Getting Started Guide 7.2

Appendix B
Open Source,Open Standards,
OpenDocument

CopyrightThis document is Copyright © 2021 by the LibreOffice Documentation Team. Contributors arelisted below. You may distribute it and/or modify it under the terms of either the GNU General
Public License (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html), version 3 or later, or the Creative
Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), version 4.0 or later.
All trademarks within this guide belong to their legitimate owners.

Contributors
To this edition
Jean Hollis WeberKees Kriek

To previous editions
Jean Hollis Weber
Olivier Hallot
Dave Barton

Steve Fanning
Valerii Goncharuk
Andrew Jensen

Kees Kriek
Rafael Lima
Peter SchofieldFeedback
Please direct any comments or suggestions about this document to the Documentation Team’s
mailing list: documentation@global.libreoffice.org

Note
Everything you send to a mailing list, including your email address and any otherpersonal information that is written in the message, is publicly archived and cannot
be deleted.

Publication date and software version
Published September 2021. Based on LibreOffice 7.2 Community.
Other versions of LibreOffice may differ in appearance and functionality.

Using LibreOffice on macOS
Some keystrokes and menu items are different on macOS from those used in Windows andLinux. The table below gives some common substitutions for the instructions in this document.
For a detailed list, see the application Help.
Windows or LinuxmacOS equivalent

EffectTools > Options
menu selection

LibreOffice > Preferences

Access setup options

Right-click

Control+click or right-click
depending on computer setup

Open a context menu

Ctrl (Control)⌘ (Command)

Used with other keys

F11⌘+T

Open the Styles deck in theSidebar

Documentation for LibreOffice is available at http://documentation.libreoffice.org/en/Contents
Copyright............................................................................................................................2Contributors.............................................................................................................................. 2Feedback.................................................................................................................................. 2Publication date and software version.......................................................................................2
Using LibreOffice on macOS.....................................................................................................2Introduction........................................................................................................................4
A short history of LibreOffice...........................................................................................4
The LibreOffice community..............................................................................................4
How is LibreOffice licensed?...........................................................................................5
What is open source?.......................................................................................................5
What are open standards?...............................................................................................5What is OpenDocument?..................................................................................................5OpenDocument filename extensions.........................................................................................6

File formats LibreOffice can open...................................................................................6
Opening text documents...........................................................................................................6Opening spreadsheets.............................................................................................................. 7
Opening presentations.............................................................................................................. 7
Opening graphic files................................................................................................................7Opening formula files................................................................................................................8

File formats LibreOffice can save to...............................................................................8
Saving text documents.............................................................................................................. 8Saving spreadsheet files...........................................................................................................8Saving presentations.................................................................................................................9Saving drawings........................................................................................................................ 9Saving Writer/Web documents..................................................................................................9

Exporting to other formats...............................................................................................9Appendix B Open Source, Open Standards, OpenDocument | 3

Introduction
LibreOffice is a productivity suite that is compatible with other major office suites and available ona variety of platforms. It is open source software and therefore free to download, use, anddistribute. If you are new to LibreOffice, this appendix will provide some information regarding itshistory, its community, and some of its technical specifications.

A short history of LibreOffice
The OpenOffice.org project began when Sun Microsystems released the source code(“blueprints”) for its StarOffice® software to the open source community on October 13, 2000.
OpenOffice.org 1.0, the product, was released on April 30, 2002. Major updates toOpenOffice.org included version 2.0 in October 2005 and version 3.0 in October 2008. On
January 26, 2010, Oracle Corporation acquired Sun Microsystems.
On September 28, 2010, the community of volunteers who develop and promote OpenOffice.org
announced a major change in project structure. After ten years’ successful growth with Sun
Microsystems as founding and principle sponsor, the project launched an independent foundation
called The Document Foundation, to fulfill the promise of independence written in the originalcharter. This foundation is the cornerstone of a new ecosystem where individuals andorganizations can contribute to and benefit from the availability of a truly free office suite.
Unable to acquire the trademarked OpenOffice.org name from Oracle Corporation, The
Document Foundation named its product LibreOffice. Continuing the version numbers fromOpenOffice.org, LibreOffice 3.3 was released in January 2011 and version 7.0 was released inAugust 2020.
In February 2012, The Document Foundation was incorporated in Berlin as a German Stiftung.
You can read more about The Document Foundation at: www.documentfoundation.org.

