Fw: Re: [libreoffice-users] LO auto save

Hi :)
I have only just noticed that this thread is a hijacking of the thread "Re: Using extension 
EnhancedGraphicExportDialogs with LibO3.5".  

When posting to a mailing list or a forum i think it is usually better to start a fresh thread to 
avoid confusion.  Hopefully by forwarding this to the list it might create a new thread and yet 
still preserve most of the thread.  It misses the post by Miguel Ángel 
http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/Using-extension-EnhancedGraphicExportDialogs-with-LibO3-5-td3455268.html#a3456029


BU?
Back-Ups done by LibreOffice/OpenOffice are placed in a sub-folder inside your user-profile
http://user.services.openoffice.org/en/forum/viewtopic.php?f=74&t=12426
NOT in the same folder as the original document.  Eggs and baskets right?  For a large work it is a 
good plan to create a copy on a usb-stick or Cds/Dvd and/or another hard-drive on another machine 
elsewhere.  Some people kept their back-ups in the other tower thinking that if some catastrophe 
affected their copy then the other tower would be safe.  Sadly not.  I found that i was keeping an 
external hard-drive in the same bag as the laptops power-supply but luckily it didn't have anything 
crucial on it.  And a usb-stick in front of a Crt monitor was pretty dumb too (on at least 2 
counts).  


Self Publishing at Lulu.com
http://www.lulu.com/
is worth exploring but i think you are talking about a more traditional, professional route.  
Perhaps something like 
Editors/Publishing house - Printing company - distribution network/shops?


I thought editors, publishers, printing companies (and all that) demanded using doc format or now 
probably docX?  ODF will become more acceptable once it gains market-share through Libreoffice and 
other programs.  Like OpenOffice there have been strong efforts to make sure it gets under-promoted 
but the shackles are off now with TDF driving LibreOffice.  

Since people seem used to getting Rtfs from you i think the best bet is to start giving people a 
copy of your work in both Pdf and Rtf.  

Pdf by default is compressed with very lossy jpg compression but LibreOffice allows you to change 
that.  A Pdf is a lot like a photograph of your work so people see how you intended it to be laid 
out.  Rtf, Doc, DocX and Odt all display differently on different machine partly due to having 
different printers and settings.  

Just yesterday i started being able to switch from giving Pdf & doc to Pdf & Odt to some people.  
Notably (for me) my boss has started using Odt for certain specific documents that involve images.  
I think for most people i still need to use Pdf & Doc or Pdf & DocX.  By giving 2 files they get 1 
that they can edit and 1 that shows the intended layout.  

Most Pdfs editors seem clunky and Adobe's seems to need constant security updates which does not 
inspire confidence in using it, nor in viewing documents that it's edited.  LibreOffice can 
allegedly edit Pdfs but it's easier to edit the Doc, DocX, Odt, Rtf or whatever and then 
File - Export as Pdf
or 
File - Print - To File (instead of to a pritner) - Pdf rather than Ps or whatever
I've only seen the 1st option but some say they have the 2nd one too.  Apparently the 2nd one is 
better. lol



Rtf
I think Rtf was developed as a format that would allow interoperability between different programs 
on different platforms
http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=10725
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Text_Format
I think it's the default format for Wordpad.  Unfortunately it had fairly low take-up, possibly as 
a result of being a lot more closed and proprietary than allegedly intended
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Text_Format#Criticism

Now, of course, Microsoft has developed a new "Open" standard 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docx
although MS Office's implementation seems to be sufficiently quirky that documents created in 
non-Microsoft programs that are then opened in MS Office appear to be quite messed-up, particularly 
pictures.  This has effectively forced people to buy the newer MS Office suites, 2007 and 2010 (or 
on Mac their MSO 2008) in order to be able to use their new "cross-platform" "Open" standards.  

The new docX format seems to have led to MS stopping development of Rtf.  According to 
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/dd797428.aspx
(from http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=8628 )
it seems that people can still read/write the current version of Rtf in MS Office 2010 but it's not 
clear what will happen in the newer MS Office when it comes out in a year or two.    

