LibreOffice 6.0 is out
The Document Foundation released LibreOffice 6.0 Final, a new version of the free and open source Office suite, for all supported operating systems yesterday.
The new version of the application is available for all supported desktop operating system -- Linux, Mac OS and Windows -- and as a cloud version.
The new version of the Office program does not support Windows Vista, Windows XP, or Mac OS 10.8 anymore. LibreOffice 6.0 requires at least Windows 7 Service Pack 1 on Windows machines and Mac OS 10.9 on Mac OS systems.
LibreOffice 6.0 comes with a big list of changes and improvements that improve interoperability, security, core apps and the help system.
LibreOffice 6.0
Here is an overview of important changes in LibreOffice 6.0
- LibreOffice 6.0 supports OpenPGP document signing and encryption as a major new feature on all desktop editions. Users may use OpenPGP to sign ODF documents and an (experimental) option to use OpenPGP to encrypt documents as well.
- Writer: rotate images to any angle.
- Writer: new default table style.
- Writer: support for "Grammar By" spell checking which improves how new words are added to a dictionary by associating it with an existing word so that LibreOffice will recognize the new word with affixes or in compounds as well.
- Calc: support for unformatted text pasting that preserves line breaks and tabs across multiple cells.
- Calc: new spreadsheet functions SEARCHB, FINDB and REPLACEB
- Calc: number of available rows in Online Calc increased to 0.5 million
- General: support for user icon themes via extension manager
- General: new fonts (Noto fonts, open source Hebrew fonts, open source Arabic fonts)
- General: option to save the original or modified image.
- General: redesigned visualization of table borders.
- LibreOffice Help: new Help system online that replaced the old wikihelp system. Responsive design supported so that mobile access is improved.
- Filters: new or improved filters
- Dialogs: special characters dialog improvements featuring a search field, a list of recent and favorite characters, and more.
- Dialogs: The Customize interface comes with a revamped improved interface featuring a two-pane display mode, a search box and other improvements.
- Notebookbar: new variants available.
- Performance: Menu and toolbar show up before the document is loaded.
- Android: added function to create new documents and to insert pictures.
The official blog post is a good starting point to find out what is new in the new version of the Office program. A full list of all changes is in the Release Notes.
The Document Foundation released a short video that highlights important changes as well.
Now You: Do you use LibreOffice or another Office program?
Related articles
- LibreOffice 5.3 ships with experimental Office-like Ribbon UI
- LibreOffice Online with ownCloud integration (CODE)
- LibreOffice Viewer for Android is a basic document reader
https://www.libreoffice.org/download/download/
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/ReleaseNotes/6.1
LibreOffice 6.1 released.
I found LO 6.1.0.3 downloaded and installed surprisingly quickly over 6.0 . Everything I do with LO seems to work well. Lots more to explore though.
https://twitter.com/italovignoli/status/1026757894501539843
“Tomorrow we will release @libreoffice 6.1, a significantly improved free office suite with a better UI, new image handling, new database engine, new help system, and new features for cloud version”
LibreOffice Writer 6.0 has a 448 page book available on its use.
https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2018/08/06/libreoffice-6-0-writer-guide/
@chesscanoe: Very useful; thanks! I’ve been using LibreOffice Writer for a few years now, and I learned something valuable just by cursorily skimming through the book. (Specifically, I learned that the regular expression \n finds a hard line break — entered by doing shift+enter — when *searching* but inserts a paragraph break when *replacing*.)
Speaking of which, the full list of regular expressions is quite extensive. I realize the book is about LibreOffice Writer *proper*, but I’m a little surprised the authors didn’t mention the Alternative dialog Find & Replace (AltSearch) extension at this point. AltSearch makes it *much* easier for users to do advanced searches and replaces, *without* having to hunt down and learn regular expressions. The first thing I do in a new LibreOffice Writer installation is to add AltSearch and make sure it’s assigned the shift+control+H keyboard shortcut. (Since control+h loads the built-in find and replace dialog, shift+control+H for the alternative dialog is easy to remember.)
At any rate, this book looks to be both an excellent introduction to LibreOffice Writer and an excellent initial reference resource, so thanks again for posting the link.
https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2018/08/02/libreoffice-6-0-6/
This is the current “Fresh” release, version 6.0.6.2. It is just me (or whatever state my computer accidentally happened to be in), or does the Windows x64 version actually load *significantly* faster than 6.0.5.2 did? Anyway, I’m looking forward to putting it through its paces.
