Make LIBREOFFICE more compatible with MICROSOFT OFFICE & 365

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00:00 Intro
00:48 Sponsor: Secure and Monitor your Internet Connection with Safing
01:52 Make the interface more familiar and reorder it
05:10 Use Microsoft Fonts
06:51 Improve file compatibility
08:48 Import Templates and Styles
09:32 Add Extensions to get more features
11:05 Other Options
12:58 Sponsor: get a laptop or desktop that runs Linux perfectly
14:01 Support the channel

To switch to a more comfortable interface, open any of the applications of the suite. Click on the "View" menu, then "User interface". By default, it's the standard menubar and toolbar combo, but if you click on "tabbed", you'll see that you can now use a ribbon interface, just like what Microsoft Office uses.

Next, we'll look at the icons. From the tabbed interface, click the main menu, in the top right corner, and select "Options". Then click the "View" menu, and in the "Theme" drop down menu, you'll have plenty of options.

You can also reorder any of the icons from any of the tabs of the ribbon. CLick the main menu again, and then "customize". Then click the "Notebookbar" tab. here, yu'll see the "target" dropdown menu that lets you select which tab you want to change.

To install Microsoft fonts, you generally have a package in your distro's repositories, provided you enabled the non free software ones. the package is generally called ttf-mscorefonts or ttf-mscorefonts installer. On Ubuntu or Ubuntu based distros, for example, open a terminal, and run

sudo apt install ttf-mscorefonts-installer

If you're using an arch based distro, you can find it in your graphical package manager through the AUR. For Fedora, I left a link in the description of the video.

If you want to use these fonts by default, you can configure that as well. Click the main menu, then Options. Then, go to the name of the app you're using, here it's LibreOffice Writer, and select the "basic fonts" tab.

You'll want to enable all compatibility features. To do that, open the main menu, then Options. In the Load Save tab, click on Microsoft Office, and make sure all the checkboxes are ticked.

Next, in the LibreOffice Writer tab, and the Compatibility tab, tick the "Reorganize form menu to have it MS compatible" checkbox. Also tick the "Word compatible trailing blanks" checkmark.

Next, if you interact with MS Office users a lot, you'll want to send them documents using the Office formats. Click on the "general" tab of the Load / Save panel, and in "Always save as", select Word 2007-365 (docx). Then in the document type dropdown, select spreadsheet, and change the "always save as" field to Excel 2007-365 xlsx, and repeat that step for Presentations and the pptx format.

To import styles and templates, click the "File" tab in Writer, and then "Templates". There, click the "Manage" button, in the top right corner, and click "Import". There, you can select "templates", "presentations", or "styles".

To install extensions, download them from the extensions portal, and you'll get a .oxt file. Then, in LibreOffice, click the "Extensions" tab, then the "extensions" menu, and "Extension manager". Click the "Add" button, and go find your oxt file to import it.

After that, these extensions will all display their commands in the "Extensions" tab.

[Blueeeeeee]

Wow, I didn't even know LO had extensions.

This video is 100% much more useful than most LO configuration videos out there.

[adithyasunil]

The video we all needed, to help out new Linux users.

[mirage]

Some handy tips. I've been using LibreOffice for years now. Partly because by the time I got my hands on MS Office I had gotten so used to Libre's UI that everything else just feels weird to me now. It's still a piece of software I happily recommend to anyone who needs to get work done.

[averagemamil]

+1 for Libre Office from me - use it all the time and rarely have interoperability problems with my MS work buddies. Will definitely add some of the tweaks you showed - thanks Nick! 👏

[thechargedcreeper]

This video came at the perfect time for me. I'm slowly trying to transition to Linux, and currently that involves switching away from closed source applications to open source cross platform ones. Office was the big hurdle for me because a. LibreOffice's layout was way to confusing with the little muscle memory I have, b. it sometimes didn't seem to correctly display math formulas saved in Word as an odt, c. the default template feeling ever so slightly off and d. Word doesn't like it when I save an odt with Windows Ink content, the 'drawing area' should be converted to an image but everything is all over the place. The last problem is Word's fault and at this point I'm using Paint to quickly make those sketches, but knowing that LibreOffice has even more extensive toolbar customization and knowing that it can convert certain Office-features for you (and that I should change the default way Word interprets math thanks to that compatibility table), I'm one step closer to ditching Office and one step closer to going full Linux. Thank you for the video man

[CorvusSolitario]

I needed this, thank you for sharing. It's easy to get lost in all the menus and features when you deal with hundreds of programs daily, and having someone show you how to make your life (and the others you work for) just a bit easier is appreciated.

[user]

Thank You so much for this one, I got really tired using office online for friends and libreoffice for my own stuff, this video probably fixed most of my issues with libreoffice compatibility, actually I never digged into settings.

[doriankandi]

My guy, thanks for putting this together. Most of LibreOffice/Excel tutorials stop after adding a ribbon/fonts. Thanks for the extra detail here. My job in finance keeps me tied to Excel, and OnlyOffice isn't as robust (no SOLVER) as LibreOffice. Here's to reinstalling Linux and trying this out!

[jeanmarccourtiade]

Nice video, thanks. I've been working with LibreOffice for a couple of years and do all my consulting work with it from reports, to presentations and data analysis (that even Excel cannot handle). Yet, this video has taught me a few things. Well done!

[Watchandlearn]

Your videos are awesome and you are one of the only channels I still watch on YouTube. Thanks for all your effort! I really wish that Libreoffice would enable a lot of this by default as when some users download and install it, they will be immediately shocked by the user interface and find an alternative like only office.

[elnicatuani]

Very useful. Thanks a million for this walktrough, Nick.

[alperkanat]

The timing of this video couldn't be any better! 🙂 Thank you Nick!

[indiboy]

I recently swithed from MS office to LO, just saw this video and all my doubts cleared in one single place. Thank you👍

[lucymorrison]

Happy birthday Nick! Also, as someone switching to LibreOffice from iWork and MS Office, this was super helpful.

[balesjo]

It's been quite a while since I looked at LibreOffice and your video really impressed me with how far the office suite has come.

[IoanEugenStan]

Thank you for all the work you are doing to make open source software more popular.

[michaelmoonbear]

This a fantastically useful video. Clear, concise, and I refer to it often. Thank you!

[marianobarella]

For budget reasons these days Ive been distro hopping and finally staying in MX Linux, and this video was very helpful to customize LibreOffice, thank you so much! New subscriber here

[RedBoyforCE]

I like the new transitions you are using! Really modern in my oppinion.

Also, OnlyOffice ftw

[robh]

I'm new to Linux, and this video is super helpful. Thank you!