LibreOffice 7.4 Community: Release Notes
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Writer
Általános Fejlesztések
- Az ▸ ▸ menüpont mostantól frissíti az OLE objektumok előnézetét blog post (Miklos Vajna; Collabora)
- Különböző fejlesztések a táblázatok és paragrafusok szegélyeiben, hogy javuljon a Word-kompatibilitásuk blog post (Miklos Vajna; Collabora)
- Fixed Index or Table of Contents generation when ▸ is set to in the Table of Contents, Index or Bibliography dialogue ( ▸ ). The generated entries start from the current chapter level, instead of the previously hardwired level 2 tdf#130318 (Andreas Heinisch; Emanuele Gissi, CNVVF)
- Writer now supports clearing breaks from Word for improvement layout fidelity blog post (Miklos Vajna; Collabora)
- A Kisegítő lehetőségek ellenőrzése ablak ( ▸ ) aszinkron módon renderelődik 61fed0c4 (Nick Wingate; Collabora)
- A csak olvasható dokumentumok esetén a Writer mostantól lehetővé teszi a követett változások megtekintését a ▸ menüpontban és az oldalsávban is.82e789bf (Michael Stahl, allotropia)
- A követett lábjegyzet törlések és beillesztések láthatóak a lábjegyzet területen tdf#85610 (László Németh, NISZ)
- Handle the "hang" baseline OpenType property, allowing text of different sizes to align to the hanging baseline. tdf#104930 (Mark Hung)
- Writer now supports rich text and checkbox content controls from Word natively blog post (Miklos Vajna; Collabora)
- Writer now also supports dropdown, picture and date content controls from Word natively blog post (Miklos Vajna; Collabora)
- Auto-correction for markup
*bold*,/italic/,-strikeout-and_underline_is now switched off by default. Turn it back on in ▸ ▸ ▸ . tdf#133023 (Heiko Tietze, TDF)
- Improved positioning of glyphs, getting rid of certain problems with kerning and unwanted shifting of characters during typing tdf#144862 (Caolán McNamara, Red Hat)
- The Outline Folding mode first introduced in LibreOffice 7.1 is no longer experimental. Turn it on in ▸ ▸ ▸ ▸ . tdf#148240 (Jim Raykowski, Julien Nabet)
Új tipográfiai beállítások
Add new optional hyphenation settings to adjust paragraph-level text flow (László Németh)
- Hyphenation zone (it's for limiting hyphenation, used especially with not justified paragraph alignment). tdf#149420
- Minimum word length for hyphenation tdf#149324
- Do not hyphenate the last word of the paragraph tdf#149248
Note: these features are part of CSS4 Text Module Level 4, DTP software
and in the case of hyphenation zone, OOXML/MSO.
New numbering in Show Changes mode
Show actual and original numbering of list items in Show Changes mode. tdf#115523 tdf#115524 (László Németh, NISZ)
- Don't use dummy mixed numbering, which counted the deleted list items as not deleted ones.
- Show the actual number first, and after that, the original number within brackets, for example “1.[2.]”.
- Not only the deleted and inserted list items, but the following ones show the actual and original numbers e.g. to help to recognize changes of a legal text.
- To improve the visibility of these list items, changed numbering and paragraph text are separated by a space, not a tabulator to avoid of incorrectly tabulated lists.
