In an attempt to end the monopoly of global software giant Microsoft, major Chinese ministries on Friday started upgrading its domestic software, by using the latest edition of WPS office software made in China.
In an attempt to end the monopoly of global software giant Microsoft, major Chinese ministries on Friday started upgrading its domestic software, by using the latest edition of WPS office software made in China.
Anybody here know anything about this WPS office software? Has anybody actually used it? Apparently the URL to the WPS Office site is http://www.wps.com.cn/
Then they will make a windows clone with the code revealed by M$ running on top of Pentium clone made in China…
Here is the link (wikipedia.com): http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/WPS_Office
I found some screenshots for the 2001 version of WPS Office at:
http://wagang.econ.hc.keio.ac.jp/pc/faq/600.html
It seems to have lots of facilities for Chinese character input. Interesting to discover software like this, it’s like as if it was invisible.
See
http://www.wps.com.cn/pcenter_view.php?styleid=34&id=10
I like the pictures describing equivalence with M$ products 🙂
It is really a bad threat to have the entire world depend on one OS/software group, be it Windows, Solaris or Linux. Rightnow, the ubiquity of Microsoft systems is a threat to homeland security everywhere. Some experts are even suggesting that the power outtage is linked to the Blaster work. http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/333505
So yeah, more people/countries migrating away from MS products and helping build a heterogenous IT environment is a good thing.
WPS was a brand name for Chinese document editing when we were still in the DOS age. It was rather popular back then.
I have tried the new WPS for windows several times. Partly due to the monopoly of MS office, WPS now is very similar to Office, imitating its look, functions and habbits. However, WPS is faster and lightweighted. In my opinion, it’s Excel counter-part is more convenient in editing tables. It is not widely adopted mainly due to its inability to be fully compatible with .doc, but who can? I do hope .wps (its own format) can become the standard format in Chinese government, schools and industries. Better than giving the money to MS. BTW, it is said that they are also developing a Linux version.
However, the concern is still there. No one can guarantees WPS will not become another MS once it establishes its own monopoly in the huge market of China. Unfortunately, it’s common for for Chinese software companies that once their software has reached the population, they tend to lose the desire to improve their software. Hope WPS is an exception.
Expecially since I know of a certain company where the whole infrastructure is based on MS products (Win2K server, IIS, Office, Win2K workstations, Outlook, IE….) and it totally and utterly SUKZ. I mean, every single virus hits it, whenever it appears on the horizon.
I strongly believe that a heterogenerous network and system, expecially not 100% MS, would be much more robust.
There was a better link at
http://www.theinquirer.net/
It is common sense that the Chinese government wants to stay
independent of MS.
Linux is a totally different case.
And yet this is built on the Windows API, isn’t it?
China has a billion people. If they can get many of them to use something it could drastically change the market. You can make a lot more money developing and selling software to a billion people that a few hundred million that compose the US and Europe.
Its an alternative to MS Office, not MS Windows…
China has Red Flag Linux (an incredible name IMHO)…and
BTW, http://211.147.5.26/iso/4.0/ for the iso! =)
I guess its all good news since they are deploying new technologies, whether based on gnu/linux or not, and gives the support they deserve as a chinese-spoken language country.
GREAT!
http://kan-chan.stbbs.net/redflaglinux01.png
rlz! =)
The pics you linked to show japanese word processing — so what is WPS supposed to be, really? Is it customized for all countries using chinese characters? Haven’t heared of this before, either.
I salute anyone who gets away from an illegally maintained monopoly like Microsoft!
What do you think is going to happen when businesses in the US and elsewhere that run on MS Word try to communicate wtih the Chinese if they mandate WPS as standard?
While some of MS Word .doc format may be readable, there will always be stuff that won’t. I think this will prevent a total adoption of WPS as a national standard, at least in business.
From one of the links posted above it seemed ( I couldn’t read the Chinese) from a diagram that WPS produces XML output.
