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. Read this: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13880_3-9864262-68.html 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.