Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Issues with installing under all versions of MS Windows
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robbio
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Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?!

I've been using open office for a while now with no problems until recently when, all of a sudden, for no reason I could decipher, all of my documents that had been saved as odt docs or word docs - any kinds of docs - started opening and being formatted all of a sudden and odg drawing docs. I can't get them to go back to the original document (tect) format... I even tried uninstalling and reinstalling a newer version but no change. I have resumes to send to people and I can't make the necessary changes the resume need before sending because everythign is essentially a picture....?! CAN ANYONE PLEASE HELP ME ASAP?!

THANKS SO MUCH!

robbio
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Re: Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?

Post by RoryOF »

Start by deleting or renaming your OpenOffice User Profile. As you are using Windows do this by

Close OpenOffice and the Quickstarter. Open File Explorer. Copy and paste %appdata%\OpenOffice\4 in the File Explorer Address Bar (not the search engine) and press Enter. Delete or Rename the "user" folder. Start OpenOffice.
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Re: Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?

Post by robbio »

Well, thank you, but it didn't help. And also pdfs open as weird code and that has not changed either. So, I have all these odg docs that were and should be but aren't aoo text docs but instead are odgs... and pdfs won't open... ?
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Re: Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?

Post by RoryOF »

It looks like your file associations have changed and you may need to remake them. If you have installed the OpenOffice pdf extension, then the pdf files should open in Draw. If you haven't installed that extension then they should open in the system PDF reader (often Adobe Reader, bit I'm not sure what it is for Win 10). Try starting OpenOffice from the Programs button, then use /File /Open to navigate to an .odt file and see if this will open correctly. If it does, this is a sign that the file associations are wrong. To fix this, right click on an .odt file and from the popup select Open With and then choose swriter.exe.
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Re: Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?

Post by robbio »

Thanks. I tried to use the open with method but the files that have mysteriosuly started becomeing odg files won't oen right in swriter...?
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Re: Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?

Post by RoryOF »

What is the file extension on these files?
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

they are .ODG files.

and the pdfs are of course pdf (i think i may need to reinstall the pdf plug in, though, because it just occurred to me that it probably went away when i ununstalled and reinstalled.... i don;t know where to get it, though/ can;t remember where I got it before. perhaps that would fix the odf problem entirely...?
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Re: Please help ASAP - suddenly odt docs open as draw files?

Post by Villeroy »

RoryOF wrote:What is the file extension on these files?
He tries to work with the Windows operating system. Since 1995 Windows is the only system which hides away the file name extensions from its users while the file name extension is the one and only property which determines the default application for a file.
Windows has no icon sets for file types. Windows file icons indicate the product which will be used when someone double-clicks the icon. For many users the double-click is the only thing they can do with a file icon.

Open the file.
Call menu:File>Properties... and choose the [General] tab.
There you find all information about the actual file type detected by OpenOffice, its full name including the file name suffix, its path, modification time, creation time etc.
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by RoryOF »

ODG files should open in Draw. It won't do any harm to reinstall the PDF extension, but make sure you install the version for OO 4 - you'll need to look carefully at the site to find it.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

thanks but they weren't odg when i created them. They were open office text files (odt i believe?) and then they suddenly became odg all of a sudden and i can't make changes within them properly as a result. i need to get them back into doc format.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by RoryOF »

If they have changed into .odg files, something has changed their extension. Try, outside of OpenOffice, at Windows system level, renaming one (preferably unimportant) to .odt and see if that will open correctly.

I'm going offline shortly.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

oh ok i'll try that. is someone else perhaps coming online when you leave?
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

Well I tried that and it still opens them in draw.... and if i force it to open in writer it is still formatted as a graphic file that can't be edted like a text file...?
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Villeroy »

What type of file is it actually? See menu:File>Properties... tab [General].
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

It says it's am open document drawing. baffling as I never have made one of these. Not f=good with the whole slides presentation software thing. Made it as a doc. Saved it as a word format, then exported to pdf... then i deleted the word formats to save space, thinking i can always convert to word and/ or pdf again if nec for a given recipient, but can keep in the program/ software's native format otherwise for storage and editing. then one day all the odt versions suddenly became odg files... and i no longer have the word files to use as text format docs to edit....
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Bill »

Please upload a sample file.

