Convert linux documents to mac or windows format

Basic Beginner

New Member
Joined
Apr 26, 2021
Messages
6
Reaction score
4
Credits
49
Hello, I would like to start learning linux, but I often need to make documents, using libreoffice writer or musescore, for people who use macs. So my question is, is it possible to make a libreoffice or musescore document on a linux os, and format it so that it can be opened on a mac or a windows pc? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.
 


Click on "Save As..."
At the bottom of the directory window you will see a drop down menu.
Click on this, it should give you several Microsoft options.
 
Thanks. Does that mean that, if I write a libreoffice document, or a musescore score, on linux os, and send it as an email attachment to a mac or pc, it can be opened on a mac, just like a mac can read such a file if it was originally written on a windows pc? I mean, are word processor documents written on a linux os compatible with macs and pcs? Sorry to ask such basic questions, but I need to know the answers before I start trying to learn linux. Thanks for your time.
 
Yes, they are, as long as they have the right software to open it. So, if you "Save as" and select a version of Microsoft Word, anyone with Microsoft Word installed, or even using Office Live on the web, will be able to open it just fine.
 
To further elaborate, both LibreOffice and Musescore can be installed/used with Linux.

Many distros come with LibreOffice installed by default. Musescore can be found in the default repos with many distros.
 
The reason you can't open a Document created in LibreOffice in Windoze is...micro$oft wont allow it because if they did no one would buy m$ office. :eek:
 
That's bs, @sam444.

@Basic Beginner, LibreOffice is available for Windows both in a traditional installer and through the Chocolatey package manager, so (as said) your documents have full cross-platform interoperability (Mac, Windows, Linux) regardless where you create them.
 
Libreoffice works on windows and Mac too.
So if any windows users in your audience have libreoffice installed on their PCs, then they should be able to open your documents directly. Libreoffice uses the opendocument format, which is an open standard. So you can open a document created in Libre on Linux, in libre on a windows machine. or vice versa.

Libreoffice can also export/save as M$ Word format, but I think it’s only in an older version of the word format. I haven’t used libre in a while. I can’t remember if it’s the 2003, or 2007 word format. Something like that. And there are certain things in the word format that libre doesn’t support (because M$ word docs are a proprietary document format). Which could mean that certain things in the exported document might be formatted slightly differently to the original libre document.

I think most of the recent M$ office versions can open libreoffice documents, but I think they only support an early version of the opendocument file format. V1, I think.
So another option could be to save your libreoffice docs as opendocument version 1, rather than the latest version of the format. That should allow M$ Office users to open/import libreoffice docs in Office. But doing that could also mean that some of your original formatting may be lost in the exported document.


To avoid potential formatting problems in exported documents, another alternative would be to export your libreoffice documents to .pdf and distribute them as .pdf files.

If you’re dealing purely with text documents, another alternative could be to provide the documents in .rtf (rich text format).

Personally, I’d just distribute the original libreoffice documents (in the latest format). And maybe .rtf and .pdf?!
 


No it's not BS...a document created in LibreOffice cannot be opened in m$ office...unless you save it as...micro$oft word 2007-2013 XML(.dox) or similar, for the reason stated. :rolleyes:
I also have LibreOffice installed on my Win 7 VM for the same reason too. :)
 
No it's not BS...a document created in LibreOffice cannot be opened in m$ office...unless you save it as...micro$oft word 2007-2013 XML(.dox) or similar, for the reason stated. :rolleyes:
I also have LibreOffice installed on my Win 7 VM for the same reason too. :)
If you have Office 2016, 2019 or MS 365 - they will now open LibreOffice default formats (.odt, .ods) - anything earlier will not (office 2013, 2010, 2007)
 
Last edited by a moderator:
The reason you can't open a Document created in LibreOffice in Windoze is...micro$oft wont allow it because if they did no one would buy m$ office. :eek:

It's not much of a selling point at all, even if true. Businesses who use it don't send people account statements in doc format, and people barely use word processors really. Even more rare they'd need to collaborate on word document editing, across different systems and applications.

Biggest selling point of Office is Excel (imo). Superior to everything other than Google Sheets for me, and for businesses I think just superior.
 
It's not much of a selling point at all, even if true. Businesses who use it don't send people account statements in doc format, and people barely use word processors really. Even more rare they'd need to collaborate on word document editing, across different systems and applications.