The LibreOffice community
The Document Foundation’s mission is:“...to facilitate the evolution of the OpenOffice.org Community into a new open,independent, and meritocratic organizational structure within the next few months. An
independent Foundation is a better match to the values of our contributors, users, andsupporters, and will enable a more effective, efficient, transparent, and inclusiveCommunity. We will protect past investments by building on the solid achievements of ourfirst decade, encourage wide participation in the Community, and co-ordinate activity
across the Community.”
Some of our corporate supporters include GNOME Foundation, Google, Red Hat, and Collabora.
Additionally, over 450,000 people from nearly every part of the globe have joined this project with
the idea of creating the best possible office suite that all can use. This is the essence of an “opensource” community!
With its open source software license, LibreOffice is key in the drive to provide an office suite thatis available to anyone, anywhere, for commercial or personal use. The software has beentranslated into many languages and runs on all major operating systems. New functionality canbe added in the form of extensions.
The LibreOffice community invites contributors in all areas, including translators, softwaredevelopers, graphic artists, technical writers, editors, donors, and end-user support. Whatever
you do best, you can make a difference in LibreOffice. The community operates internationally inall time zones and in many languages, linked through the internet at www.libreoffice.org andwww.documentfoundation.org.

4 | Appendix B Open Source, Open Standards, OpenDocument

How is LibreOffice licensed?
LibreOffice is distributed under both the Mozilla Public License (MPL) 2.0(www.libreoffice.org/about-us/licenses/) and the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL)
3.0+ (www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl-3.0.en.html).

What is open source?
The four essential rights of open-source software are embodied within the Free Software
Foundation’s family of the GNU General Public License (GPL):•The right to use the software for any purpose.

•Freedom to redistribute the software for free or for a fee.

•Access to the complete source code of the program (that is, the “blueprints”).

•The right to modify any part of the source, or use portions of it in other programs.

The basic idea behind open source is very simple: When programmers can read, redistribute,and modify the source code for a piece of software, the software evolves. People improve it,people adapt it, people fix bugs.
For more information on Free and Open Source software, visit these websites:•

Open Source Initiative (OSI): www.opensource.org•

Free Software Foundation (FSF): www.fsf.org

What are open standards?
An open standard provides a means of doing something that is independent of manufacturer orvendor, thus enabling competing software programs to freely use the same file formats. HTML,
XML, and ODF are examples of open standards for documents.
An open standard meets the following requirements:•

It is well documented with the complete specification publicly available, either free or at anominal charge.

•It can be freely copied, distributed, and used. The intellectual property of the standard ismade irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis.

•It is standardized and maintained in an independent, open forum (also called “standardsorganization”) using an open process.

What is OpenDocument?
OpenDocument (ODF) is an XML-based file format for office documents (text documents,spreadsheets, drawings, presentations, and more), developed at OASIS (www.oasis-open.org),
an independent, international standards group. OpenDocument version 1.2 was adopted by theInternational Standards Organization and named ISO/IEC 26300:2015 standard1. In December
2019, ODF 1.3 was approved as a committee specification.
Unlike other file formats, ODF (ISO/IEC 26300:2015) is an open standard. It is publicly available,royalty-free, and without legal or other restrictions; therefore ODF files are not tied to a specificoffice suite and anybody can build a program that interprets these files. For this reason ODF isquickly becoming the preferred file format for government agencies, schools and othercompanies who prefer not to be too dependent on any one software supplier.
1

www.iso.org/standard/66363.html, www.iso.org/standard/66375.html, andwww.iso.org/standard/66376.html

What is OpenDocument? | 5

LibreOffice 7.2 saves documents in ODF 1.3 Extended by default. LibreOffice can also open andsave in earlier versions of the ODF standard, as well as many other file formats, as summarized
below.
For a full list of file formats that LibreOffice can read and write, see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LibreOffice#Supported_file_formats

OpenDocument filename extensions
The most common filename extensions used for OpenDocument documents are:*.odt for word processing (text) documents*.ods for spreadsheets*.odp for presentations*.odb for databases*.odg for graphics (vector drawings)*.odc for charts*.odf for formulas (scientific formulas and equations)File formats LibreOffice can open
LibreOffice can open a wide variety of file formats in addition to the OpenDocument formats,including Portable Document Format (PDF).