>
While some of MS Word .doc format may be readable, there will always be stuff that won’t. I think this will prevent a total adoption of WPS as a national standard, at least in business.
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To me that would seem more of a reason to not use MS software.
In any case, I think the point is that it will be a CHINESE national standard, not an American one.
I don’t know why anyone would want to make a Windows clone.
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I don’t know why anyone would want to make a Windows clone.
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I prefer linux of course but a Windows clone is useful to run the many commercial applications existant.
It would be better if China develop wine to run on linux and other operating systems.
I am happy with anything that F*** M$ evil empire !
In all reality they are doing this to support local software companies.
Don’t get me wrong. This is not a bad thing. Its a good thing. I mean I am the type of guy who buys froms farmer markets to support local farmers.
I think Americans should do the same.
I would love to find an American made ATX motherboard, Power Supply, RAM, ETC
I would love to find an American made ATX motherboard, Power Supply, RAM, ETC
Well most of our key componants are not made in American anymore. Corporate america keeps sending more jobs overseas instead of making the products here. When I even talked to Dell service its was answered in India.
“”The pics you linked to show japanese word processing””
It’s been a real long time since I studied Japanese, but aren’t the Kanji pictograms common to both Japanese and Chinese (In style, not meaning)?
If so then surely it would be the same as writing something like German in an English word processor. You lose the spelling/grammar checkers, but it’s still perfectly useable so long as there’s special character support.
Even though I’m a Windows user out of neccessity I feel much disdain for M$’s monopolistic ways. Chinese “Business with Gov’t looking the other way” pirate software operations is probably responsible for taking more money out of Billy Gates’ pocket than any other factor on the planet. That being the case, I am surprised someone would go through the trouble of making a “native” Chinese Office suite… Why not just continue using pirated software. They’ve been doing it for many years as various US administrations continue to insist our relations are just peachy.
As a side rant, unless there is a fundamental shift in China’s leadership, all the technological “advice” the West is giving China is going to come back and bite us hard on the butt…
Is going to be like the Metric system versus the English system. America will stick to it’s legacy system, and the rest of the world will move on to something better.
LoL – And you’ll probably be paying about $350 for that board so that OEM’s can make up the loss of paying for higher wages and union benifits/scams.
One of the few remaining forms of humor that I do still appreciate is that of IRONY.
I find it most comical that the Chinese government, one of the largest, most insidious, and most destructive power monopolies in human history, should itself be concerned about avoiding somebody else’s monopoly.
Thanks for posting this link, David, it was good for a small chuckle at my end.
The best and only thing is to let Be win and them go back into business. At most, all MSFT can do to linux is steal a bit of thunder vicariously. If the govt. knew this, Be would be back in business, no question about it. there is research to back this up. There is users in China that will choose The Be OS, if given the option. it’s very smart way.
What the point of getting cheaper goods if your citizens are losing jobs overseas? It’s probably quite impractical for each country to manufacture everything it needs domestically. But, I think that the tug of war between national interests and transnational corporate economies is becoming increasingly one-sided.
While I support the need of the developing world to raise its status, I don’t think they’re going about it in the best fashion. In their race to catch up to the West, they’re doing incredible damage to the environment – much more in a shorter time than the West ever managed. This, of course, is due to their much larger population density.
It blows my mind that while India and China combined are only about 15% bigger than the US and Mexico, their amalgamated population is EIGHT times as large.
What do you think is going to happen when businesses in the US and elsewhere that run on MS Word try to communicate wtih the Chinese if they mandate WPS as standard?
While some of MS Word .doc format may be readable, there will always be stuff that won’t. I think this will prevent a total adoption of WPS as a national standard, at least in business.
You have to keep in mind that the population of China is as big as Europe and North America combined. They call their country “The Kingdom of the Center”. Their country is 2200 years old. They have always thought that people abroad are more eager to come to China than the Chinese are to go abroad. This very much applies today as well.
