Problem importing ODT files from Word

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Antlab

Hi all.
I am new to Scribus, but I am reading a lot of guides and tutorials, because I would like to use it for some new projects, in particular for self published books.
I found a problem when importing Word files, saved in ODT to try maintaining the format.
When I import the text in a Scribus frame, I obtain a strange behaviour, with the text completely "deformed" in the x-y ratio.
I also tried with an ODT file directly saved from Libre Office, and in that case the importation seems working correctly.
Is it a known problem or is there some way to solve the issue (I would prefer to use Word instead than LO, as I am very used to it).
Thanks.

GarryP

Sounds odd. There have been other people on the forum having problems with importing text but none I could find where the text was being "deformed".

It sounds like some kind of "style corruption" thing but I'm not even sure what I mean by that. (Have you checked your Scribus styles to make sure none are "deformed"? It could be that a style is being applied mistakenly.)

As a possible workaround, does Word allow you to use ODTs "natively", i.e. create an ODT and Save, rather than create a DOC and then Save As ODT? Doing so would allow you to use Word but with the benefit of not having to convert, which is where I think the problem may lie.

P.S. Scribus doesn't do Character Styles when importing, as yet. So if you have any of those in your Word document that could be causing an issue.

Antlab

Quote from: GarryP on August 21, 2013, 02:13:24 PM
Sounds odd. There have been other people on the forum having problems with importing text but none I could find where the text was being "deformed".

It sounds like some kind of "style corruption" thing but I'm not even sure what I mean by that. (Have you checked your Scribus styles to make sure none are "deformed"? It could be that a style is being applied mistakenly.)

As a possible workaround, does Word allow you to use ODTs "natively", i.e. create an ODT and Save, rather than create a DOC and then Save As ODT? Doing so would allow you to use Word but with the benefit of not having to convert, which is where I think the problem may lie.

P.S. Scribus doesn't do Character Styles when importing, as yet. So if you have any of those in your Word document that could be causing an issue.

Hi GarryP,
thanks for the answer.
Actually the issue seems odd also to me, but I am very new to Scribus, so I am still experimenting the various features.
To better explain what happens, I attach an image of the Scribus document.
In the first frame I imported the ODT file created directly with Word, without any DOC already existant. You can see the weird "deformation".
For the second frame I used a different path: I created a DOC from Word, imported it in LO, and then exported from LO the ODT. This time the styles are perfectly retained, apart the bullets (I know this is a known present limitation of Scribus).
So it definitely seems a question related to how Scribus interprets the ODT created by Word. Do usually people use LO or OO to retain in Scribus the styles of imported text?

Thanks.


[attachment deleted by admin]

GarryP

Actually... I have seen a similar problem before. Just looking at your screenshot brings back memories of something I think I saw on the forum a while back. Unfortunately I can't remember what the subject was and I can't do a search for the image in my head. I could also be totally mistaken.

I've done some simple tests myself using LibreOffice and OpenOffice - I don't have Word so I can't check that - and I seem to get varied results depending on which options I use on the import, but both seem to give the same results for the same options.

Using "Automatic" as the Importer, unchecking "Import Text Only" and unchecking "Merge Paragraph Styles" seems to work best but I guess it's dependant on the imported document.

My guess is that Word isn't creating the ODT file correctly as Microsoft doesn't really have much impetus to move people away from their own format. I.e. "Of course your ODT isn't working, you should have been using DOC instead!" etc. But that could just me being cynical.

Maybe someone else - who possibly has experience of the ODT file format - can help. I hope you get to the bottom of this.

P.S. I think - and I'm sure someone will shoot me down in flames if I'm just a tiny bit wrong - that OO and LO are, for all normal purposes, pretty much the same when it comes to creating the open standard document types. It's in both teams' interests to keep them totally compatible so they can try and "steal" customers away from the other by providing that compatibility. But, again, that could just be me being cynical.

Antlab

Yes, probably Word implementation of ODT introduces some strange code that is not well absorbed by Scribus.
At present it seems that I am obliged to use LO, or OO, at least for saving in ODT. I don't have particular preferences between the two, and sincerely I did not follow all the forking issues in the past.
Thanks for the help.