's worth, my wife's 2015 Intel Core M couldn't run
Teams either.

--
Andrzej (Andre) Matuch
Telegram: @AndrzejMatuch
Zephyrus G14 GA401QM on Fedora 41
KDE supporting member

On 12/30/24 2:00 AM, rbowman wrote:
> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 22:30:53 -0600, Char Jackson wrote:
>
>> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 19:08:00 -0500, -hh <recscuba_google@huntzinger.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> I have a colleague who's done some amazing stuff in Excel using Visual
>>> Basic Script (VBS); the PC I had at the time would fail just trying to
>>> load the files; his beefy machine he had would take literally hours to
>>> crunch through a set. A quick search shows that I still have an older
>>> copy: it takes up 14.34GB on disk. Youch.
>>
>> I assume you meant to say VBA, Visual Basic for Applications, which is
>> built into each of the major MS Office applications?
>
> Possibly, but there was a VBScript.
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VBScript

To be honest, I don't know ... I'd have to go ask which one ... although
knowing this person, I'd not be surprised if they used both.

At the time, this spreadsheet model was a "sanity" distraction while
worrying through his son's cancer treatments; in one summer he used it
to make $80K by day-trades on the Stock Market .. it helped to pay down
the medical bills. I laughed when he commiserated that the biggest
shortcoming the model had was that it was predicting up to two (2) days
in advance, which made it tricky to use.

-hh

On 12/29/24 11:52 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
> On Sun, 29 Dec 2024 19:08:00 -0500, -hh wrote:
>
>> I have a colleague who's done some amazing stuff in Excel using Visual
>> Basic Script (VBS); the PC I had at the time would fail just trying to
>> load the files; his beefy machine he had would take literally hours to
>> crunch through a set. A quick search shows that I still have an older
>> copy: it takes up 14.34GB on disk. Youch.
>
> How much data was involved, really? I suspect a more sensible app would
> deal with the same data much more efficiently and easily.

There was a pretty modest chunk of data ... maybe just 1000 unique data
points?

What made it large & computationally intensive was that the dataset was
routed iteratively through a ~dozen different "Monte Carlo" statistical
exercises and filters to identify & glean signal from noise.

He has expressed that he should rewrite it in {some flavor of C}, but
there were reasons why it originated in Excel: it was a personal
spin-off from the original application which was a work project, and
that (smaller) model ended up going through a M&S for ~10 million design
permutations.

-hh

On 12/27/2024 9:23 AM, Mr. Man-wai Chang wrote:
> On 26/12/2024 4:39 am, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>
>> As a programmer, I like to use powerful and versatile tools. That
>> includes
>> the ability to automate workflow.
>>
>> Tools exist for this purpose, like odfpy for ISO 26300 files, which are
>> the native format of LibreOffice. And LibreOffice itself can run Python
>> code.
>
> My programming tasks has never ever needed to automate Office using VBA.

If you ever do need to automate office software or build custom
applications, you'll find that MS Office and VBA is extremely superior
to ALL other office software.

WordPerfect and LibreOffice also offer some automation/programmability,
but not nearly at the level of MS Office.

On 12/21/2024 7:26 AM, CrudeSausage wrote:

> The moment you require an online account to verify if you are the person
> who bought the software, you don't own it.

You don't own GuhNoo-GPL software either. The only sofware you actually
own is stuff you write for yourself, or that you get copyright to.

You don't own public domain stuff, either.

On 12/28/2024 3:07 PM, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> Yeah, it sometimes pains me that it is brought up as often as it is as
> some sort of must-have piece of software. It suggests that people don't
> do much other than open up Word and Excel.

Why are you whining about MS Office, when Larry Duh brought up
LibreOffice first (in this thread)?

Besides which, hundreds of millions of people live and die by MS Office
at work.

