LibreOffice 24.2 Released, What's New

LibreOffice officially Announced the new LibreOffice 24.2 free and open-source office suite.

Let's dive into what's new:

Calendar-Based Version Number: 

LibreOffice 24.2 uses a calendar-based version number, where "24" represents the year (2024) and "2" represents the month (February). This change helps users easily track how up-to-date their version is.

Improved Comment Styling: 

Comments can now use styles, making it easier to modify formatting for all comments at once or categorise different types of comments.

Enhanced Navigation and Collapsibility:

• Nested sections can be collapsed like headings, and they can e hidden or made visible from the context menu.

• In Outline Folding mode, hidden headings are now greyed out in the Navigator.

• Comments in a thread are grouped in the Navigator.

Multi-Page Floating Tables:

Improved support for multi-page floating tables, including overlap control, border handling, footnotes, and UI enhancements.

Japanese Text Templates:

Templates with settings for Japanese text were added to improve interoperability with Microsoft World for Japanese users.

Interoperability Enhancement:

A new line break algorithm reduces spaces within justified lines by up to 20%, improving interoperability with MS Word.

LibreOffice 24.2: New features

LibreOffice 24.2 Writer running in Ubuntu 23.10

Absolutely! Automatic recovery is a lifesaver when unexpected events occurs. Whether it's a sudden power outage, a crash, or an accidental closure of an application, automatic recovery ensures that your work is preserved. Most modern software applications, including office suites like LibreOffice, have this feature.
In LibreOffice, if the application unexpectedly closes (due to a crash or other reasons), it will attempt to recover your unsaved changes when you reopen it. Here's how it works:

• Autosave Interval: LibreOffice periodically saves your document in the background. By default, it saves every 10 minutes, but you can adjust this interval in the settings,

• Document Recovery: If LibreOffice detects an unsaved your document when you reopen it after a crash, it will prompt you to recover the document. You can choose to restore the last saved version or the autosaved version

• Temporary Files: LibreOffice creates temporary files( with names like ~lock.filename.odt# ) while you're working. these files store your changes and are used for recovery if needed.

Remember to save your work manually as well, especially if you're making significant changes. Automatic recovery is helpful, but 'it's no substitute for regular manual saves!.

Writer Enhancements:

• 'Legal' Ordered List Numbering: Now you can use legal-style numbering for lists in your documents.

• Styled Comments: Comments can be visually differentiated, making it easier to identify different types of comments.

• Improved Multi-Page Floating Tables: Better support for multi-page floating tables, including overlap control, border handling, footnotes, and UI enhancements.

• Japanese Interoperability: Enhanced compatibility with Microsoft Word for Japanese users.  

• New Line Break Algorithm: Improves interoperability with DOCX files.

Impress & Draw updates:

• Small Caps Support: You can now apply small caps formatting to text in impress.

• Presenter Console Location: The presenter Console has been moved to Slide Show > Slide Show Settings.

• Bluetooth Remote Control: You can enable the Bluetooth remote control server without needed Wi-Fi.

• Template Fixes: Correct fonts are now used for CJK (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) and CTL (complex text layout) languages in impress templates, Additionally, Draw can import multi-page TIFF files (one image per page.)

Calc Additions:

• Accessibility Improvements: Enhancements for screen reader users.

• Password Strength Meter: The 'Save with Password' prompt now shows a password strength meter.

• Stronger ODF Encryption: New password-based ODF encryption is more resistance to brute force attacks.

• Search Field in Options: Quickly find settings using the search field in Tools-> Options.

• Editable Metadata Fields: More fields like contributor, Publisher, Rights, and Source are editable.

• FTP Protocol removal: FTP support has been removed.

• Armenian Language Support: LibreOffice now includes Armenian language support.

• Help Access Issues Fixed: Thanks to Mark for resolving help-related issues.

Microsoft Office Compatibility Fixes

One of the standout features of LibreOffice is its interoperability with Microsoft Office documents.

As the Document Foundation notes, "progress is so rapid that each new version [of LibreOffice] dramatically improves upon the previous", and LibreOffice 24.2 continue this trend.

In particular, LibreOffice 24.2 Writer offers improved import capabilities for 'drawing canvas' elements from DOCX documents. Connectors are now imported as true connectors, primitive shapes like ellipses are imported as OOXML shapes, and it supports multicolour gradients, theme colours, and glow effects for shapes.

Additionally, the SVG OOXML extension now imports SVG images (svgBlip elements) instead of fallback PNGs and export SVG images along with fallback PNGs for compatibility with older MS Office versions. moreover, the import of first page headers and footers in OOXML into Writer has become more sophisticated.

Download LibreOffice 24.2

You can download LibreOffice 24.2 for Windows, macOS, and Linux directly from the LibreOffice website.

if you're on Ubuntu, you might prefer to get this update from the LibreOffice PPA, via Flat hub, or from the Canonical Snap Store. Keep in mind that these sources may not update to the latest release immediately, but it's usually just a day or two post-release.

While the new features in LibreOffice 24.2 are compelling, you don't need to upgrade if you won't use them. The LibreOffice 7.6 series (including Ubuntu 23.10) is still maintained by the Document Foundation and continues to receive backported fixes.