Libre Office corrupting .docx and .ppt files

SeanObyrne · January 7, 2025, 2:57pm

I use Libre Office on a Windows 10 laptop. In the last week, I have had problems working on a Powerpoint document and several Word documents. After I save and close the document, reopening it give me the message: The file ‘XXX’ is corrupt and therefore cannot be opened. LibreOffice can try to repair the file.
The corruption could be the result of document manipulation or of structural document damage due to data transmission.
We recommend that you do not trust the content of the repaired document.
Execution of macros is disabled for this document.
Should LibreOffice repair the file?
If I answer yes, I get: The file ‘XXX’ could not be repaired and therefore cannot be opened.

I’ve worked on many such documents before, and this has never happened.
Keeping in mind that I am a user and not a tech, can anyone help?
Thanks in advance.

Hrbrgr · January 7, 2025, 3:05pm

How to open files from MS-Office 2007 or 2010 (.DOCX, .XLSX,…)?

ajlittoz · January 7, 2025, 3:18pm

If you’re the author of the documents, in the future create them in native format (.odt and .odp). If you have a constraint with remote recipients, translate the documents to alien format (.docx and .pptx) by exporting them only at transmission time. And never work on a returned updated document nor paste from it into your original ODF file (or paste only unformatted text to avoid importing M$ idiosyncrasies).

Editing DOCX or .pptx documents with LO causes cumulative damage by the repetitive conversions (one to load the document, one to save it). These conversions are not idempotent (roundtrip does not return the same file) because both formats are not interchangeable and don’t cover the same “domain”.

SeanObyrne · January 7, 2025, 3:21pm

Thank you. I greatly appreciate the tips. Unfortunately, they don’t really help me right now. I’m hoping to recover the documents, but nothing I’ve tried has helped.

Wanderer · January 7, 2025, 3:31pm

As you already stated “I am a user and not a tech” it seems you are in trouble.
Contents may be available or not. First step would be to try to open (a copy of) your files as .zip-file or to try with utilities wich can rescue from .zip-files.
.
As general point: Keep backups of your input-files. It will not save your work, but you won’t loose the complete file. (Opening and directly saving as .odt will also result in keeping the .docx as backup - until you export again to .docx)