Some documents make libreoffice-writer crash

users
#1

With some frustration I now have only my smartphone running (very slowly) OpenOffice 3.1 left among my devices that doesn't crash immediately on loading an important document I am working on.

I have tried a number of libreoffice versions between 3.4 to 3.5.2 from both debian and ubuntu repositories. They all do exactly the same thing.

I tried getting a debug log, but fell foul of this:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/libreoffice/+bug/947778

I tried resetting my user profile as several threads have suggested. Made no difference.

I tried disabling Java in libreoffice as some threads have suggested. Also made no difference.

I tried reporting a bug but the libreoffice bug submission assistant seems to just freeze.

I can't post a copy of the real document as it's real original work and confidential. The only slightly unusual thing about it is the large number (several hundred) of references inserted using the bibus citation manager. It also has about 100 footnotes. Other than that it is a very simple flat file of some 15000 words.

If anyone can help me get this show back on the road I would be very grateful.

#2

Hi :slight_smile:
You might have already tried this but it looks like you didn't mention it.  Can you download the TDF's official version instead of using one from the repos?
http://www.libreoffice.org/download/?type=deb-x86&lang=en-GB

Annoyingly the main downloads page tries to give me the .Rpm instead of the .Deb but also it lets you choose the more stable 3.4.6 instead of the 3.5.2.

This guide might help
http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Installing_in_parallel
so that you have the new version independent of the old one.

I hope this helps!  Please let us know how it goes!
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#3

You might have already tried this but it looks like you didn't
mention it. Can you download the TDF's official version instead of
using one from the repos?
http://www.libreoffice.org/download/?type=deb-x86&lang=en-GB

I have tried it now, and it works! Thank you very much. It messed with
my desktop integration a little and put the configuration files in a
different place, but when I'd worked that out it all looked good.

I didn't bother with the parallel installation though, actually didn't notice that you'd shown me that link until it was too late. I guess I can go back to the debian distro when they get 3.4.6?

Annoyingly the main downloads page tries to give me the .Rpm instead
of the .Deb but also it lets you choose the more stable 3.4.6 instead
of the 3.5.2.

It worked for me, ie offered me the .deb installation.

Cheers,
Jonathan

#4

I run 3.4.6 on 64-bit Ubuntu.

In the first version of LO, I had to install en-GB language packs and help packs to get en-US help packs to install without errors.

It has been since 3.4.1 that I have not installed en-GB along with en-US every time I updated LO. I just got into a habit in doing it.

As for 3.4.6 vs. 3.5.x, well I will not go to 3.5.x till some of the bugs in the "bug lists" are fixed. Some of them are real show-stoppers for me.

If you need LO to work 99% of the time for what you want to do, stick with 3.4.6, since it is the most stable version. If you do not need to import Visio files, 3.4.6 will be fine. If you do need to read them, I thing you should try "Dia" for reading those files and then exporting them to something Draw 3.4.6 can do. There is just too much in 3.5.x that is an issue for my work, to deal with it right now. There are always work-a-rounds. When the bugs are fixed, I will then go to 3.5.x.

Right now, I need the stable version and not be one of the testers for the newest versions. Eight months ago, it would have been different. I did not have so much back log of work/typing/etc. that needs LO to work 99.9% of the time, back then. Now I do. I am doing as much as I can with the limited amount of "desk time" I have with my pain levels getting in the way. So I do not want to be a tester right now.

#5

Hi :slight_smile:
Phew, i'm glad to hear you solved it.  Presumably you copied the old User Profile to the new place to get your previous settings and Extensions back?  You can always try the repo version another time and then perhaps do a parallel install after that maybe.
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#6

Presumably you copied
the old User Profile to the new place to get your previous settings
and Extensions back?

Yes, did that and it worked fine. I also do some strange things like replace the dictionary files with symbolic links into my working directories so that they get shared and synchronised between my different devices.

You can always try the repo version another
time and then perhaps do a parallel install after that maybe.

Since I noticed that the debian testing repository is allegedly the same version as TDF's (3.4.6-602) I tried using it but the problem came back. So I'll stick with TDF's version for now and wait for a new release.

Cheers,
Jonathan

  Regards

from Tom :slight_smile:

From: Jonathan Schultz<jonathan@imatix.com> Subject: Re:
[libreoffice-users] Some documents make libreoffice-writer crash To:
users@global.libreoffice.org Date: Sunday, 8 April, 2012, 1:11

You might have already tried this but it looks like you didn't
mention it. Can you download the TDF's official version instead
of using one from the repos?
http://www.libreoffice.org/download/?type=deb-x86〈=en-GB

I have tried it now, and it works! Thank you very much. It messed
with my desktop integration a little and put the configuration files
in a different place, but when I'd worked that out it all looked
good.

