This is aimed at students/ex-students that used Linux while studying in college.
I’m asking because I’ll be starting college next year and I don’t know how much Windows-dependency to expect (will probably be studying to become a psychologist, so no technical education).
I’m also curious about how well LibreOffice and Microsoft Office mesh, i.e. can you share and edit documents together with MOffice users if you use LibreOffice?
Any other things to keep in mind when solely using Linux for your studies? Was it ever frustrating for you to work on group projects with shared documents? Anything else? Give me your all.
Linux didn’t exist when I was in college but I did work on it’s predecessor Minix in Op Systems class in '89
VAX VMS was the bomb.
I got no pussy
Used it for physics stuff
It was my college experience. Didn’t use anything else. No issues at all
So far I’ve been able to run everything I need to off of it, and libreoffice works very well with office docs in my experience.
It was good! I really enjoyed it
I used linux all through the years I should have been in college, but was instead a hopeless drug addict. I regret nothing!!!
…apart from the drugs…
…and not going to college…
wdym by college? the same word means a lot of different things in different places
I did computer science in uni and it was never an issue. The only time I remember needing specific windows software was a RISC processor simulator we used in my low level programming class, and for that there was a hefty license on the software anyway, so basically everyone used the lab computers.
Studied languages at a university in Sweden, using only libre programs, except for one group assignment where we used Google docs. Nothing terribly interesting (computer-wise). Everything worked. Professors wanted .docx files, which LibreOffice happily exported. If I was so inclined, nothing would’ve stopped me from using something like OpenBSD, or hell, even Haiku would probably work.
I switched to Linux while going back to school in 2014.
My calculus class had one of those “buy the $80 textbook to get the code for the online assignments” things which didn’t want to work in Linux. I think the URL had something to do with Wolfram. Figures. Side question: Do they still give out copies of Mathematica to Raspberry Pi owners?
Turns out English professors can’t tell the difference between Times New Roman and Liberation Sans.
Writing papers in LibreOffice Writer isn’t a problem, it works fine for that. My professors tended to want them printed out and turned in on paper, so they had no clue what software made it. Printing to PDF works perfectly well too; if they specifically want a .docx file you’ll probably survive. I would probably recommend OnlyOffice over LibreOffice for MS Office compatibility, but an MLA formatted school essay should survive that conversion.
The least plausible thing was working with other students on PowerPoint presentations. LibreOffice Impress works well enough, you can put words and pictures on slides, but its compatibility with PowerPoint just ain’t there. “Let’s each make five slides.” maybe if you work with a blank template first, collect them all together, then apply a style.
In comp sci our labs ran fedora and I didn’t even know what Linux was I just laughed at the computer saying fedora. I thought I was on Mac tbh.
I’m currently using Arch Linux in college and my advice will be to dual boot. In some lower div classes my specific professor wanted Visual Studio .sln files so there was no other way (I guess you could VM it but I’m not trusting that with my grade).
Group sharing documents, our schools and most schools are in the MS ecosystem so you can edit on word online through the onedrive thing.
For writing stuff I would mostly use libreoffice with the LanguageTool plugin installed.
For lockdown proctored exams, I would typically get a loaner laptop from school because no way am I downloading their sussy stuff.
Edit: Since you’re studying to be a psychologist, my first paragraph will probably not apply to you. If you want to, dual boot, if not, I think maybe you could boot up a vm if there’s some really niche use cases.
@clark Uni sould their soul to Microsoft, not one Linux machine in sight.
However, I’ve been using it since last year just fine, as it was intro to programming class.
Though, I will have one electronics class down the line which uses a proprietary, Windows-only, not-gonna-give-you-a-license software, and it really sucks.
Hoping that next time it gets better…I’ve used Ubuntu on a laptop during my undergrad 2008-13. I used LyX to write anything I’d submit, including some psych work. I’ve used LibreOffice (OpenOffice) for some stuff too. I had to use MS Office or some other Windows-only software on occasion. I used a Windows VM for that. I’ve kept this formula till present day. Linux (Ubuntu LTS/Debian) on the hardware, Windows VM on Linux for special occasions.