Have you run malware scans? It's not normal for a file name to change spontaneously.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Bill »

robbio wrote:Made it as a doc. Saved it as a word format, then exported to pdf... then i deleted the word formats
You deleted the text files and kept the pdf files which will only open in Draw. Don't delete your text documents if you need to edit them.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

I did not delete the text files. I SAVED the text files (ODT) but deleted the secondary word format files that I had made from the original text odt files. They should have remained text. bt they converted themselkves into odg......

how do i u0pload a sample here? i don;t know how. no malware or virus unless both ms kb and nortin missed them...
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Bill »

When you reply to a post, there's an "Upload attachment" tab below and to the left of the "Submit" button.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

Thanks, but I cant find any upload option...? nothing here but a text field..?
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Bill »

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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by RoryOF »

Here are two sample documents. One is text in .odt format, the other in .pdf format. So that there is no doubt about the file type, I have included that in the document name as well a in the extension. Would you please try each of these and tell us in what it opens.
Attachments
TextDocumentPDF.pdf
(24.24 KiB) Downloaded 422 times
TextDocumentODT.odt
(9.82 KiB) Downloaded 440 times
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by jrkrideau »

robbio wrote:Thanks, but I cant find any upload option...? nothing here but a text field..?
Try clicking on the Quote button at the upper right of the message. Then scroll down to the bottom of the text field and you should see a tab labelled Upload attachement just below the Save Draft; Preview; Submit buttons.

You may have clicked on the Quick reply button which does not offer this option.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

This problem is still not fixed... All of my resumes are .odg files. I made them as ODT docs and exported some as pdfs, to have an odt and pdf version, but ALL of the odt files somehow became odgs and I cannot edit them. I don't understand all of this s=cgnahe user stuff but, evidently, I tried that way back to no avail. Now I need to start sending resumes again, which requires me to update them first, and I can't. SO, at this point, I don't want or need to understand how this happened anymore. I just NEED to know HOW to convert them (back) into a text form that I can edit. Within the ODT there are frames where the text is and I can edit the text within those frames, but I can't add rows or anything like that. HOW do I convert them into a workable, editable text format? PLEASE LET ME KNOW ASAP? Thanks.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

Rob Patterson Actor - Theatrical 2016.odg
(33.19 KiB) Downloaded 330 times
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by robbio »

Can you see the attached file?
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Villeroy »

Read up about PDF. It is a print-out to a file instead of paper sheets, a final output format for anything printable from any application that is able to generate something printable. If you do not save the original document of your application, your work is lost, no matter which application had been used to generate the PDF. PDF is not an editable document format.
You installed the PDF import extension which tries its very best to import any PDF from any application as a vector graphic because a vector graphic comes as close as possible to what a PDF file actually represents. This is why your office suite decides to load a PDF with the Draw component when you open a PDF with your office suite. Open the PDF with some PDF viewer. Open editable documents with whatever suitable application. Loading PDF with office+extension may be useful in very rare cases when you need to fix some typos and the original is lost. Normally, you never want to open PDF with this office suite.
Another thing the extension can do is generating a hybrid PDF which includes the original office document (text, spreadsheet, presentation) as an "attachment". This hybrid PDF opens the attached office document for editing. A PDF viewer opens the PDF part of the hybrid document.
 Edit: The attached odg file looks like a text document exported as PDF, then opened with OpenOffice or LibreOffice Draw and then saved as odg. The original text document may have been created with Writer, MS Word or any other word processor or even a desktop publishing program. 
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
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Re: Suddenly odt docs open as Draw files?!

Post by Bill »

Regardless of how it happened, since the file is actually an odg file, you can either retype the document in Writer and save it as odt or use a file conversion service to convert the odg to doc, then open a copy of the doc file in Writer and save it as odt.

ODG to DOC
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