How to Get Started with Libre Office

If you use your Mac for word processing, creating and editing spreadsheets or putting the finishing touches to a slideshow presentation, you need a suite of office applications with the right tools.

The Microsoft Office suite is near ubiquitous, but we’ve been waiting for an update to the Mac version since 2011, and it’s still relatively expensive. While iWork is now free, it lacks some of the features that come with other office suites. LibreOffice, however, is not only completely free, but it’s constantly updated with improvements and new features.

The three most popular programs in LibreOffice are the word processor Writer, the spreadsheet tool Calc, and the presentation and slide-show creator Impress. Each of these is installed with the suite when you download it from libreoffice.org. Once installed, you’ll notice the layouts of the LibreOffice programs are very similar to their competitors, so if you’re used to Microsoft Office on a Mac, or earlier versions of iWork, you will probably find quite a lot of LibreOffice familiar.

The toolbars in Writer, Calc, Impress, and the other tools in LibreOffice are pretty similar. There’s the new document icon (in the shape of the icon for the program you’re working on), plus icons for document open, save, email, PDF export, and print. The toolbars also share familiar buttons for spelling and grammar checking, cutting, pasting, and copying to clipboard, and undo/redo. Under this toolbar are buttons and menus for altering the format of text and other objects. The rest of the toolbars contain buttons for tools that are specific to the program you’re using, such as shapes to decorate slides in Impress.

Creating new documents is easy; just click the new document icon or go to File > New and choose the document type. You can also access LibreOffice’s large library of templates to help you get started. To do this, click File on the top menu and select New > Templates. It’s blank at the moment, so click the Spreadsheets tab. On the right of the window, click the icon with the arrow. This lets you import templates from the LibreOffice website. These templates range from budget spreadsheets that you can use in Calc to help you keep your finances in order, professional presentations for you to use in Impress, and leaflets you can create in Writer.

LibreOffice can handle a large range of file formats, which makes it easy to open and edit documents even if they have been originally created in another program. Similarly, when it comes to saving a brand new document, you have a large choice of file types — just click the save icon or hit Command + S. A drop-down list displays the vast array of file types for you to save your document as, including Microsoft Office formats. LibreOffice’s default file type is known as Open Document Format. For LibreOffice Writer files these file extensions are ODT, for Impress presentations it’s ODP, and for spreadsheets in Calc it’s ODS.

While Writer, Calc, and Impress have all the regular tools we’ve come to expect from Office suites, there are also a number of advanced tools. In Writer, you can use Mail Merge, which lets you send personalized documents to a large number of recipients quickly and easily. Click the Tools menu and select Mail Merge Wizard to be taken step by step through the process.

There are a number of powerful formatting options in Writer that can also really make your documents stand out. As well as changing the fonts, color, and style of your text, you can add bullet points and numbering, as well as changing the alignment and indentation of the text, all from the toolbar. Images and movie files can also be inserted into your documents for added visual impact — just open the Insert menu to see “Pictures,” “Movie and Sound…” and other options. If you’re producing a large document such as a dissertation or report, the indexing features of Writer are a huge help.

Using the Style menu on the toolbar, you can give your chapter and sections impressive-looking styles that make your document easier to navigate. Writer can then automatically create a table of contents based on your chapter and section names — just click the Insert menu bar and go to “Indexes and Tables.” Once your table of contents is created, you can click on the name of the section, heading or chapter you want, and Writer takes you straight there. You can also easily add footnotes and references to your text — ideal if you’re using Writer for academic work. 

Calc is similarly well-stocked when it comes to features. With a spreadsheet full of data, you can use it to create powerful formulas that manipulate your data. You can also easily change the format of the data you include, so if you have a spreadsheet that deals with your household budget, you can turn the numbers you’ve entered into your local currency by clicking the icon of a pile of coins on the toolbar.

One of the most useful tools in Calc is the Graphs feature, which lets you create attractive and useful charts and graphs based on the data you select in your spreadsheet — from standard bar and pie charts to scatter and line graphs.

Slideshows can be created in Impress — ideal for presentations at work.

When it comes to presentations and slideshows in Impress, you’re going to want to make each slide look as good as possible. Impress makes this easy with a number of useful formatting tools, layouts, graphics, and color schemes. You can add transitions and animations — and even create your own — to make your presentations really stand out. Experiment!

A Quick Look at the Toolbar

A. Function Buttons

These buttons let you quickly perform some of the most widely used tasks, such as creating a new document, opening an existing one and saving your work.

B. Edit Buttons

These buttons are used to cut, copy and paste selected elements, as well as undo and redo mistakes and corrections.

C. Format Options

These menus let you choose the font, style and size of text, along with formatting such as italics. Depending on the program you’re using, other text and graphic formatting options may appear here.

D. Information Bar

This bar contains info about the document you’re working on. In Writer, this includes the number of words and characters, page number and language. In Calc, it includes the sheet number and any sums you’ve created.

How to Find Your Way around Libre Office

1. Format Text in Writer

To give your documents a bit more visual flair, you can change the font, size, and format on part of the text. To do this, select the text you want to format by clicking and dragging the mouse to highlight the words. You can apply a ready-made style by clicking the menu on the taskbar where it says ‘default style’. Next to that menu, you see a drop-down list box that lets you select the font. The number next to this menu relates to the font size – change it to a larger number to enlarge the text, or a smaller number to shrink it.

2. Charts and Graphs in Calc

One of the best ways to make sense of your important data is by creating a chart or graph for a visual overview – and Calc is great at doing all the hard work for you. All you need to do is select the cells that contain the data from which you want to make a graph. Next, you can click the red Graph icon (the one shaped like a pie chart) on the toolbar and a window opens up showing you a range of charts and graphs you can use. As you click each choice, a preview of your data in the chart appears. 

3. Simple Formulas

As the name of the program suggests, Calc is very good at calculations using the data in the cells. Click an empty cell and type “=” (without the quotes), which tells Calc you are writing a formula. You can perform simple calculations such as multiplying the data in one cell by another. Just type the name of the cell (by its column letter and row number, A2, for example), add an asterisk (*) and then the second name of the cell. For division, use the “/” symbol, and for adding and subtracting use “+” and “–” respectively.

4. Adding Transitions to a Slideshow

Adding transitions between slides is a particularly quick and easy way to give your presentation a more professional edge, plus it makes them more engaging and interesting for your audience to look at. To add a transition, right-click the slide preview in the left-hand menu and select Slide Transition. A long list of transitions appear in a menu on the right-hand side; just click one to see a preview. If you need to, you can also select Apply to All Slides to make the transition consistent throughout your presentation.