Getting started with LibreOffice 5

There are quite a number of options for word processors, spreadsheets and slide presentation these days and many of it with the option for being online. LibreOffice 5 is available to users on popular platforms like Mac, Linux and MS Windows. This makes it easier for implementation across any type of systems for any organisation.

LibreOffice can help save lots within an organisation while having access to a top class application that is continuously being kept updated. The document formats will ensure it can be preserved for a long time. The installer file can be downloaded from libreoffice.org site and the offline help can also be downloaded separately.

LibreOffice 5 Installer

The minimum installation system pre-requisites recommended is a Pentium III,  512MB RAM which should be fine for almost all computers. However, is does require a considerable 1.5GB disk space and display of 1024x768 resolution with 256 colours.

Java Runtime Environment (JRE) is needed if using some features in Base.

LibreOffice 5 provides the following;

• Writer document
• Calc spreadsheet
• Impress presentation
• Draw drawing
• Math formula
• Base database

LibreOffice 5 Main Screen

The 3 notable features (see release notes for more);

AutoCorrect

Default unicode 6 support which is included in its AutoCorrect. E.g. if you type :camera: it displays the camera. Here are a few more;

Compatibility with MS Office
Improved import and export of MS Word, Excel and Powerpoint documents. This means, users can work with these docs without much hassle. More controls for compatibility is found in the Tools ->Option ->Load/Save

Improvements in import of annotated text ranges from Word documents. Better support for RTF document formats.

Entire row/column references
Ever wanted to specify an entire row/column? Now this can be done with "A:A" and "1:1".

Italian God Fathers May Run Open Source

In the current economic challenges, many countries are looking at saving cost via ICT and Italy is not an exception. Umbria, a region in the centre of Italy that produces cheese, lentils, truffles and have a relatively large number of small industries. This 900,000 strong population region is home to an active GNU/Linux User Group Perugia.

In 2012, Umbria saw the start of a revolution to switch to LibreOffice, which is LGPL or open source software (OSS) licensed. LibreOffice provides office productivity tools that include a word processor (like MS Word), presentation (like MS Powerpoint), spreadsheet (like MS Excel) and more. Advantages of this software is that it is free to download and install for almost all computers as it supports MS Windows, Linux and Mac platforms. Most popular editable document formats can be open and edited and its interface is rather intuitive and easy to use. It comes with a portable version where users can install it on a USB drive and carry it around to run LibreOffice any where. A built in PDF converter allows any edited file to be frozen and to be distributed with read only access and consistent format.

MS Office have been introducing its OOXML format through the docx formats which will eventually required every organisation to purchase an upgrade license for MS Office and this will incur la high upgrade cost. LibreOffice by default save files in Open Document Format or ODF (International document standards ISO/IEC 26300:2006) and it also supports past versions of MS Word, Excel and Powerpoint.

Through LibreUmbria, schools were introduced to use LibreOffice as their primary document editing applications before it was expanded further further to other organisations. This also received the government's top innovation award for Italian Government Projects in 2012/2013. Will the rest of the Italian Government and private organisations follow suit?

Read up news on the region of Umbria to switch over from MS Office to LibreOffice.

Jan 16, 2014 from ZDNet
Sep 26, 2013 from LibreOffice
Jun 5, 2013 from Document Foundation Blog

List of open standards can be found at ISO Public site

Fresh install of OpenOffice.org

Downloaded and installed OpenOffice.org (OO0) 300m8 on the following platform.

Wine 0.9.46
Sun Java Runtime Environment (JRE) 1.6.0_04
Ubuntu Linux 7.10

Filed bugs:
#94603 because the File ->Open dialog didnt appear till I reboot.
#94604 because the drag and copy did not show a plus sign.
#94605 because the solver tool in Calc doesnt allow slection of multiple cells for "By Changing cells" option.
#94607 because the Impress is not able to play slides with graphics smoothly. See Image below.

#94609 because the Drawing tool didnt allow wrapping of images around 3D objects.

Noticeable changes in OOo3

1. Start Centre Dialog (appears when OOo is open without any documents).
2. Native Tables can be added to Impress slides. This includes Table design styles in the Task Menu.
   
3. Calc sheet names can now contain non alphanumeric characters like % $ ' .
   
4. Calc includes a solver tool that works.
5. Writer notes feature that is displayed at side of the document with different colours for each user.
   

OpenOffice.org Document Recovery screen

After using OOo 2.4 for sometime some of the following can happen:

1. No electric - you loose a document
2. Laptops run out of juice - you loose a document
3. The OOo document is moved/renamed - OOo didnt detect the changes since it was done within OOo (Save as).
   

When you open OOo again, the following screens can appear.




And they keep appearing even after you reboot the PC/laptop.

The solution:
Delete the file XML file named Recovery.xcu found in the locations shown below. Take note that Recovery.xcu contains the settings for Recovery in the Tools ->Options ->Load/Save ->General dialog.

In MS Windows
"Documents and settings"/<user>/"Application data"/Openoffice.org2/user/registry/data/org/openoffice/Office/Recovery.xcu

For OOo3 in MS Windows
"Documents and settings"/<user>/"Application data"/Openoffice.org/3/user/registry/data/org/openoffice/Office/Recovery.xcu


In Linux (I am using Ubuntu 8.10)
~/.openoffice.org2/user/registry/data/org/openoffice/Office/Recovery.xcu

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[OOo] Outlook cant open Office attachments

After a migration to OpenOffice.org it is likely that MS Office is removed. This leaves a problem of existing programs like Outlook that receives Word documents as attachments. When a user tries to open, it gives an error that MS Word is required.
"Cannot load word for windows 6.0 files "

Users can save the attachment then open it with the Windows File Explorer (double click). The same goes for trying to open Excel and PowerPoint files.

A permanent solution is to open the Windows File Explorer (Example: Open My Folder) and at the menu bar click Tools -> Folder Options. Select the File Type tab and search for DOC extension and click the "Change" button. Select swriter and check the box for "Always use the selected program to open this file".

Do the same for XLS, PPT and ony other extensions that require MS Office.