New remote grammar checker: LanguageTool
Calc
General Improvements
- Support for sparklines was added (blog post) (Tomaž Vajngerl, Collabora)
- Calc now supports and uses 16384 columns (blog post) . (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Added COUNTA, PRODUCT, STDEV, STDEVP, VAR, VARP functions to drop-down autosum widget on Formula bar tdf#139602 (Dhiraj Holden)
- Put text in selected cell into hyperlink item Text when you use the Hyperlink dialog (Ctrl + K). If the user selects an entire cell by a single click, and inserts an URL via the hyperlink dialog, the entire content of the corresponding cell will be replaced instead of inserting a duplicate, or appending the URL. If the cell contains more than one URL or an URL including some additional text within the cell, the hyperlink dialog will only preselect the text field when opening. If this is not the case, it fill the URL field as well. tdf#80043 (Andreas Heinisch)
- The height of the formula bar is now stored into the document. tdf#99708 (Samuel Mehrbrodt, allotropia)
- Improve Move/Copy sheet dialog: OK button caption is changed according to the command chosen (Move or Copy). tdf#139464 (Laurent Balland)
- A new context menu is added, which can be accessed when you right-click on the sheet tabs area. This allows for quick duplicate (i.e. make a copy) of an existing sheet. tdf#145745 (Rafael Lima)
- Automatic cell matrix expansion for formula expressions that return an array/matrix. For formula expressions entered into a cell that obviously return an array/matrix, the result cell range is expanded as if ⇧ Shift + Ctrl + ↵ Enter was used to close an array formula. The previous behaviour of only one cell being used to display only the top left element can still be forced by selecting/marking a single cell prior to input. tdf#149378 (Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- Ease access to a sheet in a spreadsheet with a large number of sheets, with a new menu entry ▸ ▸ to get a new dialog to search for sheets names. tdf#129674 (Laurent Balland)
Example of using "Go to Sheet" dialog
- Hidden columns/rows can have an indicator per ▸ tdf#128258 (Heiko Tietze, TDF)
Dotted line indicating hidden columns
- The active cell cursor (the frame around the active cell) now scales with the zoom level. tdf#143733 (Heiko Tietze, TDF)
- Sort options and sort items are easier to access now tdf#131155 tdf#140290 (Heiko Tietze, TDF)
Most frequently used sort options placed on the first tab
- Number format: enhance readability of long decimal number with format
0.000"-"000"-"000. Embedded text in decimal part is now correctly saved and restored in ODS format tdf#96723 (Laurent Balland)
- The formula bar auto input now also suggests non-English function names and Named Ranges when you are typing the formula tdf#142031 (Andreas Heinisch)
Performance
- Improved performance when many columns contain data (blog post) . (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Improved performance of functions such as COUNTIF, SUMIFS and VLOOKUP, especially with unsorted data tdf#139444 tdf#144777 tdf#146546 (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Faster recalculation in some documents with many formulas tdf#119083 (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- A huge CSV file speed opening was improved tdf#94677 (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Improved performance of Excel export filter tdf#95346 tdf#117366 tdf#126326 tdf#133749 tdf#140893 (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Improved performance when loading spreadsheets that require recalculation c315a2f7 64cb1d10 (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Editing large amounts of multi-line text in Calc is no longer slow tdf#108560 (Caolán McNamara, Red Hat)
Impress & Draw
- Start of document themes in Impress: shape text. blog post (Miklos Vajna, Collabora)
- Also added shape fill support for document themes in Impress. blog post (Miklos Vajna, Collabora)
- Support using slide background as shape fill for PPTX interoperability. tdf#128150 (Armin Le Grand, Samuel Mehrbrodt, allotropia)
Core / General
General Improvements
- Added support for WebP images import/export tdf#114532 (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
- Note that currently, WebP is converted to PNG internally, to ensure backward compatibility of the generated document files.
- Made dialog for naming a new color asynchronous 7741b21f (Nick Wingate, Collabora)
- The configuration now remembers whether recent documents were opened read-only or editable, and opening via ▸ or the Start Center will open them in the same mode as the last time. 404c51f3 (Michael Stahl, allotropia)
- Added support for EMZ/WMZ files tdf#103954 (Paris Oplopoios)
- Fix regression for the rendering of equations created with Microsoft Equation Editor. tdf#101100 (Julien Nabet)
- Available since 7.4.4: LibreOffice can now allow multiline text in QR codes. tdf#146395 (Caolán McNamara)
Lighting of extruded custom shapes
Enhancements for lighting extruded custom shapes to make rendering more compatible with MS Office binary formats and interpret more ODF attributes. tdf#145700 (Regina Henschel)
- Wrong interpretation of the z-direction of lights is corrected. Especially a center lighting from observer to object works now. The position of specular high lights on rounded surfaces is same as in MS Office now.
