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  LibreOffice 26.8 and the languages for which nobody is paid The most significant new features in LibreOffice 26.8 concern writing systems, and it is worth explaining what has been done and, above all, why it has been done, as there is an important decision behind the developers’ work. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/09/15/lo-268-and-the-languages/ #libreoffice

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  A small clarification, before the echo settles https://italovignoli.substack.com/p/a-small-clarification-before-the?r=1va4e #odf #eurooffice

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  Euro-Office, open standards, and native ODF A welcome commitment to open standards — and why it should end with ODF as Euro-Office’s native document format. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/06/11/euro-office-open-standards-and-native-odf/

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  We proudly belong to the 0.01% who consciously choose free operating systems and software that are not only convenient, but also much safer. We refuse to delegate governance of our digital environment to others. This is despite comments from people who point out that 99.99% of the world’s population choose the convenience of Microsoft’s handcuffs over the joy of the daily discovery of digital freedom. https://italovignoli.substack.com/p/the-irony-of-9999

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  The Document Foundation: the name that pointed at the right thing, 16 years before https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/06/19/tdf-the-name/ @tdforg @libreoffice

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  The invisible architecture of lock-in: the layering of dependencies A sophisticated mechanism by which proprietary technology ecosystems maintain their grip on users and institutions, even when those users and institutions believe they are making free choices, using open standards, and building independent digital infrastructure. It does not work through force, but through a subtler and more durable strategy: the layering of dependencies. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/06/30/the-i...

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  Waiting for Windows 10 On the metaphysics of an ending that keeps being rescheduled. https://italovignoli.substack.com/p/waiting-for-windows-10

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  The non technical dependency layers: the Calendar and the Invoice A vendor’s calendar will always move. A vendor’s prices will always rise. These are not scandals, they are simply what it means to be governed by someone else’s strategy. The only question that matters is whether you are free to walk away when they do. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/03/the-calendar-and-the-invoice/ @libreoffice @odf @tdforg

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  What We Owe Each Other, in Millimetres and Volts A standard is a public agreement about how things should fit together. Two words in that sentence carry the weight: public and agreement. Public, because the rules are written down and anyone can read them. Agreement, because nobody imposes them alone; they are negotiated between parties who accept that the shared space is more valuable than any individual advantage within it. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/10/what-we-owe-each-ot...

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  How proprietary formats have become Microsoft’s main tool for lock-in https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/17/microsofts-main-tool-for-lock-in/ #libreoffice #tdforg #odf

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  LibreOffice State of the Project (July 2025 – June 2026) Quarterly updated State of the Project Slide Deck, based on data from July 1st, 2025, to June 30, 2026. 309 developers worked on the source code, adding 11.464 new commits (Git): 238 volunteer developers (77%) provided 2.028 commits (18%); 11 developers from The Document Foundation (4%) provided 4.501 commits (39%), and 60 developers from 8 ecosystem companies (19%) provided 4.935 commits (47%). https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/...

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  Join the LibreOffice team as a Marketing and Communication Professional (full-time, remote, m/f/d) https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/23/join-the-libreoffice-team-as-a-marketing-and-communication-professional-full-time-remote-m-f-d/ #libreoffice #tdforg

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  LibreOffice 26.2.5 is available for download Berlin, 23 July 2026 – The Document Foundation today announced the release of LibreOffice 26.2.5, the fifth maintenance update to the LibreOffice 26.2 branch. Building on the major feature release published on February 4, 2026, this update delivers targeted bug fixes and stability improvements contributed by a global community of developers and QA engineers. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/24/libreoffice-26-2-5/ #libreoffice #tdfor...

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  LibreOffice, yours for a lifetime On 13 October 2026, Microsoft ends support for Office 2021. No more security updates, no more fixes, no more assurances. LibreOffice has no end-of-support date, because there is no vendor with the power to declare one. When a release cycle closes, the next one is already available, free, to everyone — not to those who renewed. Support ends on a date someone else chooses. Ownership does not end at all. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/29/libre...

