[Solved] Converting a document from read only to modifiable

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dsackerman48
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[Solved] Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by dsackerman48 »

so far I ve had no results listed to solve my issue. I am unable to change the words in my document, It's in open office draw mode. Can t figure out how to get it into the open office mode so I can make changes to the wording. Help please!

Split from Converting a document from read only to modifiable. Hagar; Moderator.
Last edited by Hagar Delest on Mon Feb 26, 2018 9:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: tagged solved
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dsackerman48
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by dsackerman48 »

Hi Matt no I can t post a copy of this document as it s of a sensitive nature but that wouldn t really tell you anything anyway. The issue is that instead of it saying just open office in the title it says open office draw. That has to be a certain mode which only allows you to adjust the screen size only and you can t manipulate any of the wording in the document. I m using my laptop as I am out of town. The file is in the saved documents. I have 4.11 and I'm using windows 10. I tried using the dropdown menu in the document to copy and then paste into a new document but the mode is still in open office draw. There has to be a way to get it out of that mode? Hope you can help!
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robleyd
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by robleyd »

Is your file actually a Draw file? If so the method of altering text is different from a Writer (word processor) document. What is the file extension?

Note that Draw is a drawing package which is part of the Apache OpenOffice suite.

How to show File Extensions in Windows 10/8/7
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RoryOF
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by RoryOF »

@robleyd: perhaps a PDF document which displays in OO Draw when the PDF extension is installed?
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dsackerman48
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by dsackerman48 »

Open Control Panel > Appearance and Personalization. Now, click on Folder Options or File Explorer Option, as it is now called > View tab. In this tab, under Advance Settings, you will see the option Hide extensions for known file types. Uncheck this option and click on Apply and OK.

Above is what you advised, This folder was already unchecked. I need additional help please. I m unfamiliar with the apache repair, modify uninstall area which I found in the app settings area, I think you may have to go in there to fix this issue which is"open office draw" on this file that is part of my open office saved file that I am trying to change the wording to make it a new document. Thanks for your help!
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Villeroy
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by Villeroy »

Never renamed a file?

select file in file explorer
hit F2 (edit file name)
hit the End key (goto end of name)
type .odt
hit Enter

OpenOffice does not care that much about file name extensions as Windows does. If you know how to open some file with some program without double-clicking the file, then you can open any supported file format with OpenOffice regardless of the file name's .xyz extension.
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
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dsackerman48
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by dsackerman48 »

There must be a way to change this saved file that I have in my laptop that is saved in my open office so that I can modify it.
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by Villeroy »

dsackerman48 wrote:There must be a way to change this saved file that I have in my laptop that is saved in my open office so that I can modify it.
Get some help from a person in your environment. If the file opens in OpenOffice's Draw component then it is either a drawing or it is a PDF document (if you have the PDF extension installed, otherwise a PDF could not be loaded into the Draw component). If it is a PDF document, you better name it with a .pdf suffix.
menu:File>Properties... tab [General] tells you everything that OpenOffice has to tell about that file, the path, the file name, the modification date, the template (if any) and what file type it is.

If you want to get the text from a PDF document, simply do NOT open it with OpenOffice. Open it with a PDF viewer, copy all text (if there is text rather than pictures of text) and paste into Writer.
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by dsackerman48 »

My option is to use open office as that is why I have it. I need to find out how to alter the open office draw to open office writer. Your suggestion has not helped, thank you anyway. There should be a way of doing that. This program was created to use it and not something else. I hope you can try to help solve this as I need to re create this 7 page document that I have saved on my laptop. I don t have any other way of sending a lease agreement as I am out of town and need to email it to a new tenant. Thanks so much!
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by Villeroy »

No help without any technical information. Please remove OpenOffice from your disk and try to open your PDF files (if they happen to be PDF files, you don't tell) with some other program.
Bye
Please, edit this topic's initial post and add "[Solved]" to the subject line if your problem has been solved.
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Hagar Delest
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by Hagar Delest »

Can you at least upload a screenshot of the title bar of the Draw window when you try to open the file?
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robleyd
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by robleyd »

Or tell us the file extension of the file in question which according to your above post you should be able to see in Windows Explorer. Is it:
.odg
.odt
.pdf
or something else?
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by dsackerman48 »

The files ended up being j peg so thats why they came through as open office draw instead of Open Office write. I went to Office Depot and that was explained to me by the tech who knew Open Office. Now I know the difference and will only save my lease documents as PDF files from now on. It s hard to solve an issue when you have difficulty with the Open Office Help Forum. It would be better to have more of a simple down explanation for the less knowledgeable computer users. Thanks again for your quick responses though. It was good to have that to start the problem solving. :bravo:
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robleyd
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Re: Converting a document from read only to modifiable

Post by robleyd »

Had you responded to the question asking what the file extension was, we would have been able to advise you that you were dealing with an image file, of type JPG

If you wish to save your documents AND be able to edit them at a later date, I suggest you save them in the Apache OpenOffice format, which is .ods for Writer (the word processor), .ods for Calc (the spreadsheet) or .odg for Draw ( the drawing program).

If it happens that you are scanning and saving documents as PDF, then be aware that PDF is not designed to be readily edited.

If none of this applies to you situation, perhaps you could tell us exactly what you are trying to achieve and we may be able to offer some advice.
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Re: [Solved] Converting a document from read only to modifia

Post by Bill »

dsackerman48 wrote:The files ended up being j peg so thats why they came through as open office draw instead of Open Office write. I went to Office Depot and that was explained to me by the tech who knew Open Office. Now I know the difference...
Knowing that the file is a JPEG file is a critical piece of information about the problem. The JPEG format is an image file format, not a text file format. Image editors are used to edit JPEG files. OpenOffice is not an image editor.
dsackerman48 wrote:... and will only save my lease documents as PDF files from now on.
Not a good idea if you want a text file that can be edited. PDF files are intended to be read but not edited.
dsackerman48 wrote:It s hard to solve an issue when you have difficulty with the Open Office Help Forum. It would be better to have more of a simple down explanation for the less knowledgeable computer users.
If you had mentioned that you were opening a JPEG file then the simple explanation would have provided quickly.

I suggest that you use Google to learn about image files and text files. There are articles on Wikipedia about different file formats. Programs designed to edit text files generally can't be used to edit image files. If you want a text document to be editable, then you should save the document in a text file format like ODT. PDF and JPEG are not a text file formats.
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dsackerman48
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Re: [Solved] Converting a document from read only to modifia

Post by dsackerman48 »

Hi again. These are leases that I am re doing. They are at least 8 pages. Because the lease was saved as a j peg file I finally realized I couldn t do anything with it. I luckily had a PDF email that a previous tenant had sent me. I had that copied out and now I have to re write the whole lease, I am using Open Office and I see that it is being saved as an ODT file. I will Google the differences in types of files like you suggested. Thank you so much
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Re: [Solved] Converting a document from read only to modifia

Post by RoryOF »

You may be able to select text in the PDF file and paste it as text into OpenOffice Writer - this varies from PDF file to PDF file, according to options the PDF generator has set. Try one page first, to see if it will Paste as text. Otherwise you can OCR the PDF document to get a text file. I think http://www.zamzar.com offer free online conversion.
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