Part of the attraction of Rtf was that it eliminated macros.  When malicious code and malware was 
spread by MS document formats it was often through macros, so using Rtf was a good security 
precaution.  The newer DocX does allow macros but, of course, MS assures us that macros are now 
safe in the new format just as they previously assured us that macros were safe in their old 
formats.  Rtf also significantly reduced other clutter and resulted in much smaller file-sizes and 
better protection of privacy.  


Odf; Odt, Ods
OpenDocument Formats such as Odt (for text or more accurately, word-processor documents) also allow 
macros but use a sufficiently different programming language's implementation that so far there 
appear to have been no malware, malicious code or exploits "out in the wild".  

MS Office 2007 & 2010 can read/write Odt but only using the older version of the format, unlike 
most programs that support Odf
http://opendocumentfellowship.com/applications
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument_software#Text_documents_.28.odt.29

To make LibreOffice (or i guess OpenOffice too) use the older format to increase compatibility with 
MS Office try
Tools - Option - Load/Save - General
(been here before, see Steve's answer) and about halfway down change the drop-down backward up 2 
places from "1.2 Extended (recommended)" to "1.0/1.1"

Odf seems to support much more sophisticated placement of pictures or perhaps it's just 
LibreOffice/OpenOffice.  After saving a document as Odt you can right-click on a picture and change 
the "Anchor Point" to a greater variety than Office 2007 offers (and i think 2010 too) which allows 
you move pictures around much more easily and freely.  On that right-click menu choosing "Picture" 
(or frame) brings a pop-up box with many tabs allowing many options for wrapping text around a 
picture, creating a border and/or margin around the picture, even easily adding a hyperlink to make 
the picture clickable.  


Doc
Is the older MS Office format and seems to now be the one format that is most widely used in the 
greatest variety of programs.  You can set it as the default in LibreOffice / OpenOffice
Tools - Option - Load/Save - General
(again) at the bottom keep the drop-down that says "Text document" (slightly inaccurately) but 
change the drop-down beside it backwards up 1 place to "Microsoft Word 97/2000/Xp".  If you change 
the other types of documents (Spreadsheets (Ods) and Presentations (Odp)) then it's 2 places 
otherwise you save things as templates which can get messy and confusing.  

Of course Doc is probably about the most vulnerable format and wide open to malware and a wide 
range of problems but none of those will be generated from LibreOffice.  A 3rd party might infect 
it but if the documents is going to go from
You - Editor/Publishing house - Printers
then it should be fairly safe, or at least fairly obvious who to blame.  If professional printing 
companies and editors/publishing houses still demand that only Doc format is used then hopefully 
the keep their software updated enough to avoid the problems.  If they demand DocX they can 
probably still cope with Doc.  

Doc probably can't handle the full range of options for pictures and things that Odt allows and 
it's vulnerable but at least most people are able to use it!  


Pdf
"Portable Document Format".  Not many people can edit these.  Not many programs can.  Another 
advantage is that pictures and stuff don't get re-arranged and also the layout remains the same on 
every computer no matter what printers are attached or what settings are chosen for the machine.  
With most word-processor documents if the person viewing has their setting set as US Letter and you 
had yours at A4 then all the text and everything all get shifted around very noticeably.  Pdf is 
like a photograph of your document.  With LibreOffice, unlike Word, you can easily choose how much 
compression to set or even make it lossless to avoid any compression.  Even if you choose a high 
compression it still gives people a rough idea of the layout you intended.  