If there will be file format problems, it is not a worry of the Chinese, but a worry of the rest of the world.
Why not just continue using pirated software. They’ve been doing it for many years as various US administrations continue to insist our relations are just peachy.
Because China has joined WTO and she probably has to comply (albeit graduall) with certain agreement on the intellectual property rights of companies from WTO member countries, United States included.
The China piracy problem is really unbelieveable (piracy rate is around 92%, second to Brazil). Worse, I think many “venture capitalists” in China are trying to rip-off free software by funding companies creating their versions of software/product WITHOUT complying to GPL. While WPS is not one of them, I have read from Chinese forums online that other proprietary versions of Open Office derviatives are being created without complying to GPL/LGPL. Another funny thing is that in order to install Red Flag Linux you need to enter serial number …. I don’t know what to say but the less-known Chinese language is shielding their rip-off and piracy activity from the outside world. If you can read Chinese, just do a search on google or somewhere and I can guarantee 100% that you can locate 90% of commercial software/Roms/fonts/PDF e-books from a China based website/ftp server. One of the China Linux forum even has the binary version of WineX hosted to download for free – which subscribers paid $5 monthly to Transgaming to get it.
In the world to come, it will be cheaper for everyone to learn Chinese rather than continue to pay the Microsoft Tax. The tax rate is nothing today compared to how it will be with Microsoft DRM/Palladium/FTU. With all the 1984-ware that Microsoft has planned, people will learn Chinese so they can download all the stuff instead of paying the Western monopolies exorbitant prices for it. China’s weapon is always just to declare their country a “copyright/patent free zone” and republish everything from the West but without copyrights/patents/other legal bullshit.
The Gates vision of computing is an evolutionary dead end. That is why the pace of new apps coming out for Windows is slowing down. And it is why Linux is skyrocketing.
Of course with $50 billion in conflict diamonds, the evil empire is not weak. But money is not strength of spirit. Though Microsoft does not see it, they are already dying. Their spirit weakens every day. Their soldiers weaken. Already, Microsoft is mostly hordes of idiots. The brilliant builders have all retired.
Bravo to the Chinese for making the only sane choice. Bravo to all the governments (hello Munich!) of the world that think of their nation first instead of the kickbacks and bribes that flow in from Microsoft.
The world has simply had enough of Microsoft. It is time for the world to live again, free from the chains of Gates and his cronies. And free of spyware!
The biggest nation on Earth just voted for “no spyware”. If any of the doubters can say there is no spyware in Windows… wake up! Every security-conscious organization outside of the US hegemony is getting the hell away from Windows and its spyware.
All in all, good news from the East. Let the people have tools and information. That builds a strong country, not the restrictive and insane laws that Microsoft uses to crush the common people in the USA.
is appearing on the wall……., along with a great whooshing sound.
I know this will get modded down but you are totally insane.
You are making it sound like China is the last refuge for freedom. You know the country that raids internet bars and blocks websites. You want to compare a represive government to Microsoft.
Dude I could be here hours going after that, I don’t bother. If you are such a anti-microsoft zealot that you think we should all learn chinese and follow China then you are not worth the time.
http://asia.cnet.com/newstech/applications/0,39001094,39146335,00.h…
1) The Chinese aren’t stupid. A civilisation lasting over 3000 doesn’t last that long by making idiotic decisions.
2) US companies aren’t getting contracts in China because most are too pig headed and US-centric. The world is one big market place. Who gives a flying continental when there are 100s of economies rising and are looking for technology.
Ever wondered why Motorola, Lucent and GE are still non-existant brands in the Asia-Pacfic region? because these companies have failed to grasp the concept of a borderless world.
Siemens understands, Alcatel does too, Nokia definately has, it seems that only the US companies have problems working through their head that the world doesn’t stop at the shores of the US.
