Re: [O] General advice beyond Org

[Bob Newell <bobnewell@bobnewell.net>]

Aloha,

Sometimes you need to pick your battles.

In a place I once worked at, there were two environments. One was
extremely restrictive and you were only allowed to use specific
products ... so I had to use abominations like Word and Outlook. (In
the other environment, I could do as I wished.) It was otherwise a
good job, and I liked it, so I put up with the rules. It was neither a
battle I could win nor a battle worth fighting.

Was it harder to work without Emacs and the many tools that made me
more productive? Yes. But again, that came with the territory, and I
didn't think it was worth quitting over.

In your case, in grad school, I of course don't know your environment,
or what proprietary tools you're being told to use vs. what FOSS tools
might be available. Certainly things like Scilab, Sage Math, R, etc.
will do a lot, but your needs may be much greater.
If your evaluation (and you need to do a careful evaluation of the
merits and demerits of both your approach and her approach) is that
it's better to go with what your adviser asks, then you should do so.
No, I wouldn't like it either. But I don't think (unlike RMS, perhaps)
that there are show-stopping moral or ethical issues here.

If your evaluation truly tells you that your way is best, then you
need to come up with a plan of action, with alternatives. I'd suggest
that a good enough evaluation could possibly sway your adviser.

Best of luck to you.