I hope something there helps!  Switching to LO is a huge improvement for me especially as it has 
developed so fast, and since the long-awaited official release of the ODF 1.2 that so many people 
had been using for ages already anyway.  LO seems much better than Word 2007 and a bit better than 
Word 2010 both of which are beginning to make me growl when forced to use them.  The ribbon in 2010 
is far better than the 2007 and i really miss it in LO but it takes up a lot of space without 
really adding anything except glossy good looks.n  Hopefully you will find LO a vast improvement on 
Wordpad!! lol
Regards from
Tom :)




--- On Wed, 26/10/11, Don Parris <parrisdc@gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Don Parris <parrisdc@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] LO auto save
> To: users@global.libreoffice.org
> Date: Wednesday, 26 October, 2011, 23:04

<snip />

> I can say it is extremely unlikely that your printer relies on a specific
> document format - it should print any type of document you send it.
>
> As for document formats, I would think that ODT is a "better" format, but
> you can also save as a regular Microsoft Word document (should you need to),
> or export to PDF format.  I self-published my book using LO (years ago) and
> exported to PDF to publish it on Lulu.com.
>
> I am 99.99% certain that, while it might take a little bit of adjustment,
> you will find switching to LO a super nice adjustment to make.  :-)
>
> Regards,
> Don
> -- 
> D.C. Parris, FMP, LEED AP O+M, ESL Certificate
> Minister, Security/FM Coordinator, Free Software Advocate
> https://www.xing.com/profile/Don_Parris  |
> http://www.linkedin.com/in/dcparris


--------


--- On Wed, 26/10/11, Murray White <phymur@rogers.com> wrote:

> From: Murray White <phymur@rogers.com>
> Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] LO auto save
> To: "users@global.libreoffice.org" <users@global.libreoffice.org>
> Date: Wednesday, 26 October, 2011, 22:41
> Thanks to both of you. I'll save this
> in a folder as I have a good memory -- just short!
>
> I'm working on a very large document currently at 215 pages
> and have been using Wordpad and I do a BU of that each day
> when I add any new text which I create in a separate file.
>
> I have to now decide whether to continue with the use of
> WordPad for my daily work and just add to the LO file after
> doing the WP doc as .rtf. I'm currently saving the LO file
> as .odt but will likely do another save as .rtf to see how
> it looks as I'm not sure what the differences are. I also
> don't know if the printer of the book being created will be
> able to work from .odt or will prefer .rtf.
>
> Unfortunately, WP does not show how many pages are complete
> or give the page breaks and because this document has both
> text and photos (many) the LO is nice to use.
>
> For years I have used Works but for this I felt it might be
> an issue when the document goes to a printer as we will be
> doing close to 40 books.
>
> Any thoughts from experienced LO users would be
> appreciated. At some point I really need to look up some LO
> tutorials to fully understand all that the program will do
> and offers.
>
> I have not checked the "always make BU as I thought that if
> that occurs after each save, it could create some delays
> when dealing with a big file but once I adjust the current
> file and then begin to do the additional add on of
> information, I think I'll try the auto BU. I assume it will
> save a file called "copy" (previous file name) into the same
> folder.
>
> Thanks again.
>
> MW
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Tom Davies <tomdavies04@yahoo.co.uk>
> To: users@global.libreoffice.org
> Sent: Wednesday, October 26, 2011 3:48:36 PM
> Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] LO auto save
>
> Hi :)
> Yes, or use Steve's answer to set it at a reasonably longer
> time-interval (jic you do get carried away and forget). 
> Hmmm, longest is 60mins apparently.  It is a good idea to
> have the back-up thing ticked jic but i think that is
> unticked by default while the autosave is ticked.  
> Regards from
> Tom :)
>
>
> --- On Wed, 26/10/11, Steve Edmonds <steve.edmonds@ptglobal.com>
> wrote:
>
> > From: Steve Edmonds <steve.edmonds@ptglobal.com>
> > Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] LO auto save
> > To: users@global.libreoffice.org
> > Date: Wednesday, 26 October, 2011, 20:39
> > Hi.
> > In options>load/save>general.
> > this is under my Tools menu item.
> >
> > I turn off (untick) the backup and auto recovery options.
> >
> > steve
> >
> > On 27/10/11 08:29, Murray White wrote:
> > > I just downloaded and install LO today and am trying
> > out some things. One thing I wonder is if there is any way
> > to turn off the auto save? I prefer to use Ctrl + S at my
> > own choosing or to return to auto save if I find I prefer
> > that option.
> > > MW

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