3) Patrotic purchasing is a load of rubbish, they tried it in New Zealand and they have tried it in Australia, it is a complete and utter failure. The amount of money spent on tagging paper tags with kiwis onto products and advertising on television, that money could have been better spent upskilling labour so that they then get jobs in new areas.
China doesn’t want to depend on the West for technology. They are making a decesion based on what’s good for China. They are being patriotic and pragmatic at the same time.
The Chinese aren’t stupid. A civilisation lasting over 3000 doesn’t last that long by making idiotic decisions.
Sure it can. Europe survived the Dark Ages.
US companies aren’t getting contracts in China because most are too pig headed and US-centric.
How would you explain they survive in China? Anyone that a US company can hire to manage operations in China well, can start his/her own company. China isn’t profitable short-term and there’s no long-term to talk about.
Though Microsoft does not see it, they are already dying. Their spirit weakens every day.
They’re perfectly aware of the impossibility of maintaining growth rates in their current markets.
1) The Chinese aren’t stupid. A civilisation lasting over 3000 doesn’t last that long by making idiotic decisions.
It’s obvious you’ve never lived here.
2) US companies aren’t getting contracts in China because most are too pig headed and US-centric.
US companies have trouble here because it’s illegal for them to pay out bribes (American law….ever heard of the Lockheed Scandal back in the mid-1970s?) If you don’t pay bribes in “Greater China” you get nowhere really fast.
I suggest you come over and work here in Taiwan and China for a few years. It’ll be an eye-opener, believe me.
China is no democracy. Democracy is something you have to fight for each day and month. Applies to any country.
We will not have to learn chinese.
The way to influence China is through co-operation, dialogue and trade.
The demand for a “domestic” strengh in IT is not only a Chinese demand, it is the same in any intelligent country.
And MS-word is no standard, it is a proprietary, ever changin,
undocumented, lousy and inefficient, dangerous too as it contains data not shown in the visible text (as stupied people assume).
MS-word etc. are infact a greater catastrophe than Windows.
1) The Chinese aren’t stupid. A civilisation lasting over 3000 doesn’t last that long by making idiotic decisions.
The Chinese civilization is older than that, almost 5000 years in fact. However, sadly, of the magnificience and splendor of past times there is nothing left.
When a country the size of China or Bazil decide to become a “copyright/patent free zone” your talking about an economic clusterf**k in countries that follow the “rules”… Even if companies like M$ bend the rules to absurdity. Like I stated before, I’m no admirer of the way M$ does business. However, I will admit that if I owned large amounts of their stock, I might be quite happy to “just” worry about stock portfolio.
Dr. Karma, there’s a lot to admire of that long lived cilization. I find it knid of ironic that your “handle” is Dr. KARMA and you think so highly of the Chinese Gov’t. Speaking of which, how do you think there collective karma stacks up after that brutal occupation tibet. Hmm?
Ooof, nice spelling and grammar there…
If a company, such as Microsoft, uses military force to enforce patents and copyrights and insane license fees, then of course karma will balance this out with major nations deciding that they don’t like being victims of the Microsoft Tax.
The bulk of copyrights and patents are totally absurd so there is little heavenly virtue to be found in this system anyway.
As for Chinese military aggression, in the modern age it is but a pale shadow of what Britain and the United States have done.
Let’s look at Iraq. Without any legal or moral basis, the United States has annexed an entire country, much more vital to the world economically than Tibet. How people has the USA killed since 1991 in Iraq? Over 750,000. Tibet does not even compare. How much depleted uranium (DU) is in Tibet? None. What China has done with Tibet is pleasure compared to what the USA has done to Iraq.
We could add Afghanistan to the list as it has been shown the Afghanis had nothing to do with 9/11. And Liberia. Perhaps we will also add Iraq, Syria, and North Korea soon.
And then there is the bloodiest most brutal oppression in the modern era — the abuse of the Palestinians by the Israelis. Which the USA directly funds.