- The item "Metal" is replaced by items "Metal ODF" and "Metal MS compatible" in submenu "Surface" in toolbar "3D-Settings". The latter is not usable in strict ODF file format "ODF 1.3". In preset "Metal ODF" the specular color is Gray as specified in ODF. In preset "Metal MS compatible" the specular color is the shape fill color or the extrusion color respectively, similar to rendering in MS Office.
- The service
EnhancedCustomShapeExtrusionin API is extended with a new attributeMetalType. It has the valueMetalODForMetalMSCompatible. This attribute is used in surface preset "Metal MS compatible". - The ODF attribute
draw:extrusion-shininessis interpreted now. This attribute is similar to the setting "Specular Intensity" in the "Material" tab of the "3D Effects" dialog of 3D objects. The attribute has no direct UI, but is available as attributeShininessin serviceEnhancedCustomShapeExtrusionin the API.
- The ODF attribute
draw:extrusion-diffusionis interpreted now. Only its default value "0%" is not interpretated, because already existing shapes have this attribute not set but expect a value of 100%. For existing shapes you can force to write the attribute to file by toggling extrusion off and back on. The attribute is used in preset surface "Metal MS compatible". The attribute has no direct UI, but is available as attributeDiffusionin serviceEnhancedCustomShapeExtrusionin the API. A value smaller than 100% reduces the rendered brightness of the object.
- The ODF attributes
draw:extrusion-first-light-harshanddraw:extrusion-second-light-harshare interpreted now. The lights are rendered soft by distributing parts of the light intensity to four light directions around the original light directions during rendering. The lighting presets in submenu "Lighting" in the toolbar "3D-Settings" set the attribute compatible to MS Office. The attribute has no direct UI, but is available as attributeFirstLightHarshandSecondLightHarshin serviceEnhancedCustomShapeExtrusionin the API.
- The implementation of ODF attribute
draw:extrusion-specularityis adapted to the corresponding shape property in MS Office binary formats. This attribute corresponds to the setting "Specular Color" in the "Material" tab of the "3D Effects" dialog of 3D objects. Only that not abitrary colors but only variants of Gray are used. The attribute has no direct UI, but is available as attributeSpecularityin serviceEnhancedCustomShapeExtrusionin the API. A value of "0%" forces the first light to be not specular, which produces a matte surface in rendering the object. That is used in surface preset "Matte".
Performance
- Improved text layout performance for cases like PDF export, document loading and others, more info in the blog post. (Luboš Luňák, Collabora)
LibreOffice Help
- Help pages for the ScriptForge scripting library (J.P. Ledure, A. Romedenne, R. Lima)
- Help updates and fixes
Filters
DOCX import/export filters
- DOCX: import textboxes (with tables, images etc.) in group shapes tdf#66039 (Attila Bakos, NISZ)
Unlock protected change tracking by password verification
Unlock protected change tracking of DOCX documents by mandatory password verification tdf#128744 tdf#106843 (László Németh, NISZ)
- clicking on icon of Track Changes toolbar (or ▸ ▸ ) asks for password verification instead of showing only a warning message before unlocking without the password;
- On page of ▸ dialog window, button accepts the correct password with disabling record changes instead of rejecting the correct password.