Opening text documents
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odt, .ott, .oth, .odm, and .fodt), Writer can open thefollowing text document formats, and a variety of legacy formats not listed below:
Microsoft Word 6.0/95/97/2000/XP/Mac) (.doc and .dot)
Microsoft Word 2003 XML (.xml)
Microsoft Word 2007/2010 XML (.docx, .docm, .dotx, .dotm)
Microsoft WinWord 5 (.doc)
WordPerfect Document (.wpd)
Microsoft Works (.wps)
Lotus WordPro (.lwp)
Abiword Document (.abw, .zabw)
ClarisWorks/Appleworks Document (.cwk)
MacWrite Document (.mw, .mcw)
Rich Text Format (.rtf)
Text CSV (.csv and .txt)
StarWriter formats (.sdw, .sgl, .vor)
DocBook (.xml)
Unified Office Format text (.uot, .uof)
T602 Document (.602, .txt)
Hangul WP 97 (.hwp)
Apple Pages 4 (.pages)
eBook (.pdb)
HTML Document (.htm, .html)
OpenOffice.org 1.x (.sxw, .stw, and .sxg)... and many others
Most of these file types are automatically detected by LibreOffice, so they can be opened without
explicitly selecting the document type in the file picker.
When opening .htm or .html files (used for web pages), LibreOffice customizes Writer for working
with these files.

6 | Appendix B Open Source, Open Standards, OpenDocument

Opening spreadsheets
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.ods, .ots, and .fods), Calc can open the following
spreadsheet formats:
Microsoft Excel 97/2000/XP (.xls, .xlw, and .xlt)
Microsoft Excel 4.x–5.0/95 (.xls, .xlw, and .xlt)
Microsoft Excel 97-2003 (.xml)
Microsoft Excel 2007-365 (.xlsx, .xlsm, .xltx, .xltm)
Microsoft Excel 2007-2010 binary (.xlsb)
Lotus 1-2-3 (.wk1, .wks, and .123)
Data Interchange Format (.dif)
Rich Text Format (.rtf)
Text CSV (.csv and .txt)
StarCalc (.sdc and .vor)
OpenOffice.org 1.x (.sxc and .stc)
dBASE (.dbf)
SYLK (.slk)
Unified Office Format spreadsheet (.uos, .uof)
HTML Document (.htm and .html files, including Web page queries)
Quattro Pro 6.0 (.wb2)
Apple Numbers 2 (.numbers)... and many others

Opening presentations
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odp, .odg, .otp, and .fopd), Impress can open thefollowing presentation formats:
Microsoft PowerPoint 97/2000/XP (.ppt and .pot)
Microsoft PowerPoint 2007-365 (.pptx, .pptm, .potx, .potm)
StarDraw and StarImpress (.sda, .sdd, .sdp, and .vor)
OpenOffice.org 1.x (.sxi and .sti)
Unified Office Format presentation (.uop, .uof)
CGM – Computer Graphics Metafile (.cgm)
Portable Document Format (.pdf)
Apple Keynote 5 (.key)... and many others

Opening graphic files
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odg and .otg) and Portable Document Format (.pdf),
Draw can open the following graphic formats:
Adobe Photoshop (*.psd)
AutoCAD Interchange Format (*.dxf)
Corel Draw (*.cdr)
Corel Presentation Exchange (*.cmx)
Microsoft Publisher 98-2010 (*.pub)
Microsoft Visio 2000-2013 (*.vdx; *.vsd; *.vsdm; *.vsdx)
WordPerfect Graphics (*.wpg)
OpenOffice.org 1.x (.sxd and .std)
BMP
JPEG, JPG
PCX
RAS
TGA
DXF
MET
PGM
SDA
TIF, TIFF
EMF
PBM
PNG
SDD
WMF
EPS
PCD
PPM
SVG
XBM
GIF
PCT
PSD
SVM
XPM
File formats LibreOffice can open | 7

Opening formula files
In addition to OpenDocument Formula (.odf) files, Math can open the formats used by
OpenOffice.org 1.x (.sxm), StarMath (.smf), and MathML (.mml) files.
When opening a Word document that contains an embedded equation editor object, if the option
MathType to LibreOffice Math or reverse is checked in Tools > Options > Load/Save >Microsoft Office, the object will be automatically converted to a LibreOffice Math object.

