Not a question, but simply informing the good folk out there about this issue for a document that has a moderate amount of images and text boxes on each page with the body text wrapping, or non-wrapping around them, as the case may be. Quite frequently, if a given anchor point coincides with a text alphanumeric character, and if the document is saved to MS Word 97 format, upon reloading the file, part of the text (often a paragraph, but not always) upstream from the anchor position appears now in a reduced font size. And furthermore, if this is associated with a text box (say for a photo label), the text in the box gets correspondingly enlarged. In my document the font standard is Times Roman 12 pt. I use 10 pt for the text box labels. The affected body text takes on the size attribute of the text box, and the text in the box becomes, for some reason, 17.5 pt!
This issue doesn’t happen when using standard odt format though, nor when exported to a pdf file. However it’s worth noting, as sometimes one needs a document in Word on a USB say to print out somewhere else, like at a library printer.
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document is saved to MS Word format
the evil is always and everywhere (EAV song of 1986? - watch this video)
one needs a document in Word on a USB
Use a portable build of LibreOffice.
to print out somewhere else, like at a library printer. That is precisely why the PDF format was created.
The problem with the post is not that much about the wrong workflow chosen by @Statavarious (although of course using correct tool to the task is good), but the issue itself:
Not a question, but simply informing the good folk out there about this issue
should not go to the Ask site (where bug reports are off-topic), but to the bug tracker. Whatever the reason for using an external format is, and however preferable using native formats is, we always treat all interoperability problems as bugs (even if some couldn’t be resolved). So please file a bug, and provide clear and reproducible steps/sample ODF documents that generate problems when saved to Word 97 DOC.
I found a wiki doc on how to report a bug, and it looks complicated and involves a lot of rules re filtering the info and constructing a report that’s acceptable to the recipients… and frankly more extensive knowledge than I have at present to be able to comply as required. I agree that a pdf is the best way to go in portability, but not all computers in libraries have Adobe whereas they all seem to have MS Office… If my reporting this here is so much a problem then please delete the comment entirely and I’ll vaporise back into my own world. Cheers…
Perhaps slightly off topic/limits, but I take my chances.
If not all computers for guest use in a library can support pdf files, then someone needs to talk to the head librarian.
The main purpose of a library service must be to assist in retrieval and handling of quality checked information, and a large portion of such “referential info” exists primarily as pdf files.