cross-references disappeared and show up as text strings

[XavierStuvw]

I am working with LibreOffice Writer 4.2.8.2 420m0(Build:2). This is the latest version shipped with Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and it’s no option at this time to think about upgrades.

Yesterday I edited a document in doc format (not docx, for reasons of compatibility with co-authors) having a number of cross-references. I saved the document, close the program and shut down the computer.

Today, I opened the document and all cross-references (targets and links) have been substituted by text strings such as ‘Figure 3. SEQ “”"“Figure”""" *Arabic 1: overview’, ‘REF _Ref474846298 \r \h 1.4.2’ and the like. F9 or ctrl+F8 are ineffective, confirming that these newcomers are pure text.

This is a considerable hassle and setback. Any ideas of why this occurred (for future prevention) and of ways to restore a nice state of things (semi-)automatically?

[mikekaganski]

and it’s no option at this time to think about upgrades

It’s unclear which upgrades specifically are mentioned; if that’s upgrades of OS, then you might consider upgrading LibreOffice from official PPA.

[XavierStuvw]

@MikeKaganski In my mind, both, since I prefer not to interfere with the defaults of the package management system in place. It has happened more than once that a potential software upgrade beyond the latest supported by the OS version would have had a disruptive effect on other pieces of software. Is LibreOffice tested against this possibility?