ASCII Filter Options - Help please!

users
#1

Hello. LibreOffice has been wonderful up until recently.

All of my ODT won't open properly. Every time I try to open a .odt file, the
'ASCII Filter Options' comes up. These are all normal text files and this
has never happened before. When the filter options open up its set at:

-Character Set: Western European (Windows -125)
-Default Fonts: Times New Roman
-Language: English (USA)

I just clicked ok to try and start it, but when I do everything is gone and
turned into things like this:

"##’êH`h¤i3Vµe#K†£�½À‡T½=E©Å#Ñs#u�…�^âkÂA¼¾Cé.ì@R÷¤'KÛ‡Ù=·î#¢�öÌmÚÎ#Ťáo#íà‘ü,kvÝðŸ#·„Ëa�—+ŒîsQíf—R�7ÉÇ<P7Û5>™#W…#
£#½´i)s‘’5Å=<#Ü(…0âêJªvVuÞŠ=ƒ�ŽKÑ5“F)a¼á>#ÉÖ=Ʊ…'è<¿#LK×Ú#5…ÛpU�Œë##“#2#îHLM†1“ŠG>Mò;ì¯mÊ6Ï#
[#€–ªÈ–%[s4*˜

This has affected All my old .odt files. My .txt files are fine. I can make
and save new .odt files fine without this problem happening. The only clue I
have is that all this started happening when I got a virus a few months ago.

I really need help! Thanks!

#2

Hi :slight_smile:
Step 1 = Don't Panic
As you have pointed out your filter options seem wonky. Anyway even
if it's not that the chances are that all your files are fine.

Step 2 = Rename your "User Profile"
This is a bit of a sledge-hammer approach that solves almost all weird
problems especially ones that crept in or suddenly started happening

https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/UserProfile

Of it works it might be possible to do some finessing later. Renaming
rather than deleting means all your old settings, configs, galleries,
templates, Extensions and all that are still there but just cunningly
hidden from the program.
Regards form
Tom :slight_smile:

#3

"Jacob Marioni":

All of my ODT won't open properly.

Open them with Notepad. If they do not start with PK letters, it is corrupted. Use ZIP repair tools to try to fix them.

#4

This (the ASCII Filter options thing) indicate that LO don't recognize your
file as a valid ODT file. If you let the option as indicated, it mean that
your file is no longer a ZIP file (ODT are zip files), so I fear that their
recovery will be very hard (is possible at all). But, I might be mistaken,
so if one of these file doesn't contain sensitive informations, you could
try putting it online somewhere and link it here, so others may fiddle with
it and (hopefully) find a solution.

However, you indicate that you had a "virus". Do you know which one it was?
(usually antivirus software keep some sort of history). It's not out of the
question that something messed with your file (most likely encrypting
them), as CryptoLocker type of virus got some more activity recently.​​

#5

What do you mean by ZIP repair tools?

I know what ZIP is and I use compression software on both Windows and Linux, so the "repair tools" is the part of the question that needs clarification.

#6

-I tried changing my "user profile", but that didn't work

-When I open the files with Notepad, the text is in a different language:
Ḣ鈓䣪桠榤嘳斵䬝ꎆ붏蟀뵔䔽얩턖ѳ腵超쉫뱁䎾⻩䃬➤

-I'll try to upload the file so people can look at it, but how do I do that?
Can I just upload it here on the forum?

At_Least_you_Have_Something!.odt
<http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/file/n4091641/At_Least_you_Have_Something!.odt>

#7

Hi :frowning:
Sorry about that! I just tried opening the file here but it would
open. Then i renamed the file-ending from .odt to .zip but that
wouldn't open. I tried changing it to .docX on a whim but without MS
Office that was never going to be any different so i don't know why i
even tried it!

I tried opening with GEdit (= a lot like Notepad) but the 1st 2
letters were not PK and then i checked a different Odt that someone
else sent me earlier and that did start with PK. I'm not convinced
about the whole PK thing but it's interesting

I didn't yet try finding some tool for fixing zip files. it might be
worth testing on a copy of a couple of files. There might be an odt
fixing tool around the internet somewhere too.
Apols and regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#8

Tom Davies wrote:

Hi :frowning:
Sorry about that! I just tried opening the file here but it would
open. Then i renamed the file-ending from .odt to .zip but that
wouldn't open. I tried changing it to .docX on a whim but without MS
Office that was never going to be any different so i don't know why i
even tried it!

I tried opening with GEdit (= a lot like Notepad) but the 1st 2
letters were not PK and then i checked a different Odt that someone
else sent me earlier and that did start with PK. I'm not convinced
about the whole PK thing but it's interesting

All Zip files start with "PK", so the fact this file doesn't indicates that it's not a valid zip file (and therefore not a valid ODT file).

#9

Jacob Marioni wrote:

-I tried changing my "user profile", but that didn't work

-When I open the files with Notepad, the text is in a different language:
Ḣ鈓䣪桠榤嘳斵䬝ꎆ붏蟀뵔䔽얩턖ѳ腵超쉫뱁䎾⻩䃬➤

That's because Notepad is interpreting the file as Unicode text. From Notepad, if you go File > Open, change "Encoding" to "ANSI" and then select the file to open, you'll see something similar to the extract you included in your original message.

-I'll try to upload the file so people can look at it, but how do I do that?
Can I just upload it here on the forum?

At_Least_you_Have_Something!.odt
<http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/file/n4091641/At_Least_you_Have_Something!.odt>

Apart from the initial "PK" which others have mentioned, I can't see any of the other features which tend to be seen near the beginning and end of Zip files (such as the names of the files packed within the .zip). It looks like this file has either been encrypted by the virus (as someone else here suggested; it might help to know what the virus was), or both the beginning and end of the file have been lost which would also make it pretty much impossible to recover anything from a Zip file.

In case you're wondering why everyone's going on about Zip files, it's because ODT files are Zip files with the contents formatted in a particular way.

Easiest recovery is probably to restore the files from a recent backup...