Just started using OpenOffice recently

Issues with installing under all versions of MS Windows
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Jasonpaul
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Joined: Wed Dec 19, 2018 8:39 pm

Just started using OpenOffice recently

Post by Jasonpaul »

Recently, my MS office license (which I downloaded from my university) was expired, so I heard about open office as an open-source suite which can be a free replacement for MS office, and boy, how frustrated I was.

Using it for couple of months, Movies series world it constantly crashes, and even the recovery feature is so bad that when it suddenly crashes, it does NOT recover unsaved changes, but sometimes it even draws back to the status when you first opened the file, which means even your saved changes are lost.

I also faced several occurrences where the files saved by open office are corrupt, which I can't open anymore. I am using Writer and Calc with .doc & .xls formats respectively.

Even worse, it's quite a pain when you work on Calc with multilingual sheets. Cells get messed up and numbers become dates although you select and fix column formats.

I'm seriously considering buying a new MS Office license. While I prefer and support open-source apps, I was so frustrated with the instability and unreliability of Open Office.
Last edited by Jasonpaul on Thu Dec 20, 2018 4:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
OpenOffice 4.1.6
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Villeroy
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Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2007 1:35 am
Location: Germany

Re: Just started using Open Office recently.

Post by Villeroy »

There is a war raging on your hard disk. Windows 10 published a bad update which makes OpenOffice unstable. I have no idea how to fix it. Quite obviously it does not affect LibreOffice which is the legitimate successor of OpenOffice. I run it on several desktop computers with Windows 10.
More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LibreOffice
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
Ubuntu 18.04 with LibreOffice 6.0, latest OpenOffice and LibreOffice
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RoryOF
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Re: Just started using Open Office recently.

Post by RoryOF »

Try telling Windows 10 to do a full update; this may cure the problem as there was a bad update some months ago, which produced many of the symptoms you report. It is said that a later update replaced the bad update.

You would be well advised to work in .odt and .ods formats rather than .doc and .xls.
Apache OpenOffice 4.1.15 on Xubuntu 22.04.4 LTS
John_Ha
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Re: Just started using Open Office recently.

Post by John_Ha »

You do need to do a little maths. AOO has been downloaded by some 200,000,000 people. You say it does not work 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?

We are here to try and help, not to waste our time listening to your complaints. Please read Survival Guide for the forum

See [Tutorial] Differences between Writer and MS Word files for why you should always work in and save files as .odt.
LO 6.4.4.2, Windows 10 Home 64 bit

See the Writer Guide, the Writer FAQ, the Writer Tutorials and Writer for students.

Remember: Always save your Writer files as .odt files. - see here for the many reasons why.
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