LibreOffice 6.0.5.2 is out and works well for me running latest Windows 10 x64 Home.
@Jane try – https://forum.openoffice.org/en/forum/viewtopic.php?f=101&t=92252
@Shelly – Don’t have that much need for image modification in LO so can’t assist much with the issue relating to photo. As for controlling tables simply right-click on any cell/row of the table and choose “Insert” to get relevant options. As for bulleted and numbered lists make sure you perform a double enter after the bullet list before you start the numbered list. this “resets” the line entry to standard before applying the list condition.
I’ve been using LO for over 3yrs having no desire to keep paying M$ an annual subscription. Prior to this time I used MS products for over 20yrs from the standalone Word, Excel through to my last experience Office2016. Yes there are differences, yes you need to get used to a new UI and yes some formatting between MS docs and LO docs is not 100% compatible however; this is due to MS not playing fair with open document standards. To be honest I have only found this to be an issue with highly image laden documents which unless your in a business that utilises graphics in its documentation is not an issue. (If it is then maybe you need to stick with MSO.)
For most users LO provided documents that are completely interchangeable with MS, (we supply reports, spread sheets and presentation documents to our customers and they are yet to report any issues), and vice versa.
If you want an office suite that IMHO provides for 99% functionality for 99% of the population give LO a go. Be prepared to learn new ways of doing things, (primarily navigating menus if you’re used to the MS “ribbon” although LO does support an experimental ribbon that I am currently using), and give LO a “fair go” as we say in Oz you won’t be disappointed.
Remember this is a “free” product that takes an incredible amount of effort from volunteer developers as opposed to the M$ behemoth and I think they’ve done a damn fine job!
@Grumpy: Well said; I concur.
New to Libre 6.0. Having problems with the following and would appreciate help:
1. Don’t have enough control of photos. In Word I can increase/decrease the contrast levels and easily upload the images to, for example, CraigsList. Can’t do either of these things with Libre.
2. Can’t control tables enough. How do I add or delete rows/columns?
3. Don’t have enough control over bullet or number lists. If I try to insert a bullet under a list of numbers, it changes all the numbers to bullets too.
I don’t care if Libre is “free” if it doesn’t meet my needs. Any how to’s would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
I want to be able to increase memory, as before.
Please put this back. LO 6 is a dog now!
Updating LO 6.0.0.3 to 6.0.1.1 For Win10 x64 deleted the optionally chosen desktop icon for 6.0.0.3 but did not add a desktop icon for 6.0.1.1 even though I checked that option during install. Thus I had to manually add it. Glad to see a prior bug fixed for me.
“check for update” “your 5.4 is up to date”
or more usually….. the program open the official site in a browser and gets you to download the whole thing yourself.
we aren’t asking for the program to update itself automatically, but in this day and age, you would expect the updater to find available versions (ltsb + newest stable) and then asks if you want to update. would be nice if smaller patches are available, but even if it downloads the whole installer in the background and installs, then deletes the installer would be ok by me.
This is because I installed the portableapps version removing all additional languages. I got an interface in French but all the popups in English. Ok, now I installed all the languages and all is in French, but in bonus I have the dictionnaries in Deutch, Spain etc installed… Now I have to search the extension’s folder to remove them as they are not uninstallable by the extension manager. Wonder if sometimes developers think to make things easy, but thanks however.
Would LibreOffice be simpler to configure for you if you did a parallel install instead of a “PortableApps” install? See these pages:
Installing in parallel on Windows – The Document Foundation Wiki
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Installing_in_parallel/Windows#SI-GUI
Separate Install GUI – The Document Foundation Wiki
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/SI-GUI
I used to use Separate Install GUI (SI-GUI) all the time to have many different, fully functional versions of LibreOffice “installed” on my system at the same time, for regression testing. (I’ve since moved all of my parallel installs to an external drive because they were taking up too much drive space. It’s a huge program.) I don’t think I ever tried changing the default UI language, locale, and document language in a parallel install, but in every respect I did try, they behaved the same as the registered, normally installed version. The difference was that were not registered with Windows and could be “uninstalled” just by deleting their parent folders or moving them to an external drive. (It’s possible to edit the parallel install’s bootstrap.ini file so that it loads a user profile from outside the parallel install’s parent folder. This could be a shared profile for all compatible parallel installs, or even the officially registered version’s user profile in …\AppData\Roaming\LibreOffice.)
