OpenOffice setup

OpenOffice is included in Ubuntu installation by default.

However, when starting oowriter I kept getting the following message

 javaldx: Could not find a Java Runtime Environment! 

oowriter is working, at least the basic things, but I read that for some advanced stuff one might need Java runtime environment. I installed sun-java6-jre, but that did not solve the problem. Finally, the solution was:

  sudo apt-get install openoffice.org-java-common

This takes care of that :)

Spellchecker for another language

Adding Latvian dictionary is fairly easy. Run oowriter,

go to File -> Wizards -> Install new dictionaries..., follow the directions and you have it. Remember to restart oowriter.

The catch: If you get a "too small of a window" at some point, disable visual effects in Ubuntu (8.04): go to System -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Visual Effects -> None.

Compatibility with Microsoft Office (Word)

You may want to add MS fonts to get better appearance of the documents in OOWriter that were created with MS Word:

sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts

Also, you may want to check a few compatibility options under Tools->Options. Specifically, check these, and then click on Use as Default:

Menu -> Tools -> Options -> OpenOffice.org Writer -> Compatibility
x Use printer metrics for document formatting
x Add spacing between paragraphs and tables (in current document)
x Add paragraph and table spacing at tops of pages (in current document)
x Do not add leading (extra space) between lines of text
x Add paragraph and table spacing at bottom of table cells
x Consider wrapping style when positioning objects
x Expand word space on lines with manual line breaks in justified paragraphs

There are also options under Tools -> Options -> Load/Save, that let you preserve things like VBA scripts not used under OOffice, and the default format if you wish to make it as MS Word 2000 or 2003. Read more here: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13880_3-9864262-68.html