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  What is Digital Sovereignty Digital sovereignty is not about owning everything, it is about ensuring that nothing essential can be taken away. That single line settles more arguments than it first appears to, because it disqualifies the two positions that dominate the debate. One side imagines sovereignty as control. The other imagines it as choice. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/07/28/what-is-digital-sovereignty/ #Community #OpenDocumentFormat #Standards

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  I have launched a personal Substack, this is the intro: https://open.substack.com/pub/italovignoli/p/why-foss-mumblings This will allow me to provide comments which are unambiguously mine, and given that I am 72 and grumpy it will be fun for many and less fun for others, but that's life @libreoffice @floss @odf @tdforg

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  When Twenty Six Votes Said Everything but Were Heard as Nothing https://open.substack.com/pub/italovignoli/p/when-twenty-six-votes-said-everything?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=1va4e #libreoffice #tdforg #foss #meritocracy

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  A TURNING POINT On Sunday 19 April, at around 9 pm, a blood clot broke away from the popliteal artery behind my ailing left knee and travelled up to the pulmonary artery, where it lodged between the left and right pulmonary arteries, causing a pulmonary embolism. https://italovignoli.substack.com/p/a-turning-point

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  Twenty Years On, ODF Is Still the Only Open Standard for Office Documents, and the Only One Governments Can Trust Twenty years ago, the Open Document Format cleared its Draft International Standard ballot at ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 34 with unanimous approval. Two decades later, ODF remains what it was on the day of its ratification: the only open, vendor-neutral, freely implementable international standard for office documents in existence. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/05/08/twenty-y...

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  The Document Foundation announces LibreOffice 25.8.7 2026-05-12Italo Vignoli The Document Foundation announces the release of LibreOffice 25.8.7, the final maintenance release of the LibreOffice 25.8 family, available for download at https://www.libreoffice.org/download [1]. Users of LibreOffice 25.8.x should update to LibreOffice 26.2.x as LibreOffice 25.8.x end of life will be on June 12, and after that date the software will not receive additional security updates. @libreoffice #libreoffice

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  Why a digital document is a piece of software, and what that means for your freedom Most people think of a digital document the way they think of a sheet of paper: an object that holds words and pictures, indifferent to the tool used to open it. This intuition is wrong, and the consequences shape everything from vendor lock-in to cybersecurity to the long-term readability of public records. A digital document is a piece of software. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/05/13/digital-...

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  The Disproportion Test: a Reflection on Instrumental Criticisms of Advocacy https://open.substack.com/pub/italovignoli/p/the-disproportion-test-a-reflection?r=1va4e&showWelcomeOnShare=true

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  There is no digital sovereignty without ODF Any other choice is a choice of dependence on a single vendor Digital sovereignty begins with the document format. Everything else – server location, hosting jurisdiction, procurement clauses – is downstream of this single decision. If the format is standard and open, the user controls the document. If the format is proprietary the vendor controls it, even when the file sits on the user’s own hard drive. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026...

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  Thank you, on behalf of ODF To the funders, the members of the technical committee and the users: what is happening today is a belated public recognition of the work you have carried out in silence, supporting ODF for twenty years. You are the vanguard that has proven the validity of a concept, and that has made it possible for those politicians who realised that your example was the one to follow to make their case. All of this deserves recognition. Thank you. https://blog.documentfoundatio...

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  https://www.linkedin.com/posts/sjvn1_on-earth-or-in-space-outlook-stays-the-same-share-7448409539693023233-yZHW?utm_source=social_share_send&utm_medium=android_app&rcm=ACoAAAAL5TUBPimzP87lU161XjFkfpKPNGUp1KM&utm_campaign=share_via Outlook is the worst piece of software ever written by a living amount of human cells (would not call the author of such a disgusting amount of bits a human being)

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  A Commit Named After a Conversation My Way of Being a Good Enough Ancestor https://open.substack.com/pub/italovignoli/p/a-commit-named-after-a-conversation?r=1va4e&showWelcomeOnShare=true #italovignoli #audreytang #taiwan #libreoffice #ods #ethercalc #goodenoughancestor

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  LibreOffice State of the Project (April 2025 – March 2026) We are releasing the updated State of the Project Slide Deck, based on data extracted from the LibreOffice dashboard and the Matomo repository. We have started to publish these slide decks in January 2026, to provide a transparent overview about the progress of the project through some of the most significant measures of development, downloads and donations data collected by the marketing team at TDF. https://blog.documentfoundation.org/...

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  A long blog post to explain the artificial complexity of XLSX files, as compared to ODS files: https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2025/09/27/the-artificial-complexity-of-ooxml-files-the-xlsx-case/ @opendocument @LibreOffice

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  LibreOffice turns 15: happy anniversary! https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2025/09/28/libreoffice-turns-15/

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  LibreOffice 25.8.2, the second minor release of the free, volunteer-supported office suite for personal productivity in office environments, is now available at https://www.libreoffice.org/download for Windows, MacOS and Linux. Read the blog post: https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2025/10/09/release-of-libreoffice-25-8-2/ @libreoffice