Here’s a quick status update on LibreOffice for Android and iOS (iPhone/iPad).
LibreOffice is an application for desktop platforms, including Linux, macOS and Windows. The Document Foundation, the non-profit entity behind LibreOffice, is currently focused on delivering the best experience on the desktop. (There is also LibreOffice Online, a cloud-based version of the suite, for use in web browsers.)
While The Document Foundation doesn’t currently offer an Android or iOS version of LibreOffice, there is a LibreOffice-based product in app stores from Collabora, one of our certified developers and ecosystem members:
(More apps will be added to this list as they are developed and released.)
For more technically-oriented users: our developer community has been working on a mobile app, LibreOffice Viewer for Android, which also includes experimental editing support. This is not yet ready for widespread usage, but work is ongoing. (Binary builds are also available on F-Droid, but may not represent the latest state of the code.) If you’re familiar with Android app development, we’d appreciate your contributions!
Members of The Document Foundation – the non-profit entity behind LibreOffice – help to steer the project, vote for the Board of Directors, and spread the word. Today we’re talking to Leif-Jöran Olsson, who has recently become a member of TDF…
To start with, tell us a bit about yourself!
I am from beautiful Sweden, more precisely from the land of deep forests and white rivers in the middle of the country.
I work as a research engineer and IT operations supervisor at the Swedish Language Bank (a language technology research institute) daytime. I also run the consultancy company Frirogramvarusyndikatet.se, which among other things provides IT admin to TDF, and is a Collabora Productivity partner.
I am soon to become a grandfather for the first time. So, exciting times ahead.
What are you working on in the LibreOffice project right now?
Translations are ongoing, and the review of the grammar and spell checking infrastructure is running since last year. But the largest contribution in time and effort is the current work on a LibreOffice Online-based Sailfish OS app (like the ones for Android and iOS).
Why did you decide to become a member of TDF?
After promoting LibreOffice for many years, we decided to do a significant push for LibreOffice Online in late 2016. And since we from that time also provided IT admin services to TDF, I have been hanging around at hackfests etc.
But since the membership obligations are more towards personal contributions, I did not feel that I contributed enough to become a member. So in addition to becoming a Collabora Productivity partner at the FOSDEM hackfest 2018, I started to think about what I could do as personal contributions.
Since I work with language technology, I prepared for a review of the grammar and spell checking infrastructure in LibreOffice. In the dark ages I actually did a Swedish dictionary extension for the release of OpenOffice 3 with the new packaging format. I also started to contribute to the Swedish translations of LibreOffice. This is something I also do for other projects like Nextcloud, OTRS, SailfishOS, Matomo etc.
Anything else you plan to do in the future? What does LibreOffice really need right now?
I will also try to get closer to the standardisation and evolvement of the Open Document Format specification, since I have experience from SIS the Swedish part of ISO. In addition, as an eXist-db core developer, XML is close to my heart.
We need to get closer to valuing/counting all contributions equally. I felt the translations were not counted as real contributions in the way code is (and I say this with a free software coding experience of 25+ years). This makes me a bit sad that we are not ahead of other projects in this aspect. But let us start changing this with the very positive 10/20 years celebrations with a grand Fest Noz now. Kenavo / på återseende!
Thanks to Leif for all his contributions! And to anyone else reading this who’s involved in the LibreOffice project and community, consider becoming a member:
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Communities around the world help to translate and localise LibreOffice in over 100 languages. We really appreciate their efforts! Even when they can’t meet in person, they hold online events to make progress, as Ahmad Haris reports:
March 28, 2020: The Indonesian LibreOffice community held an online translation marathon, which focused on the user interface. Normally, we have in-person meetings for such translating marathons, but due to the ongoing COVID-19 situation, we held it online. We use Jitsi and deploy to our community server. The results were quite positive, since we’re heading towards reaching 100% translation. Only a few strings (21) remain untranslated because we also use the same string in the Indonesian language.
A big thanks to everyone in the Indonesian LibreOffice community who took part! Everyone around the world is welcome to join our translation projects and make LibreOffice accessible for all, regardless of language or location. It’s a great way to use your skills, contribute to a well-known FOSS project, and have fun!
Here’s our summary of updates, events and activities in the LibreOffice project in the last four weeks – click the links to learn more. March was a difficult month for many people around the world, so we’d like to say en extra big thank you to everyone who contributed time and effort to our software and community.
LibreOffice includes a wide range of features for home users and professionals, but it can be extended further. We’re working on a new extensions and templates website, with a streamlined design and improved usability for authors and users. We’ll post more updates on this blog as it progresses!
One of the many features introduced in LibreOffice 6.4 is the ability to join/merge multiple text boxes when importing PDFs. Indeed, many people have said that they find this feature especially useful, so we wrote a blog post showing it in action. Thanks to Justin Luth of SIL who implemented this feature.
Open Badges for LibreOffice is a new service we’ve set up, crediting members of the community for their work. Open Badges are PNG images that are awarded to contributors for reaching a certain threshold – such as a number of commits to the codebase, or answering questions on Ask LibreOffice. But these images are something special: they contain metadata describing the contributor’s work, which can be verified using an external service.
Petr Valach from the Czech LibreOffice community reported back from InstallFest 2020 in Prague, which took place on February 29 and March 1. We really appreciate the help of our Czech supporters for spreading the word about LibreOffice!
LibreOffice 6.4.2 was released on March 19. It’s the second revision release of the 6.4.x series, and includes over 90 bugfixes and compatibility improvements.
the LibreOffice Online Guide was created as part of the Google Season of Docs programme, and released in December 2019. Today we’re announcing that the Czech LibreOffice community has finished translating the guide, and it can be downloaded here. (See this page for English documentation.)
It was a team effort, and participants were Petr Kuběj, Zuzana Pitříková, Zdeněk Crhonek, Roman Toman, Tereza Portešová, Petr Valach and Stanislav Horáček. Thanks to all volunteers! The Czech team continues with the translation of the Getting Started Guide, and is always open for new volunteers, translators and correctors. Give them a hand!
Many schools, colleges and universities around the world use LibreOffice to get their work done every day. The free and open source office suite, compatible with Microsoft Office and a successor to OpenOffice(.org) with many extra features, includes a complete set of powerful tools for students and teachers:
Writer – word processor
Calc – spreadsheet
Impress – presentation tool
Draw – for technical drawings, brochures etc.
Math – formula editor
Base – database
Benefits in education
Because LibreOffice is free and open source software, students and teachers can download and install it on as many machines as they like, without worrying about license fees, subscriptions or audits. If you’re a teacher, you can be sure that your students won’t suddenly be locked out of their documents for not renewing a subscription. They can keep working, as long as they like!
As well as the desktop app, there’s also LibreOffice Online, a cloud-based version of the suite that students can access via their web browsers. You can set up LibreOffice Online on your own infrastructure, with help from professional support services.
Additionally, LibreOffice is backed up by a rich ecosystem, with many companies and resources available to help users:
One more benefit, especially for IT students and teachers: because LibreOffice is open source, anyone can study how it works and make improvements. See what you can do for LibreOffice here!
