Contents

# Compatibility

Specifies compatibility settings for text documents. These options help in fine-tuning LibreOffice when importing Microsoft Word documents.

To access this command...

Open a text document, choose LibreOffice - Preferences Tools - Options - LibreOffice Writer - Compatibility.

Some of the settings defined here are only valid for the current document and must be defined separately for each document.

### Add spacing between paragraphs and tables

In LibreOffice Writer, paragraph spacing is defined differently than in Microsoft Word documents. If you have defined spacing between two paragraphs or tables, spacing is also added in the corresponding Word documents.

Specifies whether to add Microsoft Word-compatible spacing between paragraphs and tables in LibreOffice Writer text documents.

### Add paragraph and table spacing at top of first page and page breaks

Specifies whether paragraph spacing at the top of a page will also be effective at the beginning of a page or column if the paragraph is positioned on the first page of the document. The same applies for a page break.

If you import a Word document, the spaces are automatically added during the conversion.

### Use OpenOffice.org 1.1 tab stop formatting

Specifies how to align text at tab stops beyond the right margin, how to handle decimal tab stops, and how to handle tab stops close to a line break. If this check box is not selected, tab stops are handled in the same way as in other Office applications.

In text documents created by your current version of Writer, the new tab stop handling is used by default. In text documents created by Writer versions prior to StarOffice 8 or OpenOffice.org 2.0, the old tab stop handling is applied.

### Do not add leading (extra space) between lines of text

Specifies that additional leading (extra space) between lines of text is not added, even if the font in use contains the additional leading attribute.

In text documents created by your current version of Writer, the additional leading is used by default. In text documents created by Writer versions prior to StarOffice 8 or OpenOffice.org 2.0, the additional leading is not used.

### Use OpenOffice.org 1.1 line spacing

If the option is off, a new process for formatting text lines with proportional line spacing will be applied. If the option is on, the previous method of formatting of text lines with proportional line spacing will be applied.

In text documents created by your current version of Writer and in Microsoft Word documents of recent versions, the new process is used. In text documents created by Writer versions prior to StarOffice 8 or OpenOffice.org 2.0, the previous process is used.

### Add paragraph and table spacing at bottom of table cells

Specifies that the bottom spacing is added to a paragraph, even when it is the last paragraph in a table cell.

If the option is off, table cells will be formatted as in Writer versions prior to StarOffice 8 or OpenOffice.org 2.0. If the option is on, an alternative method of formatting table cells will be applied. The option is on by default for new documents created with LibreOffice and for documents imported from Microsoft Word format.

### Use OpenOffice.org 1.1 object positioning

Specifies how to calculate the position of floating objects anchored to a character or paragraph with respect to the top and bottom paragraph spacing.

If the option is on, the floating objects are positioned as in Writer versions prior to StarOffice 8 or OpenOffice.org 2.0. If the option is off, the floating objects are positioned using an alternative method that is similar to the method used by Microsoft Word.

The option will be set to off for new documents. For Writer documents created by a version prior to OpenOffice.org 2.0 the option is on.

### Use OpenOffice.org 1.1 text wrapping around objects

By default, page header and footer content, as well as footnote and endnote content, does not wrap around floating screen objects. This behavior mirrors how Microsoft Word handles these objects. To enable text wrapping around floating screen objects in headers/footers or footnotes/endnotes, turn on this option.

If the option is off, which is the default setting, the new text wrapping will be applied.

### Consider wrapping style when positioning objects

Specifies how the complex process of positioning floating objects that are anchored to a character or paragraph should work. In Writer versions prior to StarOffice 8 or OpenOffice.org 2.0, an iterative process was used, while in current versions a straightforward process is used, which is similar to the same process in Microsoft Word.

If the option is off, the old LibreOffice iterative process of object positioning is used. If the option is on, the new straightforward process is used to ensure compatibility with Microsoft Word documents.

### Justify lines with a manual line break in justified paragraphs

If enabled, Writer adds spacing between words, in lines that end with Shift+Enter in justified paragraphs. If disabled, spacing between words will not be expanded to justify the lines.

This setting is on by default for .odt text documents. It will be saved and loaded with the document in the .odt text document format. This setting cannot be saved in old .sxw text documents, so this setting is off for .sxw text documents.

### Protect form (no longer protects whole document. Insert write protected section instead)

When importing forms from Microsoft Word, the document content outside of form controls is locked and can only be imported as read-only. This setting allows you to edit the document by enclosing the form controls in protected sections.

### Word-compatible trailing blanks

Ensure trailing spaces and their highlighting are compatible with Microsoft Word. This option is enabled by default for imported Microsoft Word formats (.doc, .docx, .rtf). For ODF files, the option is disabled by default.

