Earlier we challenged Moore's Law with OpenOffice.org. Today we have a three-way match. In the first corner, we have heavyweight Microsoft Office; in the second, undefeated champion Moore's Law; in the third corner, underdog OpenOffice.org. Let's get ready to rumble!
Again we are measuring the installed disk usage of each release. Because old versions of Microsoft Office are not as accessible as OpenOffice.org, the sizes are based on system requirements printed at the microsoft.com web site—a site which is remarkably thorough. Another complication is Office's numerous editions. The number of editions has ballooned from a 2 in Office 4 (1994) to a confusing 9 in 2007. While all editions have Word, each edition has a different set of other products such as Access, Outlook, and Visio. Which should be measured? I used the printed values for the typical installation size for the Standard versions. Release dates are courtesy of Wikipedia.
The Microsoft Office data points fits an exponential curve remarkably well with R2=0.94. At this rate of growth, Microsoft Office Standard 2013 will be 5000MB, and the Microsoft Office Premium Platinum Plus 2013 edition (a larger edition than the Standard edition) will come on a set of Blu-ray discs.
The next chart combines the Microsoft Office installations, OpenOffice.org installations, standard (meaning new but modest) PC disk sizes [1], and maximum PC disk sizes. Watch out for the double Y axes: megabyte scale for disk usage and a gigabyte scale for disk capacity.
Inspection indicates Microsoft Office Standard editions growth more closely in step with maximum disk capacities while OpenOffice.org more closely follows standard disk capacities. That means each Microsoft Office version consumes a larger percentage of a contemporary hard drive.
Extrapolation estimates OpenOffice.org will reach 1000MB around the year 2024 and it will never exceed Microsoft Office's size. However, if the OpenOffice.org 3.0 standard edition bundles additional applications (such as Thunderbird and Lightning), the trend will change. Thunderbird 2.0 would add 44MB (11% of OpenOffice.org 2.4.0).
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8 comments:
I don't find taking more space a problem. But just if it gives additional value. For example it whouldn't be crazy to include a big clipart gallery with OpenOffice and whould take a lot of space. Some sort of bundled openclipart ;)
I guess clipart adds bias to the weight.
Did you really mean 5,000GB by 2013? That's quite an exponential curve. 5GB would be a lot; 500GB would be astonishing, but 5 terabytes? Also, that doesn't jive with the comment about blu-rays.
Buho: Yes, disk space is cheap and not a problem. I meant this article from an academic and curious point of view.
RTC: Yes, I meant 5000MB. I fixed the typo. Thank you. The comment about Blu-Ray was partially a joke. I made up the Microsoft Office Premium Platinum Plus edition, but in truth, Microsoft Office frequently introduces new products and new editions. I clarified the article to distinguish the 5000MB from the Blu-ray: they are referring to different editions of MSO.
I thought that was what you meant. 5,000 GB just seemed a little over-the-top :)
Love the blog, by the way!
Hi - great comparison, thanks!
I have a question about the bottom chart, though, which shows maximum hard drives as being 1TB in space, but MS office taking up 1.5 TB?
Is there a scale issue on that graph that I'm not seeing?
Aha, sorry, yes - I see it now.
Megs on the left, Gigs on the right.
It's still off-putting seeing office take up 1.5 hard drives ;)
Buho: OxygenOffice Professional has. (ooop.sf.net)
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