SI-GUI’s interface is a little confusing at first (or at least it was at the time I was using it), but you get the hang of it pretty quickly, and it’s a lot easier and faster than doing a manual parallel install.
Thank you Martin for your interest in my posts, I will have a look on this.. About the .msi installer I would like to avoid it as much as possible however, principally because I never understood why these packages at the installation are systematically calling home.. or whatever else? forcing me to block them. So many developers nowadays thinking they do not need to ask permission, never giving real infos on why. Is it so difficult to be polite or what.
@A different Martin, same as @A different Martin, “[…]these packages [.msi installers] at the installation are systematically calling home[…]”
I do recall an article by Martin where he included software installs as one of opportunities for disconnecting from the Web (’twas about connecting-disconnecting applications). I fully understand this now that I discover that .msi installers phone home …
@Tom Hawack:
Well, this is what I get for missing some of the Original Martin’s articles. I had no idea…
@Anonymous:
I was unaware that MSI installers systematically dial home (or that EXE installers necessarily don’t). All I “knew” was that you can only be running a single MSI at a given time and that EXE installers supposedly require more work to get right. Could the dialing home sometimes possibly be to check for more recent versions, recall notices, or security certificates? I don’t know; I’m just surmising. At any rate, I think the whole point of SI-GUI is that it unpacks LibreOffice’s MSIs and does a “portable” install with the components instead of having the Windows Installer service do a regular install.
No more latence when opening menus with that version, this is what I waited for, nice! But now I have to wait for a fully french translation, tools/settings are still in english, what is not my cup of tea..
Haven’t tried it, but their promo video shows that’s what you have to do. If so, that’s a horribly unfriendly and useless UI/UX!
Anyone else notice that to rotate a picture, you had to open a popup menu and select the angle? How is that in any way helpful when you can’t see what you’re rotating as it rotates to get that perfect angle?
I use MS Office on a Win7 machine and LibreOffice on Mac’s. I’m more comfortable and faster with Office, but I can do virtually the same stuff with LibreOffice. I just have to dig a little to do it. It’s an awesome program for a great price – FREE! My thanks to the crew that puts it together.
Hooray! I love LibreOffice.
One can only be grateful for excellent, free software like LibreOffice.
So many obviously trollish comments, sad how the haters and detractors plague every comment section all over the ‘Net now.
Just upgraded LibreOffice on my Slackware, Win7, and Sierra systems yesterday and things are working well.
Been using LibreOffice forever. Never fails to ‘Impress’.
I had trouble reading a very recent Microsoft CSV file under LibreOffice 5.4.4.2, but no problem with 6.0.0.3 .
Used Word Perfect Suite until the laptop it was on smoked. WP worked OK and was cheap but behaved oddly, especially the spreadsheet. We have old versions of MS Office elsewhere. I’ve been thinking about one of the free packages, not sure which one; just don’t want to be surprised by hidden adware that shows up unexpectedly. I don’t mind paying a reasonable amount for decent office software and definitely don’t want MS Office again. The price of indecision…
try LibreOffice its great .. theirs no hidden “adware” because its free.. very trollish comment.
So true. It’s not because it’s inexpensive that it’s cheap, neither because it’s free that it includes nasty stuff. LibreOffice is a nice product elaborated by nice people, and *moreover* it’s free.
I’ve never used Base. Unless things have changed with the LibreOffice 6 release, I’m pretty sure you do need a Java Runtime Environment to be able to use macros and at least some extensions (e.g., Language Tool) in Writer.
With this new version of LibreOffice 6.0, does the “Base Module” still require “Java runtime environment (JRE) to be installed to use? It would be great if that was no longer the case so I could start using it.
Available in Evolution channel
Never used Libre but did use Open Off. for a few years because it was free. Now I have MS Office 365 (got free year with new laptop) and if you have Windows it is a giant compared to the others because it has huge sweeping connectivity with all MS programs. The others are just alternative and junior office program attempts.
I use LibreOffice, mainly for Base and Calc. I use WordPerfect for writing because I know it and have it. I was hoping that there would be calculated fields in Base 6.0 but it looks like this is not the case. It seems that there is never any improvement in Base.
