Apache OpenOffice Community Forum

I recently had 4.1.4 Openoffice Calc return "An unknown message occurred" and save my spreadsheet and then recover it. I noticed that all the charts disappeared so I opened a backup copy and continued because I had just saved before the "unknown error" and it wasn't a big deal. A few days later version 4.1.5 came out and I upgraded to it hoping that whatever the issue was in 4.1.4 would be fixed. Today I found out that it wasn't. This time I hadn't saved my spreadsheet for several minutes and had done quite a bit of work when the "unknown error" happened again. I was only changing some text so I set it go through the recover process and got back to work but this time every chart on all pages was gone leaving only a little square icon in the center of where the chart was located. I could click on the chart area and the little squares located at the corners and the center of the chart size showed, but nothing else. I saved the file hoping that maybe restarting Openoffice would restore everything, but no luck. After restarting there is no sign of any charts ever being there before - completely gone. Did this ever happen to anyone else? Is there a way to keep this from happening. This is serious! Is there any way to restore the missing charts. I have a backup copy but that doesn't really fix the "unknown error has occurred" problem.

Hi and welcome to the forum!

Do you save in native ODF (.ods) or in another format?
Better stick to .ods.

Yes, I always save in ODF mode. Here is some more information. I am running Linuxmint 18.3 on an HP xw9300 Workstation with dual processors and 8 GB of memory. On it I can run Openwindows or Libreoffice, but Libreoffice has the same problem and Openoffice does so much less often. I also have an Apple MAC that can run both office programs, but that is my backup computer in case the HP machine breaks down. I back up often on an several devices. On the HP I can even run Sun Open Solaris but it only has Openoffice 3.1, but it still works with files saved from the most recent versions. I restored my spreadsheet back to normal last night by saving very very often and making full backup copies very often. Fortunately, I didn't have any trouble. By the way, on Libreoffice, the trouble seemed to be happening when I was updating chart data, and even though it crashed, the recovery process worked and it didn't destroy the charts.

It was a good week and nothing bad happened with my spreadsheet. That's great, but I don't think this just disappears by itself. Hasn't anyone every had this happen to them?

Use LibreOffice. It is shipped with your Linux distribution.
Reminds me of https://bz.apache.org/ooo/show_bug.cgi?id=124063

As I've said previously, Libreoffice has performed less reliably than Openoffice, besides, switching away from Openoffice doesn't really solve the problem, does it, especially since Libreoffice has experienced having nearly the same problem. Fortunately, although the problem is serious, it isn't common or frequent.

This [Tutorial] Some useful hints on using images, while it is written for Writer, may be of assistance in sorting out an image (charts == images?) problem with Calc losing images during a Save/reopen process.

Since it appears that noone else is having this type of problem I might as well close it. Maybe my spreadsheet is too large or maybe there is something is wrong with one or more of the charts. It just seems impossible that something insignificant could cause all the charts to disappear. If it ever happens again, I'll be back.

rhimpel wrote:I recently had 4.1.4 Openoffice Calc return "An unknown message occurred" and save my spreadsheet and then recover it. I noticed that all the charts disappeared …

You should review Issue 127568 - Diagrams become corrupt (not retrievable) when Calc document is saved for Mac OS X. Try to reproduce the problem by creating a chart in 4.1.5, saving, and opening in 4.1.5. If the chart is missing the developers should be advised of that. You are more likely to get the problem addressed if you supply proper documentation, as shown in the discussion of the problem in the issue. As I read the issue, charts created in 4.1.4 on Mac OS X were not saved, hence upgrading to 4.1.5 won't make them appear again.

[Tutorial] Reporting bugs or suggestions

Charts problem even in OOo 4.1.5

rhimpel wrote:Since it appears that noone else is having this type of problem I might as well close it.

I have been having a (might be) related problem: When editing a chart on a sheet with 6 chats on it, the display reverts to the un-edited view. Saving, exiting and re-opening the workbook shows the changes were made and saved.
Yes, I reviewed the Issue 127568 - Diagrams become corrupt (not retrievable) when Calc document is saved for Mac OS X link provided by MrProgrammer.