I would say that the main selling point of MSO is Excel - because it's the program the people who sign the cheques live in all day every day. So they buy themselves and everyone MSO, not anything else.
Completely agreed. There isn't a credible competitor to Excel, because Excel isn't in the spreadsheets business--spreadsheets are in the Excel business, and nobody else is good at being Excel. (This is distinct from the file format, because we're talking about bug-for-bug compatibility at runtime too.) Even Mac Office isn't sufficiently good at being Excel to be Excel.
Until that changes--I'll check back in a decade or two--LibreOffice and friends, no matter how legitimately good, will be also-rans in the corporate world.
That's questionable. Is Google Apps a friend? 'Cos a lot of offices are shifting to that, even if its spreadsheet is pitiful. With Excel for the few that seriously need it.
I do concur that Calc is the main issue for LO. They've finally got it to a state where serious improvement work can start ...
