Re: [Evolution] drop-in replacement for Outlook?

[Adam Tauno Williams <awilliam whitemice org>]

On Wed, 2012-11-14 at 12:08 +0000, Tom Davies wrote:
> Hi :)
> Are there any good on-line training courses in how to use Evolution? 

Not that I'm aware of.

>  A friend with a very low level of computer skills wants to learn how
> to use Outlook so that she can put it on her CV for job
> applications.  
> Of course she doesn't actually have MS Office on her machine yet so
> she is trying to buy a version to use at home.  Then one of the other
> typical Windows problems cropped up;
> 1.   the  on-line course that people pushed her into is the old 2003 one and 
> 2.  the one on our machines is 2010 
> So, the course doesn't have the ribbon-bar.  Muahhahahah.  
> So i am wondering if she could 
> 1.  learn Evolution (and LibreOffice)  so that she could 
> 2.  become an advocate for OpenSource software almost by accident

Learning Evolution isn't learning [any give version of Outlook].  No
application is a drop-in-replacement for any other application.  Even if
the 'do the same thing'.

You can get a student edition of Microsoft Office pretty cheap.

> I tend to find that people who start with OpenSource find it easier to
> make the transition to MS as long as it's only temporary.  Even before
> the transition they tend to be more proficient with MS tools than the
> average office worker.  

I dunno;  but many many skills are more portable than people realize
[given those skills are in the skull of a person who can think in
abstractions without loosing concrete connections;  depending on the day
I vary in my guess as to what percentage of the population that applies
to].

> I might be being a tad over hopeful here but if there is a course that
> teaches people the basics of using Evolution/Outlook then it might be
> something i could get other people into taking and maybe build-up
> OpenSource take-up locally even if it's only a couple of people.  

Making training materials and documentation is VERY HARD.  And they have
to be maintained.  This explained why most commercial ones suck.  And in
my experience next to nobody [voluntarily] uses them.

But a training course in Outlook is not a training course in Evolution,
or vice versa.