[Solved] Small error in Debian desktop integration

[hman2]

Hi,

I just migrated my 4.17 to 4.18 (64 bit, .deb files). My system is Linux Mint 18. FIrst, I removed the old Open Office with the -purge option, successfully. Then I installed with -i the contents of DEBS and then DEBS/desktop integration. So far everything succeeded, OO 4.18 is running. But all the OO icons on Gnome (I have Mint Cinnamon) are still labelled 4.17, not 4.18, although they do launch 4.18.

That's not a bug, but a mere (minor) error that should be easily correctable.

Thanks
hman2

[Villeroy]

You are the one to fix this.

[Bill]

I just upgraded from AOO 4.1.7 to 4.1.8 on Ubuntu 20.04 Mate. I did not remove or purge 4.1.7. I simply used dpkg to install 4.1.8 over 4.1.7. Before installing the desktop-integration package, I opened the applications menu and noticed that the labels on the shortcuts had already changed from 4.1.7 to 4.1.8. After installing the desktop-integration package, the labels were still showing 4.1.8. Are your shortcuts the ones installed on the applications menu or possibly added later somewhere else?

[hman2]

They are what lies inside the desktop-integration subfolder under DEBS. I dpkg -i * them...

[RoryOF]

Then are you certain that installing the upgrade you changed into desktop-integration folder and ran sudo dpkg -i *,deb?

[hman2]

Yes. I do this the old-fashioned way on the command line. But again, I don't consider this to be a "bug". OO 4.18 runs without problems.

[Bill]

This is not a problem with the desktop-integration package. The names on the shortcuts on the application menu come from the .desktop files in /opt/openoffice4/share/xdg directory. The openoffice_4.1.8-3_amd64.deb package in the DEBS folder installs the .desktop files before the desktop-integration package is installed. The desktop-integration package installs links in /usr/share/applications that point to the .desktop files. This explains why I saw the version number change on the application menu before installing the desktop-integration package when I upgraded the existing packages instead of purging them and installing the new version.

I've also tried purging the old version and installing the new version several times on Ubuntu Mate 20.04 and Linux Mint Cinnamon 20. The results were always the same. The version number on the shortcuts on the application menu was always 4.1.8 after installing 4.1.8. I've even looked at the files in the desktop-integration package and can find no place where the version number is shown as 4.1.7 instead of 4.1.8.

Open the .desktop files in /opt/openoffice4/share/xdg with a text editor. If the Name below [Desktop Entry] shows "4.1.7" instead of "4.1.8", then the old file was not purged and replaced when installing 4.1.8.

[Hagar Delest]

Any chance that you made such .desktop shortcuts in your own Mint profile (~/.local/share/applications)? Either manually or by tweaking the menu with a menu editor?
If so, remove those AOO entries.

[Bill]

I finally found the Menu Editor in Cinnamon and editing the OpenOffice shortcuts does indeed add .desktop files to ~/.local/share/applications. Since these .desktop files are added by the user, they must be removed by the user. They are not removed automatically when OpenOffice is purged or a new version is installed.

[Hagar Delest]

For once I'm a step ahead of you Bill!

[hman2]

Funny note: I did look at the wrong part. It was a copy of the main starter icon of OO in the navigation bar of Cinnamon (I have the main starter in the navigation bar alongside Firefox, Opera and Thunderbird, to be able to one-doubleclick-start the things I need. I created it some time ago and forgot about it being a copy.

Of course that didn't change, but I did not realize it was my error. The standard listing of OO under the Menu button / Office tab _did_ switch to 4.18. Maybe this is due to the fact that I just rebooted the system (which I rarely do)... So as far as I am concerned, this issue is solved... Sorry if I confused anyone...

hman2