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I have now come to the divine realization again that free software is practically superior to proprietary software *because* it respects the users freedom.
Unlike "adobe reader", evince, mupdf and okular will not refuse to function totally at random and demand that you re-enter "adobe account details" (even if you are paying the monthly rent), stop working totally if you decide to stop paying the monthly rent, or be easily exploitable by running whatever arbitrary JavaScript in pdfs without asking, or produce invalid pdf's to try to get more suckers to install adobe reader.
GIMP will not stop working if the license server goes down, stop working if the country you live in has sanctions applied to it or even violate any NDAs you were foolish enough to sign via proprietary license terms unlike photoshop.
Libreoffice will not refuse to stop allowing editing at random unlike microsoft office, which at random can have the "license key" reset and require that it is re-entered.
GNU ghostscript will not arbitrarily limit how many documents, or the document length you can output unlike many proprietary pdf manipulation tools.
Free software will not arbitrary only allow execution on one core - even if the program is only single threaded, free software will not sabotage attempts to run it in parallel with GNU parallel unlike certain proprietary software that demands per-core fees.
NFS or sshfs or rclone will not prevent a volume from being accessible over a network drive unlike dropbox.
If there's a regression in an update in free software, you can just install an older version, while much of proprietary software only allows the installation of the latest version (the shiny new renderer has massive performance regressions? too bad - wait 3 months and hope the update fixes it instead of making it worse), or only allows installing a few versions back.
I'm sure you can think of many different examples - please share them.
When I think of professional software, I think of free software, when I think of unprofessional software, I'm reminded of the piles of proprietary shit I've observed.
I don't understand how a professional business would tolerate a minute of this shit unless everyone has been psyopped so hard they think that's the way software is.
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Also, unlike online converter SaaSS, GNU units will not stop functioning if your internet cuts out and even currency conversion will continue to work as per the last rates set by units_cur.
Most "modern" proprietary software seems to also lack a manual and therefore operation requires an active fast internet connection to lookup websites with usage instructions, or even usage videos, while most free software comes with a manpage and even usually a decent manual (GNU is known for its quality manuals).
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@jihadjimmy Yes, GNU's quality manuals are in the GNU info format.
A man page is usually good for quickly checking flags, while the info pages are good for checking advanced functionality.
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@Suiseiseki
Virgin man fan vs Chad info enjoyer.
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@Suiseiseki
The frustration of, adobe updates breaking their software, and constant shenanigans with MS Office accounts. Where I'd have to go through a 15 to 30 minute process every time I wanted to use it....
Well, it isn't something I have to deal with any more. I have been able to complete the same graphics work for a job, and the same analytics work, using LibreOffice and Inkscape+gimp+Krita.
And, output in formats the companies in question could open and use with their proprietary software.
It has been nothing but benefits, and less headaches for me.
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