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Designing with LibreOffice

front-cover-web-200x300Bruce Byfield, a journalist who specializes in writing about free and open source software, has recently released Designing with LibreOffice, a book about our beloved free office suite, which is not the usual death march through the menu and standard tasks. Instead, the book takes two fresh approaches to the world’s most popular free office suite.

First, it explains the importance of using styles and templates in order to use LibreOffice with the most convenience and the least effort. Second, it explains the basics of modern design and how to apply them in LibreOffice, expanding on the open secret that LibreOffice is as much a desktop publishing application as an office suite.

The result of these approaches is a unique overview of using LibreOffice. If you are a new user, the book will help you get up to speed with LibreOffice. If you have already used LibreOffice, then this book will leave you with a clearer overview of the program and its capabilities.

Designing with LibreOffice has been published by Friends of OpenDocument under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Readers do not need to ask for permission to copy, share, or re-use the contents of Designing with LibreOffice. However, the publisher would appreciate hearing how and where the material has been re-used.

Designing with LibreOffice has a website, with additional information about the book and the author. Of course, the book can be downloaded from the website, and purchased as a traditional paper book from the the Friends of OpenDocument store on Lulu.

LibreOffice 5.1.1 released

Screenshot from 2016-03-05 17:29:31Berlin, March 10, 2016 – The Document Foundation (TDF) releases LibreOffice 5.1.1, the first minor release of the LibreOffice 5.1 family, with a number of fixes over the major release announced on February 10. LibreOffice 5.1.1 offers a long awaited feature in Writer – the first request dates back to 2002 – as it allows hiding the white space between pages to provide a continuous flow of text. This feature is extremely useful on laptops.

LibreOffice 5.1.1 is targeted at technology enthusiasts, early adopters and power users. For more conservative users, and for enterprise deployments, TDF suggests the “still” version: LibreOffice 5.0.5. For enterprise deployments, The Document Foundation suggests the backing of professional support by certified people (a list is available at: http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/professional-support/).

People interested in technical details about the release can access the change log here: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Releases/5.1.1/RC1 (fixed in RC1) and https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Releases/5.1.1/RC3 (fixed in RC3). RC2 has not been released.

Download LibreOffice

LibreOffice 5.1.1 is immediately available for download from the following link: http://www.libreoffice.org/download/libreoffice-fresh/.

LibreOffice users, free software advocates and community members can support The Document Foundation with a donation at http://donate.libreoffice.org.

Screenshot from 2016-03-05 17:27:13Screenshot from 2016-03-05 17:30:08Screenshot from 2016-03-05 17:29:31

200,000 thanks

noun_23937We’ve received 200,000 donations in 1030 days, from May 1st 2013 to February 24th 2016, with an average of 194 donations per day. The best day was February 11th 2016 – the day after we announced LibreOffice 5.1 – with 474 donations. Together with volunteers who are contributing their time, and Advisory Board members who are investing in The Document Foundation, individual donors are making the dream of an independent self-sustaining free software-oriented foundation – capable of pushing the best free office suite to the next level of awesomeness – into a solid, enduring reality.

Back in 2010, when the independent foundation was announced, one of the most frequent objections was based on the assumption that a large free software project cannot exist without a single large corporate sponsor. After five and a half years, the dream has come true and has a bright future. Thanks to donations, we have been able to fund a large number of projects, from hackfests for developers to LibreOffice booths at exhibitions, along with native language community events, a stronger independent infrastructure, and so on. In addition, our staff is growing, taking care of background activities, and making things happen.

More importantly, we have been able to demonstrate that a large free software project does not need a single large corporate sponsor to thrive, but can rely on a diverse ecosystem based on companies and volunteers, and supported by individual donors. Companies come and go, while volunteers – and hopefully donors – stay, and possibly grow. So far, they have had the unique power of making a ten year-long dream come true, and become history. With a simple donation at http://donate.libreoffice.org, they can keep the history alive, forever.

200,000 thanks, again.

The new Board of Directors of The Document Foundation

TDF_Logo_WikiBerlin, February 19, 2016 – The Document Foundation (TDF) announces the new Board of Directors, in charge from February 18, 2016, to February 17, 2018. Elected as directors are, in order of votes: Marina Latini (Studio Storti), Michael Meeks (Collabora), Thorsten Behrens (CIB), Jan Holesovsky (Collabora), Osvaldo Gervasi (independent), Simon Phipps (independent) and Eike Rathke (Red Hat). Elected as deputies are, in order of votes: Norbert Thiebaud (independent), Bjoern Michaelsen (Canonical) and Andreas Mantke (independent).

The board has elected Marina Latini as Chairwoman and Michael Meeks as Deputy Chairman. “The new board of directors provides at the same time the continuity with the past, and the new energies to push forward the project. After four years, The Document Foundation is globally recognized as one of the most successful free software projects. I look forward to the next two years, as we will have the challenge of growing our community to improve the awareness of LibreOffice and open document standards in every geography”, comments TDF Chairwoman Marina Latini.

membermapAs of January 1st, 2016, The Document Foundation has more than 200 members – representing 50 different countries or native language communities, from the five inhabited continents (a map is attached) – and thousands of volunteers worldwide. For additional information, please visit: http://www.documentfoundation.org.

LibreOffice 5.0.5 “still” released

installation-wizard-graphicsBerlin, February 15, 2016 – The Document Foundation announces LibreOffice 5.0.5, the fifth release of the LibreOffice 5.0 family. Following the announcement of LibreOffice 5.1, LibreOffice 5.0.5 becomes the “still” version (a stable version that has undergone more testing over a longer time), and can be used for the deployment in large organizations.

The Document Foundation suggests deploying LibreOffice 5.0.5 on a large scale only when backed by professional level 3 support from certified developers (a list available at: https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/professional-support/). When migrating to LibreOffice from proprietary office suites, organizations should seek professional support from certified migration consultants and trainers, which are listed on the same webpage.

In addition, there are companies providing LibreOffice LTS (Long Term Support) versions, with incremental updates, targeted at enterprise deployments.

People interested in technical details about the release can access the change log here: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Releases/5.0.5/RC1 (fixed in RC1) and https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Releases/5.0.5/RC2 (fixed in RC2).

Download LibreOffice

LibreOffice 5.0.5 is immediately available for download from the following link: http://www.libreoffice.org/download/libreoffice-still/.

LibreOffice users, free software advocates and community members can support The Document Foundation with a donation at http://donate.libreoffice.org. They can also buy LibreOffice merchandise from the brand new project shop: http://documentfoundation.spreadshirt.net/.

TDF website has a brand new look

The House of LibreOffice and Document Liberation ProjectWednesday, February 10, we have not limited our activity to the launch of LibreOffice 5.1, but we have also updated the look of the 5 years old TDF website – our first web property, and our first website – by using the same template of the LibreOffice website.

We have also reorganized contents, to simplify the navigation. We now have a menu bar with the following items: Foundation (Statutes, Financials and Affiliations), Governance (Foundation Bodies and History), Community, Certification, Get Help (Professional Support) and Contacts.

With the overhaul of the TDF website, we have now renovated all project’s web properties.

TDF, LibreOffice and Document Liberation websites are complemented by this, which is supposed to become the place where people go for the last news.

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