I didn't bother with the parallel installation though, actually
didn't notice that you'd shown me that link until it was too late. I
guess I can go back to the debian distro when they get 3.4.6?

Annoyingly the main downloads page tries to give me the .Rpm
instead of the .Deb but also it lets you choose the more stable
3.4.6 instead of the 3.5.2.

It worked for me, ie offered me the .deb installation.

Cheers, Jonathan

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#7

Unfortunately I'm still not out of the woods.

The TDF version of LibreOffice isn't detected by bibus. Which means no bibliography, which is pretty much a deal-breaker.

So I played with the debian/testing version again, and managed to get it to not crash with my file by deleting my user profile. Then I rebuilt the profile... and it started crashing again. And now if I start again with a virgin profile, it still crashes.

I tried to look at the source for bibus (it's all in python) to work out how it detects whether Libre/Open-Office is present, but don't know enough about the LibreOffice API to know what I'm really looking for.

So I still have a basically unusable system. :frowning:

#8

Hi :slight_smile:
Ok, so if you have created parallel installs of LibreOffice without using the guide then they might be interacting badly.  I don't think it's that but it might be worth uninstalling the downloaded version and then reinstall it but following the parallel install guide this time. 
http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Installing_in_parallel

There is a chapter about bibliographies and such in the official guides.  Chapter 12 in the Writer Guide
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation/Publications#LibreOffice_Writer_Guide
I don't think that is going to help either but it might be worth a quick flick through and perhaps skim read parts.

Frequent crashing usually indicates a bad version of java.  Java 6_21 seems to be the best for older versions of LibreOffice but i think you need the 7_3 (or around there, most recent is best).  Unfortunately java gets compromised so fast nowadays that the last few versions haven't even been released before Oracle have had to start working on the next version.  So it takes a bit of digging around on the Oracle website (or via java.com).  I found these links through a quick googles search but i'm not sure they are the latest or best links
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/java-se-jdk-7-download-432154.html
http://www.java.com/en/download/faq/java7.xml

On the wiki-page for documentation they have 3rd party documentation alongside early releases of official documentation and this section might be useful for attcking the problem from a programming perspective
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Documentation/Publications#Programmers

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#9

Hi :slight_smile:
There are likely to be differences between the official TDF version and any version in any distros repos because they tend to tweak them a little to fit in better.  It doesn't usually make things go wonky but appears to have broken something for you this time.

Noob-friendly "gateway" distros such as Ubuntu/Debian family are great for starting out with Gnu&Linux but once you get into tweaking things yourself you might enjoy giving Arch or Slackware a try.  There are a lot of distros in between the 2 extremes.  Slackware usually tries to do the least amount of tweaking for most packages but apparently Arch has better documentation to help set the whole thing up.  If i went this route i would dual-boot with Ubuntu/Debian for a while by installing Arch or Slackware on a new partition.  I don't think i would go this route at all tho.  I prefer sticking with Ubuntu as articles appear in fairly mainstream media about it and i bump into people that are using it.

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#10

I prefer to always use TDF's version of LO. Of course my version of Linux is Ubuntu 10.04 LTS, so the repository tends to not get the most up-to-date version of the packages I use.

I also am using 3.4.6 now. I am waiting for some issues to be resolved in the 3.5.x line that are show-stoppers for me.

I ALWAYS have a working user profile in backup, for when my profile get corrupted by something. That tends to happen about every 6 months or so.

As for Distros, well I like the GNOME desktop used by Ubuntu 10.xx. I have tried 11.xx "classic GNOME" options but I cannot get the panels on both the top and bottom of the desktop, like I really want/need them to be used for. Maybe when 12.04 LTS gets going, it would have what I need. I do not like the "tablet style" of desktop environments that seem to the the distros are going. I have had to have GNOME as my default desktop with KDE installed so I can use many of its system tools that work better for me than GNOME's version. So I use a combination of GNOME and KDE packages. Until I can get a "modern" distro to give me enough of what I need, I cannot switch. Actually, I use a dual boot laptop to test out Ubuntu's newest version to see if I can get it to do what I want/need.

#11

Noob-friendly "gateway" distros such as Ubuntu/Debian family are
great for starting out with Gnu&Linux but once you get into tweaking
things yourself you might enjoy giving Arch or Slackware a try.

I know we all have our preferences for distros but I'm curious why you put Ubuntu and Debian in the same basket. Apart from the fact that Ubuntu is built on Debian they seem to be quite different and aimed at quite different users.

