LibreOffice dialog speed

By filippo September 27, 2022 Uncategorized No Comments

Short version: do not use a default network printer.

LibreOffice is very slow opening UI dialogs, such as “Format”. I am using version 7.4.1.2 (x64) on Windows 7, but it was the same with many previous versions.

This is also reported by many others on the Internet. Someone suggested that clearing the user directory solves the issue, but this didn’t happen in my case.

Someone suggested that the issue is linked to the network being available or not, so I made some tests disabling the network on my PC.

Before doing anything, opening the “Format” dialog takes about 10 seconds.

After disabling the network, opening the “Format” dialog becomes very slow, taking 40 seconds. However, the second time I open the “Format” dialog it becomes very fast. Something has happened.

If I re-enable the network, the “Format” dialog opens again in about 10 seconds.

Somebody else on the Internet suggested that this is linked to the default printer being on the network, even if this was for an Ubuntu system. However this is exactly my configuration. I set the default printer to the local PDF writer, and the “Format” dialog becames very quick.

P.S. This seems to be a known issue, even if this bug is marked as “hangs opening some files” we have the comment: “Sometimes (not always) that action can freeze for 30 seconds before the Format cells dialog comes up. Again this won’t happen if my network printer is ONLINE only when it is OFFLINE.” The bug is almost 11 years old.

https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=42673

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