[upstream] OpenOffice Right-to-Left and Left-to-Right buttons disappear just after being added if CTL isn't enabled

[Erdal Ronahi]

When adding either the Right-to-Left or the Left-to-Right button to the toolbar, they appear for a moment and then disappear again.
I have the bug in Dapper, but the person who told me the bug uses Breezy.

Seems to affect : Breezy, Dapper, Edgy (if not already fixed) and the latest Feisty (confirmed).

[saiyth (m-s-salih)]

I noticed the same problim in Edgy with openoffice 2.0.4

[Stéphane Graber (stgraber)]

Confirmed on Feisty with OpenOffice : 2.2.0~rc3~oof680m10-0ubuntu3

[verb3k (verb3k)]

I am having the same problem in Feisty Fawn .

This bug prevents me entirely from working with openoffice.org since I use Arabic which is a Right-to-left language.

The version is 2.2.0~rc3~oof680m10-0ubuntu3 , as Stéphane Graber said .
Hope this will be fixed before the final release.

Thanks in advance ,
Ali

[Matthias Klose (doko)]

- unreproducible; please recheck with a live CD
- Stephane, do you plan to fix that for 7.04 (you're the assignee)?

[verb3k (verb3k)]

It is present with herd5 , I am sure of that , Stephane and I were having the same problem. I don't know if the problem is still in the OOo version which was released today.
And I don't think Stephane will fix this , I know him....he just works on kernel bugs and the like . I was planning to ask him about this.

[Stéphane Graber (stgraber)]

Hey Matthias,
1) I'll check with a LiveCD as soon as possible (before Herd6) but I've just retried with a clean OpenOffice (removed .openoffice) and it still seem to be here.
2) Nope, I won't I've no real knowledge of OpenOffice, of course if someone point me to a potential patch (or if I come across one) I'll package it.
I've put myself as the Assignee because there was none and I've done some changes to this bug (status, description and title)

If anyone has a recent (if possible daily) LiveCD around here and can just check if the bug occurs it'd be great.
Exact step :
Launch OpenOffice Writer
Click on the arrow at the right of the Formatting toolbar
Go to Visible Buttons
and tick either Left-To-Right or Right-To-Left

Expected result : The selected icon would be added to the toolbar
Bug result : The icon is shown for a 1/4 second then disappear while it's not tick in the "Visible Buttons" menu but is in the "Customize toolbar" window

Thanks

[Matthias Klose (doko)]

confirming, removing the mulestone. Stéphane, could you forward this upstream?

[Stéphane Graber (stgraber)]

I think I've just found where the problem come from, in fact OpenOffice hide those buttons if the CTL (Complex text layout) isn't activated in the language settings.
So, if you want to be able to see those icons (from my point of view you shouldn't be able to see them in the menu except if the CTL is enabled) just go to : Tools -> Options -> Language settings -> Languages and tick : "Enabled for complex text layout (CTL)"

Does this solve everyone issue ?

The next question is of course if whether or not we should enable that by default or if there is a way to turn those icons completely off if CTL isn't activated.

Stéphane

[Erdal Ronahi (erdalronahi)]

Thanks for this solution, but it is highly improbable that this solves "everyone's issue". It is absolutely counter-intuitive.

From a user's point of view CTL should become enabled as soon as someone adds the RTL-button to his setup. I do not know if something like this is possible, though. To remove them completely would make it even harder, I guess.

On the other hand, what disadvantages would it have to enable CTL by default? Higher memory consumption? Slower startup?

[verb3k (verb3k)]

I think it is a bug ....because when you enable CTL they will appear just fine but when you want them to "disappear" tthe refuse to do so. It will be the oposite of this bug....First we couldn't add them...then we couldn't remove them.

Hope for a fix soon.

[Stéphane Graber (stgraber)]

Ok, so they seem to appear when you enable CTL and disappear when you disable it.
There is no way to force them to appear or disappear other than activating/disactivating CTL.

This might be a "feature" of OOo (to avoid people complaining about where the hell to we activate those buttons), but I don't really get why they put them in the Visible buttons if we can't activate/deactivate by hand.
I'm decreasing the importance to Low.

[Jon (t-tim-timmy)]

Still exists in OO 2.3.0, gutsy (Ubuntu 7.10).
IMO should exist in the toolbar and enable CTL when chosen.
If possible, even show in immediate toolbar (without having to select it) if a right-to-left language is installed in underlying OS (if installed on OS - probably will be used in office programs).
This should be intuitive for users who migrate from Microsoft, and plenty of right-to-left languages to go around.

[Chris Cheney (ccheney)]

It appears that OpenOffice is planning on fixing the problem by disabling the RtL LtR buttons from displaying as an option if CTL is not enabled, so you won't see that it is even a choice unless CTL is enabled. That probably won't happen until 2.4.0 at the earliest though.

Chris

[Jon (t-tim-timmy)]

OK.
If that will be the way this bug is fixed, may I suggest, for intuitiveness, auto-enabling CTL at install time if a complex language is installed in the underlying OS.
Querying the user about his/her preference is also an option (although a less desired one, in my opinion).

[majid_karimi59 (majid-karimi59)]

hi every body
i solve it
go to tools->language->for all text->more
locale setting = hindi or such
ctl = arabic or such
enjoy

[tapin13 (tapin13)]

Stéphane Graber REALLY thanks for your "tip"!!!
I think OpenOffice developers have to change this parameters automatically, if user select to add RTL button.

[SB (sonny-benshimon)]

wanted to confirm bug is still present in OO 3.1
I don't know if this is a place for a "recommendation":
The whole thing makes sense that if the CTL is not turned on, then you can't have the LTR and RTL buttons present.
Instead of thinking if CTL should be on or off by default, maybe the buttons can be added but left "grayed out" or to pop up a small window notifying the user that if one wants the RTL\LTR buttons, the CTL option should be turned on (and HOW TO DO THAT, since this is a "well-hidden" option)

[mnokel (mnokel)]

me using oo and ubuntu, tried to add an arabic text from wikipedia to an empty paper, I usually start this by changing the writing direction from left-to-right to right-to-left. At first I didn't find the icone for it, then I added it, but it appears for a few millisecond and disappear again! I don't know why!

[Medya (medya)]

I have ubuntu 9.10 and Office 3.1 and I still have this bug ,
it is such a small bug and can be solved so easily, I wonder why they havent solved it already.

[yonatan (yonatan-offek)]

Same here, kubuntu 9.10, OpenOffice 3.1.

By the way, is there a reason why Enhanced language support options aren't on by default? I think a lot of people could use them (China, India...).

[Abdulaziz Junaid (dulajun)]

I see also that Enhanced language support options must be on by default.

[liorda (liorda)]

+1 for yonatan's request. It should be enabled by default.

[kulight (kulight)]

this is still happening on OOo 3.2 on lucid 10.04

[Björn Michaelsen (bjoern-michaelsen)]

[This is an automated message.]
There are no new official OpenOffice.org releases in Ubuntu packaging anymore => Won't Fix

If the problem persists, please mark this bug as "also affects project Libreoffice" or "also affects distribution Libreoffice (Ubuntu)" if that has not happened already.

Please leave references to upstream OpenOffice.org bugs in place to allow cross pollination.