Right-click menu New item to create Writer document missing

[JeffB]

I’m running Windows 10 Pro x64. MS Office and OpenOffice were uninstalled and machine rebooted.

I’ve uninstalled Libreoffice, I’ve re-installed it, I’ve repaired it but no matter what I do when I right-click inside Windows explorer, select New, I do not have the option to create a new LibreOffice Text document only the other LibreOffice products.

I’ve checked the registry and all values are there and active.

Here are two screen shots, one from a registry editor and the other showing my right-click menu: Imgur: The magic of the Internet

Any suggestions?

[anon73440385]

What will be shown, if you Right click - Open Key in ShellNewHandler on the entry for LibreOffice.WriterDocument.1? What is the value for FileName in the related registry entry (e.g. C:\Program Files\LibreOffice\share\template\shellnew\soffice.odt)?

[josue82]

I JUST did this, as the 7.0.4 installer DID NOT add the “New Item: OpenDocument Text” back after updating.

I found this thread with the solution:

Right-click menu item to create Writer document missing

In Windows 10, when I right-click in a folder and select the menu item “New”, there are options to create several kinds of documents, but not for Writer or Calc However, there is one for an “OpenDocument Drawing”. After a new install of LibreOffice, the option to create Writer and Calc documents does show up in the right-click New menu. But after a few restarts, next time I look, only the Draw document remains. This cycle has happened several times, over at least a couple years. I have foll…

Here’s what up: You have to copy the ShellNew Key in the Registry to a DIFFERENT location

The key is here:

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ .odt\LibreOffice.WriterDocument.1

It needs to go into the higher level

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ .odt

It should look like this then

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ .odt\ShellNew

Then it works.

There’s no easy way, so you have to run the registry editor, nav to the location and recreate the Key in the new location. BEWARE: VERY DANGEROUS TO MESS WITH ANYTHING IN THE REGISTRY. I am looking for a way to upload my “fixed” registry hive export to somewhere you can get to it. If anyone had a suggestion of where to share something like that…

[EarnestAl]

Until LO 7.1 is released it can lead to unexpected outcomes by right-clicking and creating new document in file explorer, e.g. incorrect language, etc

A you discovered it is a Windows created empty file, not a LibreOffice file

[josue82]

Al- I’m not sure what you’re saying, but from my experience, creating a new “Microsoft Word Document” from explorer context menus creates a shell placeholder .docx file, not a properly configured Libre Office Text [.odt] file. The blank is a MS Office issue. I’m talking about in the “New Items” list there WAS an item labeled “OpenDocument Text” configured correctly with LO 7.0.0.1. That was IN ADDITION TO “Microsoft Word Document.” Every time MS Office updates [which is a lot], it nukes the OpenDocument Text listing entirely. There is still a “Microsoft Word Document” item, and, for me, if you open it with LO before MS Word, you previously got an error about invalid document type- not because the New Item listing was corrupted, but because MS didn’t properly configure the new file- it was 0K. Now, it seems, at least LO can open them without choking.

[EarnestAl]

A document created from right-click in Explorer does not pick up any of the Locale settings, such as language, date format, currency, etc. See blog Locale-independent Writer templates for improved handling of empty files, to arrive in LO 7.1

If you are American it might not matter, but for the rest of us it takes much more work to bring the document back to normal, e.g. English (UK), DD/MM/YYYY, than to open LO and create a new document from File > New.