Modified Flag Set / No Changes

users
#1

Hi
Perhaps you can help.

My students submit examinations done in LibreOffice Calc to a web page.
I bundle them up and download them to a Windows XP box running
LO Version 3.6.4.3 (Build ID: 2ef5aff). In previous semesters, an older
version was used. There were no problems like this in previous semesters.

This semester close to one third of the submitted examinations are
being modified when opened by me for grading. I confirmed by

  1. Open file (usually from the Cygwin command line, but also from Recent Documents)
  2. Immediately clicking the X close icon in the upper right hand corner.
  3. A message pops up asking whether I want to change, dismiss, or cancel.

I typed nothing, yet if I cancel, and then do a save-as, the saved-as file is different.

I have two hypotheses.

#1)
RANDBETWEEN() is used this year in some problems, perhaps it sometimes causes this
problem. I cannot recreate that behavior, however. Further, Compare document shows no
differences, nor does oodiff.

#2)
Some students did work outside of class and the version they used is not 100% compatible
with the version in the labs. My reasoning is that I found in one submittal (I have not checked
all of them to this level of detail) that one of the fonts changed from something like
"New Times Roman1" to "New Times Roman". (I used unzip and then a script to split the
various files into lines so that diff produced useful output.)

Any advice? Is it possible to determine what LO is changing?

Best regards,

David Gast

#2

Hi,

3.6 is EOL - please try with 4.1 and see if the problem is still there.

All the best,
Joel

#3

Hi David

jmadero wrote

3.6 is EOL - please try with 4.1 and see if the problem is still there.

What Joel means by EOL is that the 3.6 line is considered End Of Life, which
means that even if bugs are found they won't be fixed because developers
have moved on.

Out of curiosity: Is there any reason why you can't update to the final
version in that branch (3.6.7.2)? (That won't solve the problem in any
case...)

I tested with LibreOffice 4.1.2.3 under Windows XP Pro x86 SP3 and I can
confirm that Save As creates different sized files on each save even if you
just open and Save As.

BTW if it's important that the files are exactly the same why aren't you
using a file copy operation?

Can you recall which version didn't change file size?

Best regards,
Pedro

#4

Hi :) 
Even tho 3.6.x branch might be eol it is still very usable.  I think it's even possible to download earlier versions of LibreOffice.  I think that might be the best way to go with this tbh.

If you can find the earlier version that did work then it should be possible to install that alongside the existing version of LibreOffice.  Personally i wouldn't.  I would just wipe the version you have at the moment and go back to the older one that did work, just to complete this task.  Then afterwards upgrade to the 4.1.3 when that comes out

Errr, i don't have a link for the older versions but Tim of Kracked Press usually produces that sort of thing quite quickly if he is around and not working on one of the many other charities and projects he works with.

I do have a link for how to install muliple versions of Lirbeoffice but as i said i probably wouldn't go this route even though it should be fairly easy
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Installing_in_parallel
(tbh the main thing is just to make sure the "Quickstarter" is off in both and to avoid having both open at the same time as each other)

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

Hi David

jmadero wrote

3.6 is EOL - please try with 4.1 and see if the problem is still there.

What Joel means by EOL is that the 3.6 line is considered End Of Life, which
means that even if bugs are found they won't be fixed because developers
have moved on.

Out of curiosity: Is there any reason why you can't update to the final
version in that branch (3.6.7.2)? (That won't solve the problem in any
case...)

I tested with LibreOffice 4.1.2.3 under Windows XP Pro x86 SP3 and I can
confirm that Save As creates different sized files on each save even if you
just open and Save As.

BTW if it's important that the files are exactly the same why aren't you
using a file copy operation?

Can you recall which version didn't change file size?

Best regards,
Pedro

#5

Thanks to all who replied. Perhaps I was not clear. I am trying to find out why the Modified Flag
would be set if I have made no changes. What objects can LibreOffice Calc *silently* modify when starting
up that would cause the modified flag to be set?

While I can copy the files to a computer at home and try different versions, it would not actually be useful
for my purposes (perhaps someone on the list wants to know, however). If some file opened without change
in another version of LibreOffice Calc, then it might mean that the file was created in that version. That would
obviously be unacceptable if the exam was to be done in the lab using a particular version.

Unfortunately, the lab is public space (for many classes) and I do not
the authority to modify what the technicians call the "lab load" in
the middle of a semester. We will update to the latest version in early January.

Best regards,

David Gast

#6

Hi :slight_smile:
Sorry this doesn't answer the question either! Hopefully someone else can
directly address your specific concerns.

The lab techs might not be aware that LibreOffice is OpenSource. it's
fairly obvious imo but they just might not have had time to think about
it. They might be more amenable to doing the updates, even mid-term, if
they hear it's OpenSource and that it's just an update from one stable
branch to another.

Any release after x.x.4 in any branch is "stable branch" although the x.x.0
- x.x.2 of the same branch is not. It's a bit of a misleading term tbh but
it is commonly used in many projects and helps people understand what is
going on more quickly. Sometimes precision is less valuable than clarity.
The x.x.0 - x.x.2 releases are more about adding new features and better
compatibility with whichever version of MS Office is currently more widely
used. Sometimes that adds unexpected odd results but that is smoothed-out
by later releases in the same branch.

So the lab-techs probably don't want the headache of having to thoroughly
test newer versions of any software, especially mid-term, but if they have
confidence in the stability then they might be much happier about it. That
is what the term "stable branch" aims to help with.

Most teams of lab techs have at least 1 person who really understands this
concept of "stable branch" versus "exciting new features branch" and
hopefully all of them know it or will quickly grasp the concept. Most
OpenSource projects have some similar way of working. Even with
proprietary software they are familiar with the idea that programs settle
down after "Service Pack" 1 or 2 have been added.

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#7

I have at least one file that does this. It is a DOCX file. Anything I say is a guess, but....

When a file is stored on disk, things such as page numbers may be stored in the file, but, in LO, the data does not determine things like the page number; the view controller portion determines this. So, when you open a document, it shows things such as page numbers as they were stored in the file, but, these are recalculated after the document has been loaded. I believe that there are numbers field types that do this (for example, figure numbers).

I have loaded long documents, jumped to the middle of the document, and a few seconds latter, literally see the page number change in front of me. This was some time back and I don't remember what document I was dealing with...

So, why would page numbers and such change? there are many reasons I suppose. Your computer may have a slightly different version of the font specified in the document. I see this a lot when a Microsoft Specific font is used and I load the document on a Linux System that either substitutes the font (because it does not have the one specified) or it has one by the same name that is not really exactly the same (such as Courier).

I seem to remember an option that I used to see but don't remember seeing recently about formatting for printer fonts or something, might be related to that.

Especially if the document was not last edited in LO, there may be different pagination rules in LO than in something like Word.

Understanding what has changed is probably tricky at best without comparing the generated documents on the system that reports the change and the original system used to create the document. I suppose it is even possible that it does not know for certain if things have changed, but I am just guessing.