Off-topic;
I have two questions to ask for you:
1. I need a privacy tool for the edition Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB 2016 or not?
2. If the answer is Yes, what is the best and most complete privacy tool?
I second the OOSHUT UP suggestion, it’s excellent, they add more and more things to shut up as windows tries new tricks. The latest has over 90 things you can turn off in Win 10. That’s scary!
Yes you need to make privacy adjustments. Try a program that is kept up to date like https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10
Ok, thanks for the answer!
FYI this release fixes the huge UI lags series 5.x had – at least for Windows, can’t speak for Linux.
E.g. resize a column, or open a menu could have a delay of 3-4 sec on a gaming machine.
Fixes as well all the missing fonts (Liberation, Libertine, Deja Vu, etc) from the installer (!!) from 5.4 series. (5.3 as well ?)
The only drawbacks i’ve seen so far is the quick launch crashes when session closes (6.0.0.1, 6.0.0.3, can’t tell yet) and it seems the persona theme search from Mozilla’s is broken. However it will keep your actual one if you had any. Minor stuff if you ask me… Anyway, this release seem really promising for the whole 6.x branch.
Current version is 6.0.0.2 but i’m not sure the integrated auto-update feature works fine.
If needed you can manually check for updates and get any version you want directly from their repository: http://downloadarchive.documentfoundation.org/libreoffice/old
Despite the name it has everything from the good ol’ 3.x to the latest 6.0 ;)
It looks like the current Fresh Release version is actually 6.0.0.3.
Huge UI lag? That’s weird, I have an average desktop and haven’t seen any UI lag or delays when opening menus or when resizing columns and LibreOffice opens very fast, without using Quickstarter. Before I increased the memory cache size, the only delay I would ever see, was when opening LibreOffice from a cold start which would take 3-4 seconds, after that first start it would open instantly. With an increased memory cache size even cold starts are now pretty much instant. It sounds like you know more about LibreOffice than I do but have you increased the memory per object and image cache? Back when I did that it made a noticeable difference for me, not that it was bad before but just that everything got faster. And I don’t know if it matters but I don’t use any themes.
Just updated to v6.0.0.3 and noticed that “Memory” is now missing under Tools/Options/LibreOffice. Under Memory I had “Use for LibreOffice†set to 256MB and I had “Memory per object†set to 20MB. I then went to Tools/Options/LibreOffice/Advanced then clicked on “Open Expert Configuration” then opened “org.openoffice.Office.Common” (double click), then Cache, then all the items under that (what a friggin pain) and my cache size looks unchanged from what I was using previously.
LibreOffice isn’t a perfect replacement for MS Office but not having to buy or rent MS Office and not having to deal with the constant barrage of updates makes it worth using especially when it does everything I need.
https://s14.postimg.org/t3qowcjcx/Libre_Office_Memory_Cache.png
Thanks for the tip, but i did that and it didn’t change anything.
However the results weren’t consistent across the machines i could test it on, my laptop is fine with 4.x but starts having the problem from 5.0, my desktop started to have the same from 5.1.2 and on a rather old test machine from work, from 5.1.0.
The only 5.x that i didn’t have trouble with is a (i think) custom 5.2.6.2-lin1 x86. I don’t even know what this is exactly…
But that’s fine, 6.0 works like a charm everywhere. Good to know also you now need some xml knowledge to tweak that… :s
Still the same antiquated update system on Windows – no delta patches/updates. No wonder Microsoft’s Office is still the dominant suite.
@Jeff
Microsoft is still dominant because of ignorant consumers like you. Plus under-the-table deals offered by their sales to enterprises’ CTOs
@Jeff:
I’m a pretty diligent and impatient updater, I have an 8-year-old, middle-of-the-road Windows 7 x64 laptop (with the “speed-crippling” Meltdown patch), and the time it takes to keep LibreOffice Fresh up to date is not an issue for me. I can handle the ten minutes or so it takes for a full install every couple/few months. (On the other hand, I *do* have relatively fast unmetered Internet, so the ~270MB download isn’t as big a stumbling block as it might be for other users.) It’s when I see that iCloud and iTunes updates are available on other computers I look after that I really start to gnash my teeth and wail. The downloads seem to take forever, the installs seem to take forever, and I know I’m going to have to reboot the computer every time.
