[Solved] German Grammar Checker no longer working

[A.S.]

I reformatted my computer and reinstalled the newest version of Open Office - vs. 4.1.3

I have the language packs for spelling and grammar checks for German installed and updated, but while my text is showing the spell checker as working with red squiggly lines, the blue squiggly lines indicating grammar errors are no longer appearing.

When I look in the menu under Tools / Language, I can't find the German grammar extensions which appear in the extension manager. I can see a French Dictionary listed, but nothing German. I have the feeling that installing the grammar checker was not enough, it somehow needs to be added somewhere in Windows Explorer in order to be recognized, but I can't find the German spell checker either anywhere under Open Office in Windows Explorer and it is working.

[RoryOF]

Did you perhaps have LanguageTool installed before? If so, you may need to reinstall (perhaps also to re-download)

[A.S.]

Thanks for your quick post, Rory,

I uninstalled the extensions and reinstalled them. Also, I remembered that one of the reasons I re-installed my operating system was because I'd gotten a faulty java file on my computer I couldn't get rid of. Now what I'm getting when I try to install the extension called Language Tool, is a Java error that Java is not able to create an implementation folder.

When I did the re-installation of Windows, I went to Oracle and downloaded Java and also Java (64 bit). Since there is no longer a Java 32 that I can find, I was hoping that the Java without 64 bit in the name was the 32 bit. However, both installation files have the same file name.

I had looked before for a java 32 installation file, but wasn't able to find it, not even at old apps.
So at the moment, while I have 2 Javas installed, I don't know if I simply have the same two installed. When I installed each, I did not get the message that the other one is already installed and do I want to overwrite it.

It seems possible I'm running into a Java problem.

[RoryOF]

For OpenOffice on Windows you _must_ use a 32 bit Java. This you can download from http://www.java.com; I have no direct URL to hand, but I think it is located under "Archives" or "Older versions" (words to that effect). The 32 bit Java versions will have 586 in their filename.

Once that is installed on your computer (will run alongside other Javas), in OO you must use /Tools /Options /OpenOffice /Java to select it. It may not be necessary, but I would then exit OO, and restart it.

Edit: Try http://javadl.oracle.com/webapps/downlo ... 075a80e441

[A.S.]

Rory, thanks for your suggestions


The problem does seem to be related to Java Runtime Environment not installing. I uninstalled whatever Oracle is referring to as 32-bit and installed this older x86 version. The installation went fine, but when I tried to activate it in Writer, it says that JRE is not installed.

I followed instructions from Java.com to enable Java in the FF browser by going to Tools / Options / Plugins and there I found no Java installed, neither the 64-bit nor the 32-bit.

I currently have an older version of FF installed, so with the older installation of Java and the older installation of FF, it should work, but obviously JRE is not getting installed. In fact, when I want to add it to Writer, I usually just have to click on the folder. I'm wondering if I'm going to the wrong folder, by going into my Program Files. Is there another java folder I should be looking for under appdata or something like this?

[RoryOF]

I have never used a 64bit Windows, so cannot say from personal experience if it autodetects the 32 bit Java. I think (but am not certain) that it does not and you might have to enter the path to it by hand, but perhaps someone with actual experience will join in and tell you - perhaps knowledge of the form of the path will also be given.

[A.S.]

Hi Rory,

After a lot of headaches for the past two months, I finally solved this. Not 100% sure of which step mattered:

Edit: (One additional note to the below. Everything below worked for the admin user on my computer but did not all carry over to the regular user. I cannot install the Language Packs to the regular user because they are already installed, but I seem to need to add them. I'm not sure where to add them from.)

So the below is what worked:

I had installed both the current 32 and 64-bit Java versions, which both, unfortunately, have the same version number: Ver 8.0_121

In add/remove programs, you can distinguish the two because the 64-bit version has (64-bit) in parentheses after the name and the 32-bit version has nothing after the name.

I went to Oracle a number of times to see what I had in my computer and continued to get an error that no Java could be recognized. There's a tool to check your system and it did not recognize what I had installed even though these could be seen in my Program Files and in Program Files (x86). I think I overlooked a button in the test procedure on the Oracle website, because I noticed a button in what looks like a movie screen that says to Activate Plugin and clicked on that. This activated the Java and it congratulated me on now having Java, but did not say which version it had activated.

I went back into add/remove programs and uninstalled the 64-bit version.
Then ran the activation test at Oracle again.

I reboot between all of these steps.

I then uninstalled Open Office and rebooted.

In my files I had a previous version of Open Office 4.1.2 plus two Language Packs from Open Office, one English and one German.

I installed all of these, starting with Open Office and then the two language packs.
I then started Open Office and went to Tools / Options / Java and found that java was already recognized.
I opened the document and the grammar checker was working again.

As the last thing, I cannot say for sure if it was necessary for me to go back to a previous Open Office version, however, that version had its associated Language Packs with it and this might have made some difference.

[Villeroy]

You can have as many Java runtimes on your system as needed to run all your programs. There is nothing wrong with that. Just set up your software to choose the right one. For OpenOffice the configuration option can be found at menu:Tools>Options>Java

Troubleshooting Open/LibreOffice and Java

If you would install LibreOffice instead of OpenOffice, you could use the 64-bit Java which is installed by default on your 64-bit system. LO is availlable in a 64-bit version for Windows.

[A.S.]

Are Libre Office and Open Office both Apache?

[Villeroy]

Both are open source. http://www.libreoffice.org/about-us/who-are-we/

[robleyd]

No. Apache OpenOffice is of course Apache, where LibreOffice is a project of The Document Foundation.