Apache OpenOffice Community Forum

Every version of this program I have had over the last 3 years seem to be getting progressively less reliable. I only really use the word processor part and never do anything fancy or technical and THE PROGRAM CRASHES MULTIPLE TIMES DURING USE, EVERYTIME. I also can no longer save my files in a compatible format for distribution to other platforms, DESPITE DOWNLOADING THE REQUIRED PLUG-INS TO SAVE IN CURRENT WORD/DOC(XML) FORMATS!! ALMOST ALL PAGE FORMATTING IS LOST AND DOCUMENT IS BASICALLY DESTROYED BY TRYING TO SAVE IN ANYTHING OTHER THAN .ODT. I really think you guys should focus less on adding all the shiny interface stuff and work on reliability, compatibility and ease of utility.

I absolutely love your projects and all freeware efforts. However having a program tool that is unstable and requires additional plugins to be compatible with the rest of the civilized world is....not going to catch on or be popular. I myself am strongly considering ditching the Apache platform and just going with webbased Google Docs.

Many of us who do heavy editing and Writing use OO for its stability. You need to investigate why your computer and your Open?Office are unstable - but if you are minded to move to Google Docs (or anything else), this is your decision.

If you start Windows in Safe Mode, does OO run stable in that mode?

agntorange7 wrote:Every version of this program I have had over the last 3 years seem to be getting progressively less reliable.

That is not true if you are using AOO. Do the maths. AOO has been downloaded by some 200,000,000 people. You say it is unreliable for you.

Do you think the problem lies with the AOO software the other 199,999,999 people find is OK? Or do you think that, just possibly, the problem might lie with your understanding (or lack of understanding), your installation, your unique PC configuration and/or your way of working?

agntorange7 wrote:I also can no longer save my files in a compatible format for distribution to other platforms

See [Tutorial] Differences between Writer and MS Word files for why you should always work in and save files as .odt.

I really think you guys should focus less on adding all the shiny interface stuff and work on reliability, compatibility and ease of utility.

That's not true. The problem is people like you who have no idea of what you are doing and blame the software instead of blaming their own ignorance. I suggest you carefully examine the image above and carefully read the tutorial before posting again or you will come across as being extremely foolish. A bad workman blames his tools.

agntorange7 wrote:I myself am strongly considering ditching the Apache platform and just going with webbased Google Docs.

Be aware that Google Docs uses .odt files so be sure to get their version of the image above so you understand the limits with which you will be working.

Which shiny interface stuff? Apache OpenOffice looks like a typical desktop application of the late 90ies. After 2005 (version 1 to version 2) there have been 2 moderate additions to the user interface. The first one was the new welcome screen which does not affect the interaction with any kind of document. The second one was the side bar which is a concession to users like you. The side bar can be switched off entirely via menu:View>Sidebar

Try this:
1. Shutdown OpenOffice including the "quick-starter" (blue icon near clock)
2. Open the Windows file explorer
3. Paste the following into the address bar: %APPDATA%\OpenOffice\4
4. Rename the "user" folder to something else (i.e. user.old)
5. Restart OpenOffice. It will behave like a first time installation.

If you are missing templates, auto-text, macros you can import them from the old folder. Don't hesitate to ask.

agntorange7 wrote:DESPITE DOWNLOADING THE REQUIRED PLUG-INS TO SAVE IN CURRENT WORD/DOC(XML) FORMATS!! ALMOST ALL PAGE FORMATTING IS LOST AND DOCUMENT IS BASICALLY DESTROYED BY TRYING TO SAVE IN ANYTHING OTHER THAN .ODT.

I'm not aware of a plug-ins from Apache that do this. What are the names of the plug-ins and where did you get them?

DESPITE DOWNLOADING THE REQUIRED PLUG-INS TO SAVE IN CURRENT WORD/DOC(XML) FORMATS!!

There is not such extension in on the Extensions site. Where you downloadad it from?

Try the LibreOffice:
- It can export to such foreign filreformats, like the half-standardized OOXML fileformats. (but it is the best to store your important documents in the international standard ODF fileformats.
- You can test your computer (the hardware and op. sys) by installing of the LO: if the root of the problem is in the PC or in the office application...

ALMOST ALL PAGE FORMATTING IS LOST AND DOCUMENT IS BASICALLY DESTROYED BY TRYING TO SAVE IN ANYTHING OTHER THAN .ODT.

Yes. It is true. The file formatts of the Microsoft CAN NOT HANDLE the page styles! It is a basic difference between the different fileformats. And the most valuable feature of the Apache OpenOffice and the LibreOffice are the STYLES. Page styles, Paragraph styles, Character styles, and others.