PPTX import/export filters
- PPTX export: fixed export of embedded video files tdf#53970 (Tünde Tóth, NISZ)
- PPTX import: fixed import of linked media files. Linked media files were imported as images in documents created with Impress after PPTX export. tdf#53970 (Tünde Tóth, NISZ)
- PPTX: add "glue points" to some basic shapes (ellipse, triangle, right triangle, trapezoid, parallelogram, diamond, pentagon, hexagon, heptagon, octagon). Note: PPTX import doesn't import connectors connected to the glue points – only ODP export keeps them for the planned editing, i.e. moving the connected shapes without losing the connecting lines and arrows. tdf#147459 (Tibor Nagy, NISZ)
RTF filter import/export
- RTF filter improvements tdf#148515 tdf#95706 tdf#139948 tdf#116358 tdf#111851 tdf#104390 tdf#118047 tdf#131234 (Vasily Melenchuk, CIB/allotropia)
PDF export
- Improved PDF export options in the command-line blog post (Miklos Vajna, Collabora)
- Field type of Numeric, Currency, Date and Time forms are exported to PDF tdf#105972 (Xisco Fauli, TDF)
HTML export
- Export encoding (character set) configuration is dropped from Options|Load/Save|HTML Compatibility, HTML is now always exported using UTF-8 encoding tdf#148413 (Mike Kaganski, Collabora)
EMF/WMF import
- Added support for Miter Limit for EMF+ format tdf#142261 (Bartosz Kosiorek)
- Added support for individual line endings for EMF+ format tdf#143875, tdf#55058 (Bartosz Kosiorek)
- Fixed holes in lines created with LINETO for EMF/WMF tdf#89331 (Bartosz Kosiorek)
- Added Z compressed graphic formats support for EMF/WMF (.emz and .wmz file formats) tdf#103954 (Paris Oplopoios)
- Use variable types according to EMF+ documentation tdf#103859 (Bartosz Kosiorek)
- Fix displaying EMF+ PathGradient fill tdf#131506 tdf#143031 (Bartosz Kosiorek)
TIFF import
GUI
- The Navigator can now scroll to the item on selection by a single click, without leaving the navigator. Enable this with the expert option NavigateOnSelect at org.openoffice.Office.Writer > Navigator tdf#131063 (Jim Raykowski)
- Start Center thumbnail rendering improved tdf#134065, tdf#147998, b70d17b0 (Mike Kaganski, Collabora)
Before
After
- Search field for the Extension Manager tdf#126672 (Samuel Mehrbrodt, allotropia)
- The font dialog was reworked to remain compact when Asian and/or Complex languages are enabled tdf#139395 and tdf#146928 (Heiko Tietze, TDF)
Character dialog
- Experimental dark mode support for Windows 10 and Windows 11. See this blog post. tdf#118320 (Caolán McNamara)
Icon Theme
- The Colibre icon theme which is the default theme in Windows, now has a dark variant while maintaining the monoline color composition from Microsoft. tdf#146545 (Rizal Muttaqin)
Localization
New languages/locales with locale data
Available as default document language and for locale specific formatting.
- Pennsylvania Dutch {pdc-US}. tdf#146602 (Peter K. Zacharias, Pennsylvania Dutch Education Corporation; Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- Aranese {oc-ES}. tdf#147053 (Javier Torres Fernández; Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- Dhivehi {dv-MV}. tdf#148428 (Adam, M. A.; Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- English (Mauritius) {en-MU}. (Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
Improvements to proofing tools and language support
- Added Central Kurdish (ckb) Spell Checker & Dictionary. commit 1, 5727a12a (jwtiyar nariman; Olivier Hallot, TDF)
- Occitan since 2018 has several type variant language subtags in the IANA language-subtag-registry. Historically LibreOffice used oc-FR for Occitan Languedocien and oc-ES for Occitan Aranese as language tags. These were underspecified at least for oc-FR and are now augmented to be written as oc-FR-lengadoc and oc-ES-aranes, the previous oc-FR and oc-ES are still recognized and accepted as aliases. LibreOffice 7.3.5 will accept oc-FR-lengadoc and oc-ES-aranes as aliases for oc-FR and oc-ES for forward compatibility. tdf#147390 (Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- Danish spell checking dictionary has been updated (stavekontrolden.dk)
- Slovenian thesaurus was updated (Martin Srebotnjak, OdprtiTezaver).
