Author: Mike Saunders

Yes, we’re half-way through the Month of LibreOffice, November 2024. And already, 206 contributors have won cool LibreOffice sticker packs! Details on how to claim them will be provided at the end of the month, but if you don’t see your name (or username) on that page, it’s not too late to join…

How to take part

There are many ways you can help out – and you don’t need to be a developer. For instance, you can be a:

• Handy Helper, answering questions from users on Ask LibreOffice. We’re keeping an eye on that site so if you give someone useful advice, you can claim your shiny stickers.

• First Responder, helping to confirm new bug reports: Go to our Bugzilla page and look for new bugs. If you can recreate one, add a comment like “CONFIRMED on Windows 11 and LibreOffice 24.8.3”.

• Drum Beater, spreading the word: Tell everyone about LibreOffice on Mastodon, Bluesky or X (Twitter)! Just say why you love it or what you’re using it for, add the #libreoffice hashtag, and at the end of the month you can claim your stickers.

• Globetrotter, translating the user interface: LibreOffice is available in a wide range of languages, but its interface translations need to be kept up-to-date. Or maybe you want to translate the suite to a whole new language? Get involved here.

• Code Cruncher, contributing source code: The codebase is big, but there are lots of places to get involved with small jobs. See our Developers page on the website and this page on the wiki to get started.

• Docs Doctor, writing documentation: Whether you want to update the online help or add chapters to the handbooks, here’s where to start.

So, two more weeks to go! We’ll be posting more updates on this blog and our Mastodon, Bluesky and X (Twitter) accounts…

Here’s our summary of updates, events and activities in the LibreOffice project in the last four weeks – click the links to learn more…

• The biggest event in October was the LibreOffice and Open Source Conference 2024, which took place in Luxembourg from October 10 – 12! We had talks, workshops, social events and more – as this quick recap video shows (also available on PeerTube):

• In addition, we’ve started editing and uploading videos from the talks. Here’s the first batch – but there are many more to come, and we’ll put them on PeerTube too. (Apologies for the occasional video stutter in some places.)

• But there was much more happening in October, like the LibreOffice community joining Software Freedom Day celebrations in Nepal!

• We talked to Ritobroto Mukherjee about the work he’s doing to improve LibreOffice, as part of the Google Summer of Code. He also tells us about his experiences joining our community.

• Then we caught up with Jonathan Clark, who recently joined the small team at The Document Foundation to work on improving LibreOffice’s language support, especially for RTL / CTL / CJK.

• On the release side, we had one update to LibreOffice in October – version 24.2.7, planned to be the last in the 24.2 branch. Then all users are strongly recommended to upgrade to the latest stable branch, LibreOffice 24.8.

• Did you know that TDF has a certification program for LibreOffice developers and migrators? Rafael Lima told us about his experiences becoming a new certified developer, and what the requirements are.

• And finally, we looked ahead to some upcoming and future events. The LibreOffice project will be at FOSDEM 2025 in Brussels at the start of February, for instance. And thinking further ahead: we’re looking for people to host the LibreOffice Conference 2025!

Keep in touch – follow us on Mastodon, X (formerly Twitter), Bluesky, Reddit and Facebook. Like what we do? Support our community with a donation – or join our community and help to make LibreOffice even better!

Here’s your chance to learn new skills for a potential future career change, or expand your knowledge and have fun on the way: get involved in the Month of LibreOffice, November 2024! Over the next four weeks, hundreds of people around the world will collaborate to improve the software – and you can help them. There are many ways to get involved, as you’ll see in a second.

And best of all: everyone who contributes to LibreOffice in November can claim a cool sticker pack, and has the chance to win extra LibreOffice merchandise such as mugs, hoodies, T-shirts, rucksacks and more (we’ll choose 10 participants at random at the end):

How to take part

There are many ways you can help out – and you don’t need to be a developer. For instance, you can be a…

• Handy Helper, answering questions from users on Ask LibreOffice. We’re keeping an eye on that site so if you give someone useful advice, you can claim your shiny stickers.

• First Responder, helping to confirm new bug reports: Go to our Bugzilla page and look for new bugs. If you can recreate one, add a comment like “CONFIRMED on Windows 11 and LibreOffice 24.8.2”.

• Drum Beater, spreading the word: Tell everyone about LibreOffice on Mastodon, Bluesky or X (Twitter)! Just say why you love it or what you’re using it for, add the #libreoffice hashtag, and at the end of the month you can claim your stickers.

• Globetrotter, translating the user interface: LibreOffice is available in a wide range of languages, but its interface translations need to be kept up-to-date. Or maybe you want to translate the suite to a whole new language? Get involved here.

• Code Cruncher, contributing source code: The codebase is big, but there are lots of places to get involved with small jobs. See our Developers page on the website and this page on the wiki to get started.

• Docs Doctor, writing documentation: Whether you want to update the online help or add chapters to the handbooks, here’s where to start.

We’ll be updating this page every few days with usernames across our various services, as people contribute. So dive in, get involved and help make LibreOffice better for millions of people around the world – and enjoy your sticker pack at the end as thanks from us! And who knows, maybe you’ll be lucky enough to win bonus merch as well…

So let’s get going! We’ll be posting regular updates on this blog and our Mastodon, Bluesky and X (Twitter) accounts over the next four weeks – stay tuned…