Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 23734
Captions disappear on exit and reload
Last modified: 2013-08-07 14:38:26 UTC
The problem only seems to occur after save, exit, and reload. The missing captions still exist and can be cross-referenced fine. They won't print or appear in page preview. Captions will sometimes reappear if there is a later illustration and caption added. But the later one will then disappear. I was at one point able to get them all back by adding an illustration and caption then exit/reload. But since then (after only editting text) the last caption is gone again. I was unable to recreate the problem starting from scratch and leaving all the various settings alone (numbering, formating, etc). I'll send an attachment that illustrates the problem. It is a trimmed down version of my original paper. Almost any further slight modifications to the file will cause the captions to reappear. Such as delete the ToC or change text in the headers.
Created attachment 12034 [details] Illustrates disappearing captions
HI->OD: Could not reproduce but maybe you can.
Created attachment 12283 [details] Example doc where captions disappeared
This problem might have something to do with a table of contents. I noticed that my captions disappeared after I updated the document's table of contents for the first time. My OS is Windows XP Home, SP1 on a Dell Inspiron 5150 using Open Office 1.1.0. As well, I have Writer set to save files in MSWord 97/2000/XP by default. I've converted the sample document to .sxw for your convenience.
I just spent a ridiculous amount of time re-captioning images. Ouch. Oddly enough, if I updated the TOC between adding a caption and saving the file, the captions didn't disappear on reload for me. Go figure.
I'm experiencing the same problem with captions on an embedded OLE object (diagrams) on windows XP. I'll add an attachment with the file. If you load the file, add a caption, and save it, when you reload it, the caption is gone.
Created attachment 28231 [details] File which when modified to add a caption and saved, reloads without a caption
Same problem with an OpenOffice Draw object and a caption. This time it's a .odt file on OpenOffice 2.0. I've noticed that after document reloading the captions are just hidden and they apper again when the user resizes the external borders.
Created attachment 32064 [details] Odt file with hidden caption.
Successfully reproduced in Windows XP SP2 (English) in OO 2.0 680m1 Build 8990. 1. Download the file WindowsCaptionProblem.sxw (posted by dcam) 2. Open file. 3. There should be no caption underneath the picture on Page 3. 4. Right click on the image and click on 'Caption...' 5. A dialog will popup. Insert any text in the field labeled 'Caption' and click 'OK' 6. Save file using Ctrl+S or File -> Save 7. Exit 8. Open file again. => No caption underneath picture on Page 3. You can try and insert other pictures (Insert -> Picture -> From File) and add captions in similar manner. If pictures are added and then the above steps from 6-8 are repeated, then only the last image seems to be missing the caption. "Last image" is the last image added, not the last image in the file. I could not reproduce the problem from scratch, even when I saved the file as .sxw instead of .odt. However, converting the version of the file posted by dcam to .odt still had the same problems. (even after I deleted the original picture and then added a few of my own.) The problem does not occur with captions added to Sound objects, Frames or Tables. Follow-up testing showed that copying and pasting the image missing the caption didn't bring back the caption. However, performing any one of the following actions would bring back the captions: - Previewing the Page (visible while previewing AND after you are done previewing) - Exporting to PDF or XHTML (visible in the exported file AND then in the file then onwards) - Toggling View -> Field Names or View -> Hidden Paragraphs would bring back the captions. - Switching to Web Layout (View -> Web Layout) (visible in web layout AND then when you go back to print layout) - Resizing the image (not the frame) to make it smaller and then resizing the frame to make it larger. After doing any of the above, usually the captions would remain in the file until you exited again. The re-appearance of the captions would not enable Save unless other changes were made in the file. In one case, after the captions appeared again because of the above actions, the caption on the last image disappeared again once the Table of Contents was deleted. This problem clearly is something to be addressed as it brings about unexpected behavior in the application. Any files that are shared amongst many people or even just opened again for reference would be missing actual content in the file; a functionality not working properly is another thing, but content "disappearing" is never acceptable. Moreover, the frustration that others had in adding the captions again, only to have them disappear shows that this bug could potentially cause a large amount of time and resources for many.
For what it's worth I can confirm this bug's occurence for OOo 2.0.1.
This defect is already fixed in coming OOo 2.0.2. The trick to reproduce the defect is: - create new Writer document. - insert some text (at least as much as you got two pages) - insert a graphic at the last paragraph - insert a caption to the graphic - save the document - important: the text frame containing the caption text has to be selected. - close the document - open the saved document - due to the fact that the document is open by its owner the last cursor position (selected text frame) is restored. This causes the caption text to be lost due to an layout error. The lost caption can also cause a crash. OD->MRU: Please verify and close this issue.
set status to WORKSFORME - reason: see above.
Closed.
Again, for what it's worth: Thank you very much for fixing this bug! ;-)