> But as a Linux user myself, I somehow tend to prefer using something like Google Docs in the (very rare) cases I need an office suite. Calc just isn't anywhere close to Excel,
This sounds really paradoxical to me: granted Calc isn't Excel, but it has maybe 50% of the features when Google Doc has, I don't know, maybe 3% …
When doing basic things, you are almost always good with Calc, meanwhile Google Doc is like the most minimal spreadsheet you can get.
Keep in mind that the author already states they rarely need an office suite, so needing spreadsheets is an ever rarer occasion. For those kinds of users, Google Sheets is perfectly fine and even has some convenience features that the competition doesn't (for me, those are mainly great checkbox and dropdown support, some fancy "online" formulas that can do things like currency conversion, and linking spreadsheet ranges into Docs).
Both are true, though, if you consider a non-power-user's perspective. Calc is behind Excel and Sheets in usability, but ahed of Sheets (and behind Excel) in "power". You can do more with Calc out of the box, but it's much more annoying to use than Sheets and if you don't need that power, Sheets is the better choice (ignoring philosophical issues).
I would agree that "Calc" has worse usability if you're talking about OpenOffice. I find LibreOffice's Calc to be as usable as Excel because it reminds me of Excel 2003 (and older). Additional anecdata: I asked my wife who hates using Excel and she said that LibreOffice Calc was no different.
This sounds really paradoxical to me: granted Calc isn't Excel, but it has maybe 50% of the features when Google Doc has, I don't know, maybe 3% …
When doing basic things, you are almost always good with Calc, meanwhile Google Doc is like the most minimal spreadsheet you can get.