Plus, with LibreOffice, I don’t have to keep my eyes peeled for potentially bork-o-genic Microsoft Office patches, which seemed to start cropping up more frequently after Satya Nadella fired half of Microsoft’s QA staff. I do in-place updates of LibreOffice Fresh x64 for Windows on my own computer and of LibreOffice Fresh x86 for Windows on another computer, without first uninstalling the previous version, and I don’t think I’ve ever run into an updating-related problem.
Anyway, I can find things to complain about in LibreOffice, but the updating model is not something I would have thought to include.
Ha! I wrote that I could handle a ten-minute install every couple/few months, and today the Document Foundation released a new final Fresh version (6.0.1.1) only one week after the previous one (6.0.0.3)! Even so, it wasn’t that big a deal. It was an atypically short update cycle, and I just did my morning browsing while the installer ran in background. (There’s also an optional off-line help installer, but that install goes pretty quickly.)
@ Jeff
“Still the same antiquated update system on Windows”.
FYI I downloaded Libre 6, installed it and deleted the remnants of Libre 5. That took about 5 minutes. The Libre installer removes all obsolete files. What is your problem ?
MS Office 2016 Home price in the UK is £ 120 for indefinite use
MS Office 365 Home in the UK is £ 80 per year.
Libre Office is FREE !!!!!
Enjoy paying for MS Office :)
I agree. Proceeded as you did. 260MB gets quickly downloaded nowadays (on most systems, OK).
LibreOffice, installed/using only Writer and Calc. I never encountered an issue except once (I think it was in the 4.x sequence) with saving as PDF, otherwise no problem before and after.
This is free though….
Yeah, it’s got nothing to do with their immense marketing structure and the fact it’s taught at schools. People just go “frak this sheet, this update system that I don’t even really have to use in the first place and which patches only come out from time to time is so getting on my nerves, I’m shelling out for some MS Office sweetness in my life right now, can’t wait for their update system”.
Post of the day!
:-) I think that it’s amazing that they give away something like this. There is so much work involved, to just give it away, it must be a labor of love. And practically speaking, it is extremely functional. Many thanks to its creators.
I opted recently for the office suite of WPS. I only have used text so far in a fairly basic way but so far so good.
It seems that one of their selling points that they will give one 1gb in the cloud storage space to share etc. docs
@Wybo:
Is that the old Kingsoft Office?
@Jody Thornton:
According to Wikipedia, WPS is indeed the old Kingsoft Office. The personal basic version is free; the fully featured professional version is subscription-based.
Please remove me from any lists you may have. I used to enjoy the read but now the ugly new look the begging for money & other ads are just too much.
I’m sorry that you feel that way. This “begging for money” as you call it is an attempt to get rid of advertisement on the site by relying more on direct user support. This would be a win-win if it works out but it won’t if I don’t display the support options on the site.
I have seen this begging for money and then I realized I had my adblock on , I turned it off for this site, money I don’t have but I will allow ads on this.
Martin, although I thoroughly enjoy reading your newsletter, I am getting really sick of these trolls and argumentative types. Don’t have the time or patients to wade through their drivel. Perhaps it’s time to move to a tighter Comment section design. My other Fav tech site is howtogeek.com. Requires signing up plus a few extra clicks to get to the Comments.
Thank you for keeping us informed.
@Phylis Sophical
Howtogeek use Discourse for its comment section, which is more of a forum than a comment section. I really like Discourse, it’s one of the best forum software out there.
Martin – my guess is this is a troll, as the same/similar message has popped up a few times in recent weeks.
I use LibreOffice portable, for years. Never used Office.
Did they finally fix bug with disappearing images in writer?
https://ask.libreoffice.org/en/question/89834/writer-and-impress-images-disappear/
https://ask.libreoffice.org/en/question/72828/images-disappear-in-writer/
https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=99050
https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=47148 is the report to follow.
According to https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2018/01/29/tdf-uses-tendering-process-improve-libreoffice-share-knowledge-community/ Collabora are working on it
I can’t properly recommend LibreOffice to friends until there is a fix for
long running bug
https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=58358
whereby if one scrolls up or down while using a zoom other than 100%
a garbage distortion of some of the text occurs.
See this pic:
https://bug-attachments.documentfoundation.org/attachment.cgi?id=71579
It has persisted since version 3 and is still with us in version 6.
Abiword never did that.
I’ve never had that issues in LibreOffice.