Introduction
Text Documents (Writer)
HTML Documents (Writer Web)
Spreadsheets (Calc)
Presentations (Impress)
Drawings (Draw)
Database Functionality (Base)
Formulae (Math)
Charts and Diagrams
Macros and Scripting
Office Installation
Common Help Topics
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Open

Opens a local or remote file, or imports one.

To access this command...

Choose File - Open.

Ctrl +O

On the Standard bar, click

Open File

Office uses the native file picker dialogue box of the window manager of your operating system for the Open command.

If the file that you want to open contains styles, special rules apply.

Display area

Displays the files and folders in the folder that you are in. To open a file, select the file, and then click Open.

To open more than one document at the same time, each in an own window, hold Ctrl while you click the files, and then click Open.

Modern system file dialogue boxes present many features for file handling. Most allow you to rename, delete, create files, sort list of files, display files and folders in icons, tree or list views, traverse the file system folder tree and much more. Use the mouse right button to get a list of commands on the selected files in the display area.

File name

Enter a file name or a path for the file.

The following features are available in the dialogue box:

  1. Office has an AutoComplete function which activates itself in some text and list boxes. For example, enter c:\a~/a into the URL field and the AutoComplete function displays the first file or first directory found on the C: drivein your home folder that starts with the letter "a".

  2. Use the Down Arrow key to scroll through the other files and directories. Use the Right Arrow key to also display an existing subdirectory in the URL field. Quick AutoComplete is available if you press the End key after entering part of the URL. Once you find the document or directory you want, press Enter.

Version

If there are multiple versions of the selected file, select the version that you want to open. You can save and organise multiple versions of a document by choosing File - Versions. The versions of a document are opened in read-only mode.

File type

Select the file type that you want to open, or select All Files (*) to display a list of all of the files in the folder.

Open

Opens the selected document(s).

Insert

If you opened the dialogue box by choosing Insert - Document, the Open button is labelled Insert. Inserts the selected file into the current document at the cursor position.

Read-only

Opens the file in read-only mode.

Play

Plays the selected sound file. Click again to stop playing the sound file.

Opening Documents With Templates

When you open a document created from a template, Office checks to see if the template has been modified since the document was last opened. If the template was changed, a dialogue box is shown where you can select which styles to apply to the document.

  • To apply the new styles from the template to the document, click Update Styles.
  • To retain the styles that are currently used in the document, click Keep Old Styles.

Office recognises templates located in any directory defined for Templates in Tools - Options - Office - Paths.

If a document was created using a template that cannot be found, a dialogue box is shown that asks you how to proceed next time the document is opened.

To break the link between the document and the missing template, click No, otherwise Office will look for the template the next time you open the document.

When you use File - Save As and select a template filter to save a template in a directory that is not specified in the Templates path, then the documents based on that template will not be checked.