A Fileopen problem. In Kubuntu 15.04, the current release, right-clicking on any filetype defaulted to Writer while in the file manager (Dolphin) generates this message: "KDEInit could not launch 'ksystraycmd': Could not find 'ksystraycmd' executable". Other LibreOffice filetypes (e.g., spreadsheets) open properly in LibreOffice when right-clicked in the file manager. Workaround is to launch LibreOffice, navigate to the file, then open conventionally -- very inconvenient. This bug was reported to the Kubuntu community several weeks ago, but nothing has come of that, yet. Since this bug is highly inconvenient, it could cause users to abandon Writer and by extension all of LibreOffice. The right-click within the file manager worked correctly in the previous version of Kubuntu (14.10); I've tested it successfully also in a currently updated version of Kubuntu 14.04 LTS. Note that only Writer files (of any type: .odt, .doc, etc.) fail to open; others are fine.
More re a Fileopen problem. I tested this glitch on a laptop running the 32-bit version of Kubuntu 15.04. The right-click of a test .odt file (while in the file manager) launched Writer exactly as it should. So, it appears this glitch is only in the AMD64 version of the o/s.
You could try this trick in your 64-bit machine: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/User_Profile#Resolving_corruption_in_the_user_profile If that doesn't solve it, you could try with 5.0 beta http://www.libreoffice.org/download/pre-releases/ https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Installing_in_parallel/Linux Set to NEEDINFO. Change back to UNCONFIRMED, if the problem persists. Change to RESOLVED WORKSFORME, if the problem went away.
Beluga, thanks for the tips. I tried re-creating the user profile, without success. I hesitate to install a beta release, for fear that this might cause unintended effects re existing documents. It seems that I'll need to wait for 15.10, in hopes that this problem will be fixed then. It's very odd that the only version of 15.04 that exhibits this problem is the 64-bit one, and only with Writer. If I could drop to 14.04 LTS, I'd do that, but my understanding is that results could be unpredictable. By the way, I did copy ksystraycmd from a 14.04 install to the /usr/bin directory on my 15.04 (changing the owner and group to root). Also no effect.
This bug report can be closed. Due to an unrecoverable hardware error, I had to install Kubuntu 15.04 to a new hard drive, then migrate my files. The new install does not exhibit the launch problem with LibreOffice Writer, so apparently the cause was fixed in later patches (or my original install was simply corrupted). In any case, all is well.
Thanks, I'll set status to WFM.