File formats LibreOffice can save toSaving in an OpenDocument format guarantees the correct rendering of the file when it istransferred to another person or when the file is reopened with a later version of LibreOffice orwith another program. It is strongly recommended that you use OpenDocument as the default fileformats. However, you can save files in other formats, if you wish.

Tip
When sharing a document that you do not expect the recipient to modify, thepreferred option is to convert the document to PDF. LibreOffice provides a
straightforward way to convert documents to PDF. See Chapter 10, Printing,Exporting, Emailing, and Signing, in this guide.

Saving text documents
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odt, .ott, and .fodt), Writer can save in these formats:
Office Open XML Text (.docx)
Microsoft Word 97–2003 (.doc)
Rich Text Format (.rtf)
Text Encoded (.txt)
HTML Document (.html and .htm)

Microsoft Word 2007–365 (.docx, .dotx)
Microsoft Word 2003 XML (.xml)
Text (.txt)
Unified Office Format text (.uot, .uof)
DocBook (.xml)

Encryption support within the Microsoft Word 97/2000/XP filter allows password protected
Microsoft Word documents to be saved.

NoteThe .rtf format is a common format for transferring text files between applications,but you are likely to experience loss of formatting and images. For this reason, otherformats should be used.

Saving spreadsheet files
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.ods, .ots, and .fods), Calc can save in these formats:
Office Open XML Spreadsheet (.xlsx)
Microsoft Excel 2007–365 XML (.xlsx)
Microsoft Excel 97–2003 (.xls and .xlw)
Microsoft Excel 97–2003 Template (.xlt)
Microsoft Excel 2003 XML (.xml)
HTML Document (Calc) (.html and .htm)

Data Interchange Format (.dif)dBase (.dbf)
SYLK (.slk)
Text CSV (.csv and .txt)
Unified Office Format spreadsheet (.uos)

8 | Appendix B Open Source, Open Standards, OpenDocument

Saving presentations
In addition to OpenDocument formats (.odp, .otp, .fodp, and .odg), Impress can save in theseformats:
Microsoft PowerPoint 2007–365 (.pptx, .potm)
Microsoft PowerPoint 2007–365 AutoPlay (.ppsx)
Microsoft PowerPoint 97–2003 (.ppt)
Microsoft PowerPoint 97–2003 Template (.pot)
Microsoft PowerPoint 97–2003 AutoPlay (.pps)
Office Open XML Presentation (.pptx, .potm, .ppsx)
Unified Office Format presentation (.uop)
Impress can also export to any of the graphics formats listed for Draw.

Saving drawings
Draw can save in the OpenDocument Drawing formats (.odg, .otg, and .fodg).
Draw can export to any of the following graphics formats: BMP, EMF, EPS, GIF, JPEG, PNG,SVG, TIFF, and WMF.

Note
Adobe [Macromedia] Flash (.swf) export has been removed from LibreOffice 7. Flash
Player reached end-of-life in December 2020.

Saving Writer/Web documents
Writer/Web can save to these formats:HTML document (.html and .htm), as HTML 4.0 Transitional
Text and Text Encoded (LibreOffice Writer/Web) (.txt)

Exporting to other formats
LibreOffice uses the term “export” for some file operations involving a change of file type. If you
cannot find what you want under File > Save As, look under File > Export (not available inMath) for additional types.
Two popular formats that LibreOffice can export to are PDF (Writer, Calc, Impress, and Draw)
and EPUB (Writer only). See Chapter 10, Printing, Exporting, Emailing, and Signing Documents,
for more information about exporting to those formats.
LibreOffice can also export files to HTML and XHTML. In addition, Draw and Impress can export
to a range of image formats.
To export to one of these formats, choose File > Export. On the Export dialog, specify a filename for the exported document, then select the desired format in the file format list and click theExport or Save button as appropriate.

Exporting to other formats | 9