On Mon, 12/30/2024 8:31 AM, Andrzej Matuch wrote:
> On 2024-12-29 21:49, Joel wrote:
>> sticks <wolverine01@charter.net> wrote:
>>
>>>>> "Precious hardware"
>>>>>
>>>>> That's funny
>>>>
>>>> It's my baby, yes, I have an emotional attachment to my computer, I
>>>> assembled it.  M$ crapware, other than such for Linux, can step off.
>>>
>>> Fine, you obviously have some emotional issues.  I don't really give a
>>> shit what you call or how you feel attached to your computer.  Have at
>>> it weirdo.  I'm still laffing at you.
>>>
>>>>> -- 
>>>>> I Stand With Israel!
>>>>
>>>> "That's funny."
>>>
>>> Now that you Linux guys have completely taken a shit on the win11 group,
>>> you're now stooping to commenting on sig files.  I manage to only use 4
>>> words to get my point across.  You on the other hand have written a
>>> short essay for yours.  Kinda fits your character.
>>>
>>> FWIW, I got no problem with the way the normal people talk about Linux
>>> here.  One of our favorites in this group regularly uses it for things
>>> and shares his experiences.  He even manages to point out the flaws and
>>> problems with the various microsoft operating systems.  Everybody
>>> appreciates the education a handful of people in these groups give us.
>>>
>>> What they don't do is rave on an on about how horrible microsoft is at
>>> every chance they get and advocate Linux above all else in a fucking
>>> windows newsgroup.  We're here to learn about Windows 11 and if Linux
>>> can be of use in sorting things out great.  But you can take your Linux
>>> pom poms and wear yourself out in your advocacy group.  It's just
>>> getting a little old around here IMO.  Other than that....Fuck Off!
>>
>>
>> "You obviously have some emotional issues."
>
> Ignore him. Looking back, I had an emotional attachment to the Powerbook G4 I used in the early 2000s and still remember my MSI GT72 very fondly.
>
> Meanwhile, he wants to learn about Windows 11. Good for him. The rest of us want to be educated on why a majority of AMD-powered computers in the wild will be forced to suffer fTPM stuttering even three years after the problem surfaced because Microsoft won't ease up on the TPM requirement and manufacturers don't want to deploy an update for the machines they've sold.
>

We wave "Hi" from the Windows group :-)

https://www.ghacks.net/2022/06/27/bypass-windows-11-microsoft-account-requirement-and-deny-privacy-questions-during-setup-with-rufus/

"Remove requirement for Secure Boot and TPM 2.0"

Happy motoring!

Paul

On Mon, 30 Dec 2024 19:12:32 -0500, Paul wrote:

> https://www.ghacks.net/2022/06/27/bypass-windows-11-microsoft-account-requirement-and-deny-privacy-questions-during-setup-with-rufus/
>
> "Remove requirement for Secure Boot and TPM 2.0"

This is why they say, Windows is a great OS -- if your time is worth
nothing.

On Mon, 30 Dec 2024 13:01:13 -0500, -hh wrote:

> On 12/29/24 11:52 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>
>> How much data was involved, really? I suspect a more sensible app would
>> deal with the same data much more efficiently and easily.
>
> There was a pretty modest chunk of data ... maybe just 1000 unique data
> points?
>
> What made it large & computationally intensive was that the dataset was
> routed iteratively through a ~dozen different "Monte Carlo" statistical
> exercises and filters to identify & glean signal from noise.

I’m sure something could be whipped up in Python with NumPy/Pandas/
Matplotlib etc that would go through the same operations much more quickly
and efficiently.

Microsoft is even offering access to these Python toolkits to Excel users
now -- at a cost. You know -- charging for something that the users could
bypass Microsoft and access for free, only they’re too dumb to realize it.

On Mon, 30 Dec 2024 08:25:01 -0000 (UTC), Chris wrote:

> -hh <recscuba_google@huntzinger.com> wrote:
>
>> I have a colleague who's done some amazing stuff in Excel using Visual
>> Basic Script (VBS); the PC I had at the time would fail just trying to
>> load the files; his beefy machine he had would take literally hours to
>> crunch through a set. A quick search shows that I still have an older
>> copy: it takes up 14.34GB on disk. Youch.
>
> Sounds horribly inefficient and virtually impossible to debug. I'd bet a
> decent python script would do it in minutes, with a tiny footprint and
> be reliable.

Even Microsoft realizes that now.

On Mon, 30 Dec 2024 18:58:06 -0500, DFS wrote:

> If you ever do need to automate office software or build custom
> applications, you'll find that MS Office and VBA is extremely superior
> to ALL other office software.

Unfortunately, no. Even Microsoft realizes that VBA is crap, which is why
it is offering Python access to Excel users -- at a cost, of course.