[6] At the time, the only open source alternative was the older text-based sc, both products having similar functionality to early versions of Lotus 1-2-3 or Microsoft Excel.

Oleo's key bindings however were inspired from the Unix world, and similar to those used by the emacs editor, which frustrated novice users familiar with the DOS counterparts.

By 1999 Oleo was still judged as "not completely usable",[11] due to the awkward graphical interface lacking in user friendliness like X-style cut, copy, and paste or tear-off menus.

Oleo offers spreadsheet access to the GNU Scientific Library, a large collection of mathematical functions.

[12] A single Oleo process does not support the display of more than one file at a time, but GNU screen or multiple terminals can be used as a work-around.