Biggest selling point of Office is Excel (imo). Superior to everything other than Google Sheets for me, and for businesses I think just superior.
Out of interest - in your opinion, what "killer" features does Excel have, that alternatives like Libreoffice Calc, Gnumeric and GNUCash do not?

I've found Calc and Gnumeric to be capable enough for professional use. What functionality do you feel they are missing?
 
Out of interest - in your opinion, what "killer" features does Excel have, that alternatives like Libreoffice Calc, Gnumeric and GNUCash do not?

I've found Calc and Gnumeric to be capable enough for professional use. What functionality do you feel they are missing?

If a selling point is something that causes sales, then I take it back. It's just the best thing in Office imo. I've had Lubuntu installed just under a month and I haven't opened Libreoffice once, for context.

I can't go into great detail, but certain things just work better in Excel (or did). I found things like even autofilters didn't work as expected, admittedly a few years ago now (and on Windows). Working with large amounts of data, I always found Excel better too. Just generally less buggy, mucking about with stock data or whatever was a no-no with Calc or Gnumeric. I've not used anything except sheets for a few years really, although I generally use spreadsheets in "periods".

Does Gnumeric support VBA?
 
My understanding jives with @Linuxembourg's statements. There are quite a few things that can be done in Excel that can't be done in Calc, especially with VBA. There are some folks that do some really, really complicated stuff in Excel. (See below.)

One might argue that Excel is the wrong tool for the job, but that's the tool they've got - and it's the tool they've been building on top of for decades.

I've heard this from high-level operators and office-drones, all of whom were users of Excel (presumably, as they knew more about the subject than I did) and not sales reps. All of whom were what I'd also call techies, inasmuch as I remember.

Now...

I have absolutely no idea if this is true or not. I am not a user of Excel or Calc.

I haven't touched Excel in over a decade. Even then, it was just simple spreadsheets. If I want to do calculations on data sets, Excel is not going to be the tool I reach for. I am merely parroting what I've seen elsewhere.
 
That's bs, @sam444.

@Basic Beginner, LibreOffice is available for Windows both in a traditional installer and through the Chocolatey package manager, so (as said) your documents have full cross-platform interoperability (Mac, Windows, Linux) regardless where you create them.
I haven't looked at this thread for a couple of days, hence my lack of response, so thanks a lot, and I think I can assume that Musescore will have the same cross-platform performance, since Musescore makes builds for Mac, Windows and Linux. Thanks!
 
Libreoffice works on windows and Mac too.
So if any windows users in your audience have libreoffice installed on their PCs, then they should be able to open your documents directly. Libreoffice uses the opendocument format, which is an open standard. So you can open a document created in Libre on Linux, in libre on a windows machine. or vice versa.

Libreoffice can also export/save as M$ Word format, but I think it’s only in an older version of the word format. I haven’t used libre in a while. I can’t remember if it’s the 2003, or 2007 word format. Something like that. And there are certain things in the word format that libre doesn’t support (because M$ word docs are a proprietary document format). Which could mean that certain things in the exported document might be formatted slightly differently to the original libre document.

I think most of the recent M$ office versions can open libreoffice documents, but I think they only support an early version of the opendocument file format. V1, I think.
So another option could be to save your libreoffice docs as opendocument version 1, rather than the latest version of the format. That should allow M$ Office users to open/import libreoffice docs in Office. But doing that could also mean that some of your original formatting may be lost in the exported document.


To avoid potential formatting problems in exported documents, another alternative would be to export your libreoffice documents to .pdf and distribute them as .pdf files.

If you’re dealing purely with text documents, another alternative could be to provide the documents in .rtf (rich text format).

Personally, I’d just distribute the original libreoffice documents (in the latest format). And maybe .rtf and .pdf?!
Thanks for all this helpful information, it's great. I was beginning to get cold feet about trying linux, because I googled 'can macs and pc's open linux documents', and everything I found seemed to say no, and that you need to buy an app called Paragon to open linux docs on macs. But I thought it seemed strange, so I found this forum, and after the info you've all given me, now I know it's definitely worth learning Linux. Great forum, thanks a lot!
 
If you have Office 2016, 2019 or MS 365 - they will now open LibreOffice default formats (.odt, .ods) - anything earlier will not (office 2013, 2010, 2007)

Ah that's why, it's been a very long time since I used m$ office and it'll be a cold day in Hell before I'll every use it again. ;)
 

Members online


Top