Scripting
DispatchHelper .UNO:command directory
com.sun.star.frame.DispatchHelper service .UNO:Commands wiki page has been upgraded. It lists all usable 7.4 commands together with their arguments.
The ScriptForge libraries
An extensible and robust collection of macro scripting resources for LibreOffice to be invoked from user Basic or Python scripts. (Jean-Pierre Ledure)
The libraries expose a total of 26 services each with a bunch of methods and properties.
New in LibreOffice 7.4:
- The (new) Menu service, to describe a new menu to be displayed in the menubar. The menu may contain usual items, checkboxes or radio buttons. Each item can be decorated with icons and tooltips.
- The (new) UnitTest service, a framework to setup testcases and testsuites for complex Basic modules and extensions.
- The (new) Region service , to manage locales, timezones and daylight saving times. What time is it in Tokyo when it is 12am in Brussels ? Also to convert numbers to letters in any language.
- Get the list of the available extensions and their install directories (filesystem service).
- Run menu commands with arguments (ui, document services).
- Manage a fallback language (l10n service).
- Export sheet ranges as images or PDF files (calc service).
- Erase rows or columns from sheet ranges based on filters expressed as formulas (default = erase all empty rows or columns) (calc service).
- Create and place a pivot table (calc service).
- Resize and/or center dialogs on a background window or dialog (dialog service).
The whole set of services (except when not relevant) is made available for Python scripts with identical syntax and behaviour as in Basic.
The English version of the documentation of the ScriptForge libraries (7.4) is fully integrated in the LibreOffice help pages (https://help.libreoffice.org/7.4/en-US/text/sbasic/shared/03/lib_ScriptForge.html?DbPAR=BASIC). Their translation into other languages is underway. (Alain Romedenne, Rafael Lima)
VBA Support
- Added support for Application.WindowState, commit (Tomaž Vajngerl, Collabora)
- Added support for Application.GetOpenFilename tdf#118246 (Tomaž Vajngerl, Collabora)
- Export VBA-Project using detected charset on import tdf#75263 (Andreas Heinisch)
- VBA Range.Sort expands a single cell range to Range.CurrentRegion tdf#149579 (Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- Not case-sensitive support of VBA NumberFormat tdf#52602 (Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
- Support for referencing a Sheet by Name tdf#149325 (Eike Rathke, Red Hat)
Basic
- Up to and including LibreOffice 7.2, missing optional procedure arguments would be treated as an object of type Error, with error code '448', which would be coerced to e.g. numerical value '448' or boolean true in expressions depending on expression context. This now raises an error, as expected tdf#144353. In particular, expressions like "if IsMissing(FOO) or FOO" used to work "by accident", but now don't any more.
Feature Removal / Deprecation
- FTP support is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
- In the SDK, the tools
idlcandregmerge(using the legacy type registry format) are deprecated and will be removed in a future version, in favor ofunoidl-write(using the incompatible new type registry format internally introduced in LibreOffice 4.1). 40f2aee6
- The C function
typelib_setCacheSizehas been deprecated without a replacement, and calling it no longer has any effect. c3e9eb99
Platform Compatibility
Mac
- LibreOffice 7.4 requires macOS 10.13 or newer to run.
- Due to Apple's policy regarding C++ standard library features, the minimum macOS version requirement will be raised in the future like so:
- release in Feb 2023 → 10.14 Mojave
- release in Aug 2023 → 10.15 Catalina
API Changes
- The service
EnhancedCustomShapeExtrusionin API is extended with a new attributeMetalType. It has the valueMetalODForMetalMSCompatible. The attribute is not usable in file format "ODF 1.3". For implementation context see Lighting of extruded custom shapes. - The service SpreadsheetViewSettings has a new property
FormulaBarHeightallowing to read/set the height of the Calc formula bar. d0cacf09 (Samuel Mehrbrodt, allotropia)
Jump Lists
Under Windows, it is now possible to customize the Jump Lists via UNO API. Documentation. (Samuel Mehrbrodt, allotropia)