Bug 166443 - LibreOffice Spreadsheet won't open due to fatal corruption
Summary: LibreOffice Spreadsheet won't open due to fatal corruption
Status: NEEDINFO
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: LibreOffice (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
6.1 all versions
Hardware: All Windows (All)
: medium normal
Assignee: Not Assigned
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2025-05-03 03:34 UTC by DW
Modified: 2025-06-16 22:48 UTC (History)
4 users (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


Attachments
Screen Shots of the error, and a screen shot of the Windows version (1.50 MB, application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.text)
2025-05-03 03:38 UTC, DW
Details
Good file (16.70 KB, application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.text)
2025-06-16 22:43 UTC, libreoffice
Details
Corrupt file (1.41 MB, application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.text)
2025-06-16 22:44 UTC, libreoffice
Details

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Description DW 2025-05-03 03:34:46 UTC
Description:
On rare occasions but it's happened around 8 times so far since I've been on LibreOffice, a spreadsheet I use everyday cannot be opened. I have screenshots of the error message. It says 
"Read Error. 
"Format error discovered in the file in sub-document content.xml at 2,4181533(row,col). 
This is very distressing because I lose so much work. I think it is a fatal bug in LibreOffice. This is the first time I'm reporting it. 
This is not a minor or normal severity as below. It is serious. 

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Close spreadsheet as normal and shut down computer at night.
2. Next morning I get the Read Error.
3. Cannot get into the speadsheet, it's impossible. I have to use a past saved one but I lose weeks of work. 

Actual Results:
It cannot be reproduced because it is a bug that occurs sporadically and not often. But it has happened at least 8 times since I started using LibreOffice which has been for about 5 years. 

Expected Results:
I couldn't get into the spreadsheet. Only the spreadsheet I was working on. all the other spreadsheets can be opened and read as normal. 


Reproducible: Sometimes


User Profile Reset: No

Additional Info:
Something is seriously wrong and I don't know what it is. It happened with a previous version of LibreOffice and it is happening with this one too which is a later version and quite recently installed. I didn't think it would happen on this later version. This is the first time it has done so, but it happened several times on the previous version. I don't think the version is the problem.
Comment 1 DW 2025-05-03 03:38:45 UTC
Created attachment 200635 [details]
Screen Shots of the error, and a screen shot of the Windows version

The attachment is a LibreOffice Writer file which shows 3 screenshots, 1 with the LibreOffice Version, 1 with the read error, and 1 with the Windows version images.
Comment 2 Mateusz Wlazłowski 2025-05-03 10:01:02 UTC
Could you provide us the document for us to reproduce ? Remove all sensitive data from the data

Thanks
Comment 3 Julien Nabet 2025-05-03 10:09:41 UTC
DW: An ods file is in fact a zip file with a specific structure.

Here is what you can do:
1) make a copy of your file
2) rename your file to have the zip extension instead of ods
3) unzip your file
4) you can investigate in content.xml


Also, what LO version do you use? 6.1 is an old one, last one are 24.8.6 or brand new 25.2.2

Mateusz: I don't think the reporter can sanitize his file since he can't even open it.

DW: you can attach your file to the bugtracker but you must know that it means it'll be publicly available.
Comment 4 Mateusz Wlazłowski 2025-05-03 10:58:53 UTC
Right, DW you can try using another software to sanitize the file, such as onlyoffice
Comment 5 libreoffice 2025-06-16 22:43:56 UTC
Created attachment 201318 [details]
Good file
Comment 6 libreoffice 2025-06-16 22:44:31 UTC
Created attachment 201319 [details]
Corrupt file
Comment 7 libreoffice 2025-06-16 22:48:18 UTC
I have had a similar problem going back many years, except with Writer.  Once in a while I will open a file in writer and discover that it has been overwritten with a couple megabytes of gibberish.  The files are accessed from a USB drive on Windows and MacOS.  It happens with doc and odt files, with or without images, with or without links.  It happened again recently and I ran across this report.  I'm including 2 files, one is corrupted, the other is the previously not corrupted version.