Warning re Book Keeping with Libreoffice 4.2

[unixman]

Hi

It seems that the recently released LibreOffice version 4.2.0, and later, is merrily corrupting Excel spreadsheets. My accountant uses Excel, I use LibreOffice. We have been exchanging spreadsheets without a problem for years until I upgraded to LO 4.2.1.1 as part of upgrading my PC to Fedora 20.

Many emails and 4 serious bookkeeping errors later, the accountant and his assistant have transferred all my figures to a fresh file as it was the only way to get rid of the corruption.

The fix is to roll back to version 4.1 or use an even earlier version. More here

Calc v4.2.0 corrupts Excel XLS file - Ask LibreOffice

The corruption was silent but lead eventually to errors running into thousands. Nice timing for this, just at the end of the financial year.

Yes I know Fedora is bleeding edge, and I accept it therefore has small annoyances. But you don't expect it to smash like a wrecking-ball through your core business for Pete's sake. Debian here I come.

[cojak]

Thanks for the warning unixman.

[Spacecadet]

Always worthwhile checking the release notes on any software before installing.
This is from the very top of the 4.2.2 release :

This is the third release from the 4.2 branch of LibreOffice which contains new features and program enhancements.
It is the first bugfix release, and remains targeted for early adopters and private power users--for conservative requirements, we refer you to LibreOffice 4.1.5 from the previous series.

[Ticktock]

I have a funny feeling I heard about something similar happening to Word and the Libreoffice equivalent. From memory I think it had something to do with whether the file (and autosave) was set to .doc or .docx, so it may be the same - check whether it's set to .xls or .xlsx

[unixman]

Just opening and saving the Excel file is enough to corrupt it. Confirmed by testing this morning. I opened a fresh XLS sent from my accountant, typed a space into some cell (to make the file "saveable"), saved, sent back to the accountant. He opens it and sees corruption striaghtaway.

Re the release notes, yes I read those too, but release 4.2.2 is called "stable" nontheless.

Not angry I just love this littel red fella

[Spacecadet]

I checked my version this morning and I'm on 4.1.1
The latest version in software manager (linux mint) is only slightly higher at 4.1.3

Did you install direct from the LO website?

[xoggoth]

Office these days is zipped xml. Might be worth changing .xlsx to .zip, unzipping and seeing if you can rescue any data that way.

[Sysman]

I checked my version this morning and I'm on 4.1.1
The latest version in software manager (linux mint) is only slightly higher at 4.1.3

4.1.5 here on my Mac. I only update it there when it nags me.

Did you install direct from the LO website?

Fedora tends to include bleeding edge versions, so it might have come via the auto update route (perhaps not: just checked on my Fedora 19 and LO 4.1.5 is shown as the version in the repositories).

I wouldn't recommend Fedora for production systems, and accounts definitely falls under the label of production.

[unixman]

Yes version 4.2.1.1 was installed as part of a recent update to Fedora 20 around Feb 24th. It is still showing in the F20 repos. I have been with Fedora for 5 years without this kind of problem, but yes it is not really suitable for business. The shocking bit is what kind of testing are LibreOffice actually doing ? Obviously non that includes opening and saving an XLS file.

An Ubuntu colleague is also on 4.2.1.1.

[Spacecadet]

Yes version 4.2.1.1 was installed as part of a recent update to Fedora 20 around Feb 24th. It is still showing in the F20 repos. I have been with Fedora for 5 years without this kind of problem, but yes it is not really suitable for business. The shocking bit is what kind of testing are LibreOffice actually doing ? Obviously non that includes opening and saving an XLS file.

An Ubuntu colleague is also on 4.2.1.1.

I knew Ubuntu had a habit of using a lot of bleeding edge releases in their own OS and the bundled software which is one of the reasons why I picked Mint.
Just had a peek at the Fedora website. Nothing obvious there to warn users that they are potentially installing unstable software.