So compared to the USA, China looks peaceful. And they certainly are in better karma by making information and tools available to their people for free or really cheap, something that does not happen in the USA.
In the objective sense, looking the this world as one world for all of us, the USA has very bad karma.
Dr. Karma has been smoking some very bad sh*t.
I smoke only the very best USA truth porn —
New York Times
Wall Street Journal
Washington Post
FOX News
CNN
And no amount of denial will change the fact that the world is slowly but inevitably moving away from Microsoft’s taxes and spyware.
The stock market has been exposed to be a giant scam, Americans owe trillions in personal and national debt, the USA just takes over countries for their oil… it goes on. If you can’t see the writing on the wall of a desperate empire… pay more attention to what’s real vs. what’s news.
“The Chinese civilization is older than that, almost 5000 years in fact. However, sadly, of the magnificience and splendor of past times there is nothing left.”
Haha… it’s funny how people are always filled with so much pride. If the age of stuff found in an area was the only determining factor in a “civilization’s” age, then the African continent would be the oldest civilization in the world because people have existed there for over 100,000 years and have left relics all over the place. Right now, I consider the Chinese civilization only 50 years old because the communistic revolution changed Chinese customs, beliefs, and way of life. The revolution signaled the death of the old civilization and the birth of the new civilization. Don’t agree, prove me wrong by showing me their emperor.
Talking about relics, the oldest ones in China are from about 8 million years ago.
The world is evolving, and every revoluation will change your way of living and thinking. But the culture is still there, which cannot be changed so easily like the government. BTW, does the fact that you still have an emperor out there making you feel more civilized in a modern today?
Notice how no old civilization supports the draconian IP system of the “new world”. In many ways IP is the mark of the GREED of the “new world order”.
The insane IP laws of the West are bound to fail as the bulk of people on Earth care much more about survival than they do making the rich of the West even richer.
There is no longer any morality left in the IP system. It is all driven by GREED.
The chinese commies have not just occupied Tibet, killed hundreds of thousands of people, forced children to kill their own parents… they have utterly raped the country by polluting it beyond recovery and carpet-cutting the trees. It’s just unbelievable and appaling the hatred the chinese commies must feel towards Tibet.
I also agree with Anonymous; in fact, what I have written is the same as you have, in other and simpler words. What else do you think “there is nothing left” means?
The Tibet problem is not that simple. The time China occupied Tibet went back to hundreds of years ago, when no modern law ever exists. Although the control on Tibet from the central government was rather loose at that time, Tibet was definitely a part of China.
If Tibet became independent, it would be a disaster for China’s own safety. Just for this purpose, China puts a lot of money into Tibet every year, helping them build civilian facilities and creat job opportunities.
Talking about the trees, please be reminded of the tropical forests in Latin America and Africa. Those trees are not cut for China.
You better shit up. In teh 20th Century the US was the country which used the most weapons of mass destruction. Other countries also violate humen rights but USA is one of the worst and does it in the name of freedom and democracy.Altough if you look at the US it so close the a Democracy as China is, with the exeption that the chinese people now that the don’t live in democracy.
Look at Vietnam big parts of the countrie are still pollutet by Agent Orange and the USA didn’t pay even a cent of reperation. And the vietnamese never intended to attack the US or do any bad things to them.
Americans can talk about the abuses of the “commies” all day long conviently ingoring the unpleaseant facts of our own history. The very land we live on is stolen and it’s former “owners” brutally exterminated.
Anonymous, what you say may or may not be the case, but I’m not american, neither am I living in america.
GWB: You better shit up. Right on your head, buddy. Maybe that’ll improve your typing, if not your other brain functions. Too bad, because there is about 35% truth in what you said about Vietnam.
As for fan’s statements: they are indeed false and shouldn’t be taken seriously. He knows that very well, but chinese can’t stand to lose “face”, and they’ll gladly lie in order to save it. Isn’t it, fan, hun?