### Tolerate white lines that may appear in PDF page backgrounds

Use LibreOffice 4.3 anchoring paint order and tolerate white lines that may appear in PDF page backgrounds created from legacy documents.

### Hide paragraphs of mail merge fields with empty value when generating merged documents

When this setting is active, database fields that expand to empty values are treated as hidden paragraph fields. The option is enabled by default and is automatically applied to non-ODF documents (to ensure compatibility with other office suites). For existing ODT documents, the option remains disabled if the setting was not previously configured, preserving the layout of legacy documents.

### Render non-breaking spaces (NBSP) as standard-space-width (off for fixed size)

When this option is enabled (opt-in for both old and new documents), non-breaking space character will no longer be strictly fixed in width. When disabled, the NBSP character has always the width of a standard space (U+0020) on the given line. This change is only noticeable when the paragraph is justified.

Additionally, when non-printable characters are displayed, a tilde (~) or degree symbol (°) will now appear in place of a non-breaking space (NBSP), as the gray field alone is often not visible.

### Do not add an extra space after number in footnotes / endnotes with hanging first line

This option removes extra spacing between the footnote number and its text when the paragraph has a hanging indent, such as in Microsoft Word.

### Set tabstops relative to indent of paragraph

This setting makes all paragraph tab positions relative to left page margin, not to the indent of the paragraph.

### Allow tabs to extend beyond the right margin

When this option is enabled, paragraph tab stops can extend beyond the right margin. When disabled, tab stops beyond the right margin are ignored.

### Do not mirror drawing objects anchored in paragraphs with an RTL writing direction

Writer automatically mirrors drawing objects anchored in right-to-left (RTL) paragraphs, whereas Microsoft Word does not. When this option is enabled (intended for DOCX files), Writer will not automatically mirror the position of drawing objects simply because they are anchored in an RTL text node.

### Render endnotes at the end of document inline, rather than on a separate page

By default, Writer places endnotes on one or more separate endnote pages, while Microsoft Word positions them inline at the end of the document, immediately following the body text. This setting creates a dedicated section at the layout level and places the endnotes within that section, effectively making them inline.

### Use Word-compatible font metrics for text grid and Asian text

Whenever Microsoft Word uses a CJK font to lay out text, it applies an extra multiplier to the line height. This behavior depends solely on the font file itself—it does not matter whether the font is set as the East Asian font or if the text contains any CJK characters. The only determining factor is whether the font identifies itself as a CJK font.

If the font reports coverage for any of the following code pages, the line height multiplier is applied:

- CP932 (JIS/Japan)

- CP936 (Simplified Chinese)

- CP949 (Korean Wansung encoding)

- CP950 (Traditional Chinese)

Writer would respect the original font metrics when laying out DOC/DOCX files. This change makes Writer try to emulate Microsoft Word behavior instead, subject to a compatibility flag.

### Make whitespace character height not affect line height

Remove space and tab characters height value from line height calculation. This setting is enabled by default in Microsoft Word document file formats.

### Underline Word-compatible trailing blanks

Microsoft Word’s Underline Trailing Spaces compatibility option. Previously, the feature behaved as if this option was always enabled, while in Word it is disabled by default.

### Adjust spaces to half the width of ideographic spaces, using Word-compatible rules

When enabled, Writer adjusts the width of certain normal space characters to one half the width of a CJK ideographic space. This adjustment is only applied to leading and trailing spaces, multiple sequential spaces, and spaces between CJK characters.

This flag is enabled automatically when importing DOCX files with the w:balanceSingleByteDoubleByteWidth option enabled and also when importing DOC files with the fDntBlnSbDbWid compatibility flag unset.

### Adjust line heights to grid height in table

For CJK text documents using a CJK Text Grid, the number of lines per page and the number of characters per line are specified in the page style. Typically, adjusting the number of lines per page also impacts tables. This compatibility option disables that behavior, ensuring tables remain unaffected by the grid lines per page setting. The option was introduced to match a similar feature in Microsoft Word, allowing these documents to be rendered accurately.

### Ignore paragraph directions for list label alignment

Writer now applies list label direction, ensuring that start and end label alignment match start and end paragraph alignment. When this option is enabled, Writer ignores paragraph direction for list labels, always using left-to-right alignment.

In order to preserve the layout of existing documents, this flag is enabled automatically when loading an ODF created with earlier versions of LibreOffice.

## Use as Default

Click to use the current settings on this tab page as the default for further sessions with LibreOffice.

The factory defaults are set as follows. Enabled are the following options, while all other options are disabled:

1. Add spacing between paragraphs and tables

2. Add paragraph and table spacing at top of first page and page breaks

3. Add paragraph and table spacing at bottom of table cells

4. Justify lines with manual line breaks in justified paragraphs

5. Hide paragraph of mail merge fields with empty values when generating merged documents.

6. Set tab stops relative to indent of paragraphs

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