On March 26, we celebrated Document Freedom Day. Mike Saunders from The Document Foundation, the non-profit behind LibreOffice, gave an online talk about the importance of open standards and free software:
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Here’s our summary of updates, events and activities in the LibreOffice project in the last four weeks – click the links to learn more…
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The Document Foundation (TDF) has received two different proposals for the organisation of the LibreOffice Conference 2025. TDF Members will receive an email asking them to cast a vote and decide which will be the final venue.
City: Budapest, the capital of Hungary and a former part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, is well known for its stunning landscape, with the Danube River and surrounding hills, its Belle Époque architecture, and its vibrant atmosphere. The city offers numerous attractions, including the medieval Buda Castle district and its famous thermal spas. As a popular tourist destination, Budapest boasts a wide range of accommodations, cafés, parks, and a bustling nightlife with many pubs and entertainment venues. Additionally, Budapest serves as Hungary’s administrative, cultural, and educational centre, with a population of around one million. The city is home to numerous museums and academic institutions.
Entity: The LibreOffice Conference 2025 in Budapest would be co-organized by the FSF.hu Foundation and the ELTE University Faculty of Informatics. The FSF.hu Foundation, established nearly 25 years ago, was created to support the localization and promotion of FLOSS in Hungary. In addition to handling financial matters, FSF.hu has offered to issue visa invitation letters. A list of countries requiring a visa for travel to Hungary can be found on the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs website.
Dates: The expected date for the conference is September 1 – 5, 2025.
Venue: The conference venue will be located in the heart of Budapest, at ELTE University’s Faculty of Informatics, one of Hungary’s leading universities. The venue, near by the Danube River offers a spacious university campus with numerous large and small rooms, computer labs, and open spaces ideal for community gatherings, meeting the typical needs of a LibreOffice Conference.
The venue provides a reliable Wi-Fi connection suitable for a conference of this scale, and the auditoriums used for the event will be wheelchair accessible. Additionally, the university can provide personnel for video recording during the main conference days.
Team: The organizing team consists of experienced contributors from the local LibreOffice community, including Annabella Szép, Anikó Kelemenné Husi, Gábor Kelemen, András Tímár, Miklós Vajna, Balázs Varga, and Attila Szűcs. Each of them has extensive experience in developing, testing, or teaching LibreOffice. This dedicated team shares a deep commitment to the project, working together effectively as a well-coordinated group.
From ELTE Faculty of Informatics, Ágnes Erdősné Németh is responsible for managing the conference venue.
Gábor Kelemen, head of the organizing team, will oversee visa and sponsor relations.
After many years of collaboration and contributing to LibreOffice’s growth, we now hope to be awarded the opportunity to host the LibreOffice 2025 Conference in Budapest.
City: Belval is the new technology and University campus being developed next to Esch-sur-Alzette, the second largest city in Luxembourg, and is optimally positioned in Europe to provide visibility to LibreOffice and its community as well as for engaging with the various EU institutions it hosts. Being also bordering with France, Belgium and Germany it facilitates the participation to the conference of organisations within the greater region creating even more opportunities to promote LibreOffice and the complementary Open Source software that can form the foundations for the technological autonomy/sovereignty that many countries are now looking to achieve.
Entity: TDF will be the legal entity handling financials and sponsorships directly.
Dates: To guarantee that all participants will have a hotel room on campus we selected the week starting the 29th of September 2025.
Venue: As it has been proven to be an excellent location, we will be hosting it again in last year’s venue, within the Belval campus of the University of Luxembourg, and we will work to get even more support from ministries, local organizations, and of course the university itself.
More information about the location can be found here.
Team: The organisation of the conference is a joint effort made by several local volunteers and organisations coordinated by Paolo Vecchi with the support of the Digital Learning Hub and 42 School which are providing the venues.
So those are the two proposals, and as mentioned, TDF Members will receive an email asking them to cast a vote and decide which will be the final venue.
(Translated from the Spanish original.)
Juan C. Sanz writes:
The Firebird database is distinguished by its unique features within the LibreOffice Base compatible database ecosystem. Why do I consider Firebird to be special? Because it is the only database engine that supports all possible forms of connection in Base and also allows the creation of both embedded, external and server databases directly from LibreOffice, without having to use specific tools.
LibreOffice offers the following Firebird connection options:
Additionally, like other database servers, it is possible to establish a connection via JDBC or ODBC connectors. These connectors are available free of charge and as open source software on the official Firebird website.
Advantages of multiple connection options. Firebird offers several ways of connection that represent important advantages:
This option is especially easy and accessible for users with little database experience. Simply enable the experimental features of LibreOffice to start using it. It is ideal for learning basic database concepts and the Base tool.
The connection to the server via the internal driver provides a fast and easy way to configure connection. In any case, ODBC and JDBC connections also work without problems, although, as they require an intermediate connector, they are usually slower.
For all these reasons, I consider that Base and Firebird are an ideal combination.
Heiko Tietze from LibreOffice’s Design community tells us about UI and UX improvements in the suite, how decisions are made, and more. (Also available on PeerTube).
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Nearly a year ago, we posted about the German state of Schleswig-Holstein’s plan to move 30,000 PCs from Microsoft Office/365 to LibreOffice.
Now, Stephane Fermigier from EuroStack – which promotes European technological sovereignty and open source – has posted an update, citing an article in the German c’t Magazin. It discusses various reasons for the migration to LibreOffice and Linux, including:
In Fermigier’s post he also points to a recent talk from the LibreOffice Conference 2024 in Luxembourg (see below – video also available on PeerTube). Meanwhile, Dirk Schrödter, Head of the State Chancellery of Schleswig-Holstein, posted some thoughts on LinkedIn, including:
This is not just about technological independence but also about economic aspects. At present, our administrations and businesses are trapped in a system characterized by monopolistic structures and high licensing fees. […] It is a core responsibility of our state to be able to influence the operational processes of its IT systems at all times and to ensure the data security of its citizens and businesses. […] The necessary conclusion can only be: Open Source software must become the standard in our digitalized administration.
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