ODF format version: 1.3 vs. 1.3 Extended

[jeshkhol]

The current ODF format versions to choose from are 1.3 and 1.3 Extended:

Options > Load/Save > General: Default File Format and ODF Settings

I’m planning to edit a large ODT/FODT file in a text editor, and so I’m interested to learn what the difference is between the 1.3 and 1.3 Extended ODF formats.

I read here that the “non-extended format is not the default behavior for LibreOffice and may cause data loss.”

What exactly may cause data loss?

What I’ve also found is this:

https://docs.oasis-open.org/office/OpenDocument/v1.3/os/part3-schema/OpenDocument-v1.3-os-part3-schema.html#__RefHeading__440346_826425813

https://docs.oasis-open.org/office/OpenDocument/v1.3/os/part3-schema/OpenDocument-v1.3-os-part3-schema.html#__RefHeading__440348_826425813

I’m afraid I don’t understand what these differences mean in real-life scenarios.

LO 7.3.2.2

[mikekaganski]

Standardization is a lengthy process. It takes much time, and has strict schedule, e.g. making all new proposals unable to get into still developing standard release long before it gets published.

On the other hand, LibreOffice evolves dynamically; it gets new features, among them - those that need changes to the standard. You may see the extensions implemented in LibreOffice (including proposed, but not yet included into the next standard release) here - see “LibreOffice ODF extensions” and " LibreOffice OpenFormula extensions" in the bottom.

This means that whenever you choose non-extended variant, you disallow all those features.

[jeshkhol]

OK thanks @mikekaganski. The key term for me is “those features” at the end of your message.

I’ve saved an ODT sample file as FODT in two ways:

• (1) ODF format version: 1.3 Extended
• (2) ODF format version: 1.3

I then opened each of the two resulting FODT files in a text editor. I want to see whether any text (= string of entered characters) is missing in (2) that is present in (1).

To see the differences I deleted in both files all the lines from the beginning down to </office:master-styles>. Comparing the two files I then found that the only differences lie in the numbering of <text:span text:style-name="T1">: in (1) they are numbered from T3 to T15, in (2) from T1 to T13 – everything else is identical in both files.

I conclude that whether format (1) or (2) is selected may well affect the features available in but not the content of the files I use.

[erAck]

It depends on what features you actually used in your document. Some features or aspects thereof can not or only insufficiently be saved in 1.3 non-extended. The difference was larger between 1.2 and 1.2 Extended of which a chunk of extensions was added to ODF 1.3 then.