I recommend Ubuntu to friends and family who don't have the patience, motivation or experience to set things up manually. I use Debian and tweak it extensively. I like the fact that it's almost identical on i386 and arm architectures, the quality control is very high, and knowing it well helps me when I am called upon to fix broken Ubuntu installations. I guess the attention to quality control and integration is why the Debian distro managers tend to tweak the upstream packages. Occasionally I download a package from an upstream distributor (like now!) but it rarely gives me much satisfaction.

Anyway about to investigate further what's breaking libreoffice for me.

Cheers,
Jonathan

#12

Hi,

Thanks for all the feedback.

The good news for me is that uninstalling then reinstalling libreoffice 3.4.6 from Debian/testing seems to have fixed things.

Ok, so if you have created parallel installs of LibreOffice
without using the guide then they might be interacting badly.

I don't think that was the issue. In each ease I uninstalled libreoffice before reinstalling, whether from the TDF archives or the Debian repository. That said, there are a lot of packages to install and uninstall and I didn't pay attention to each of them.

Frequent crashing usually indicates a bad version of java. Java 6_21
seems to be the best for older versions of LibreOffice but i think
you need the 7_3 (or around there, most recent is best).

Do you actually *need* Java? Or should I say, do I actually need Java to use libreoffice for my purposes. In any case, I don't think my crashes are related to Java because disabling Java in libreoffice settings never made any difference.

Cheers,
Jonathan

#13

Hi :slight_smile:
Normally i wouldn't lump them together but you started it! lol.  They are both in the same family so there are often similarities but as you point out they aim at different markets.

Good luck with sorting the issue.  I'm curious if just getting the latest java would fix it. 
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#14

Hi :slight_smile:
I was clutching at straws with my previous post.

There is not much that you do need java for and if you do need it then some grumbling pop-up will appear to let you know.  If that happens just switch java on again and retry whatever it was that produced the grumble.

Databases and Extensions often depend on java, unless you use an external back-end for the database.

Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#15

I do not know about him but since my laptop has Ubuntu 11.xx on it and the dual boot loader shows Debian instead of Ubuntu, there is issues there.

Most people use Ubuntu, instead of Debian, but since Ubuntu comes from Debian, but is made "easier to use", I thing some people just group them together. Mint seems to be based on Ubuntu, but I have seen info on their side that they have Debian based versions as well, skipping Ubuntu as a middle step.

He did state "family". So I thing he meant the distros based on Ubuntu or Debian. Well at least they use the same install files.

I use Ubuntu 10.04 LTS for my default desktop [using it now]. I have a Vista laptop that dual boots to Ubuntu 11.xx. I do not know if I have updated it to 11.10 or not. That is the system I used to test out Ubuntu's new environments, which I do not like as much as 10.04. Hopefully when I try 12.04, it will be more like 10.04 for my needs.

#16

To create documents with a bibliography, LyX/LaTeX and BibTeX is
_significantly_ better than any word-processor.

#17

e-letter wrote

Unfortunately I'm still not out of the woods.

The TDF version of LibreOffice isn't detected by bibus. Which means no
bibliography, which is pretty much a deal-breaker.

To create documents with a bibliography, LyX/LaTeX and BibTeX is
_significantly_ better than any word-processor.

Yes, LyX and BibTeX are very useful LaTex based layout and typesetting
utilities, but depend on auxiliary and style files--external to the text and
markup otherwise performed in a text editor or word processor. Excellent
results, but challenging to master.

In line citation management "WYSIWYG" function of commercial products (e.g.
EndNote or Scholars Aid) or open source projects like Bibus or Zotero meet
the majority of use cases with integration into the common word processors
(MS Word, OO Writer, LibO Writer).

Regards OP's failures with Bibus - IIRC, it has PyUno Python, wxpython and
wxWidgets version dependencies for use with OpenOffice/LibreOffice Writer,
and it looks as if its development has stalled (last release v1.5 in Oct.
2009). Resolving problems with current OO/LibO releases may require a
refresh or rebuild of the Bibus extension.

Perhaps review functionality of Zotero as a currently maintained alternative
to Bibus that will function with current OO/LibO releases?

#18

Regards OP's failures with  Bibus - IIRC, it has PyUno Python, wxpython
and wxWidgets version dependencies for use with OpenOffice/LibreOffice
Writer, and it looks as if its development has stalled (last release
v1.5 in Oct. 2009).  Resolving problems with current OO/LibO releases
may require a refresh or rebuild of the Bibus extension.

FWIW Bibus continues to function with the Debian releases of LibreOffice.