The file has been changed since it was opened for editing

[theophoretos]

Hello. A recent problem I kept encountering in using Open Office Writer is that, when I just open a document and begin writing, as soon as I save the editing, I will suddenly get this warning message: "The file has been changed since it was opened for editing. Saving your version of the document will overwrite changes made by others". What am I getting his? I'm the only person who has opened it, and I don't have it opened anywhere else. Is this a bug?

I have been having so much problem with Open Office in the past 2 months, and I have been using it for many years. Does anyone else experience an increased frequency of problems in the past 2 months?

Edit: Changed subject, was Mysterious warning about overwriting changes made by others  Make your post understandable by others  -- MrProgrammer, forum moderator

Edit: Also see → DST caused: The file has been changed since it was opened though that was not the situation for theophoretos.

[RoryOF]

Is the file you are working on stored on some form of network or cloud?

Edit: Reports suggest that this may be due to timestamps on the file changing. What version of OpenOffice are you using, listed on /Help /About OpenOffice

[theophoretos]

Hi, the file is on the hard drive of my laptop. And I use open office 3.4.1, as you can see on my signature.

[RoryOF]

The only think I can think of is when (if) the problem occurs again start TaskManager (Ctrl Shift Esc) and see how many soffice processes are shown running on the processes tab. There should (I think) only be two; if there are more we need to find why this is happening.

[theophoretos]

Here I present to you another type of strange malfunctioning with my open office. My computer would freeze, forcing me to reboot, and then open office would go into recovery mode, but then the document would remain locked, so that I would never be able to open it up again, and my entire writing would be lost. How do you explain this?

screen shot:

[theophoretos]

Thanks Rory, anybody else has an opinion?

Still another thing: every time when I cut a sentence from my open office to paste it somewhere else, open office would freeze for about a minute. Why can't my 64 bit windows handle this?

[RoryOF]

When an OpenOffice application terminates abnormally a lock file may be left. These are housekeeping files designed to prevent two users or two editing instances trying to modify the file simultaneously. With OpenOffice closed these files (typically only of a few hundred bytes) may be safely deleted, which will release the editing lock. To see them you may need to enable viewing of hidden files.

From your reports there is some fine tuning needed to get OpenOffice to run satisfactorily on your Windows 8 system. I have no experience with that version of Windows.

[Bill]

Thanks Rory, anybody else has an opinion?

Still another thing: every time when I cut a sentence from my open office to paste it somewhere else, open office would freeze for about a minute. Why can't my 64 bit windows handle this?

You can use the Sysinternals Process Monitor to see what process might be causing the problem. I don't see this on either 32-bit Vista or 64-bit Windows 8.

[theophoretos]

Thanks. Any other opinion?

[RoryOF]

One quick test you could make: start Windows in Safe Mode (press F8 key while "starting Windows" message in older versions, can't say about Win 8). Now run OpenOffice. If the problem you report does not arise while running in that mode, it originates from interference by some other program or background process.

[theophoretos]

hm... okay Rody.

Today I have another strange malfunctioning of Open Office. When I turned on the computer, an Open Office doc which I was working on last night started its recovery. I know that, if I turned off the computer when an Open Office doc was still open, the next time when I turned on the computer it will go into recovery mode. But last night I have clearly closed all Open Office doc before shutting down my computer. Why is it recovering then? I have turned on "show hidden files", so I knew that the lock file was deleted last night before I shut down the computer.

[RoryOF]

There is something strange happening on your computer which I doubt we can diagnose remotely; I suggest you need a hands-on second opinion from some computer knowledgeable person.

[Hagar Delest]

Try to reset your OpenOffice user profile.

[hskoppek]

I receive the same warning in OO 4.1.3, but I am operating MAC OS 10.13.1

I am the only user, the document is stored on my harddrive and this is the message:

It is annoying.

I am not so technically savvy, so if it has to do with lock files or so, I would need some explanation where to locate them, etc.

[John_Ha]

Edit: Edited to correct statement. Also see keme's comments below.

The simplest thing to do is to respect the message. It is saying that during the time you have been editing the file, the file (or file meta-data?) has been edited by someone else changed by the Operating System or by someone else. Does someone have Shared access to your files?

The fix is, assuming you are editing fred.odt ...

1 File > Save as ..., and save the file with a new name such as My_fred.odt

2 Close AOO

3 Reboot

4 Start AOO. It should start normally with no lock files to worry about.

Now check fred.odt and My_fred.odt to see which you want. Delete the wrong one.

If this solves the problem, please view your first post in this thread and click the Edit button (top right in the post) and add [Solved] in front of the subject.

[keme]

It may have to do with lock files, but something else is at play too.

• Did you adjust the system time backwards while the file was open?
• Is the file stored in a folder which is syncronized with cloud storage?
• Is the file stored on a network server?
• Do you run automated backup while you are working with your computer?

Those are situations where file attributes or reference information may change in a way that might indicate a breach of file integrity. I do not know which of them, if any, OpenOffice tests for, or otherwise what mechanisms it uses to maintain this integrity.