If you’re actually trying to install another version of OpenOffice or under a different version of RHEL, then click on the OpenOffice tag, as there may be an entry on that other version.

Because of a font-fallback problem with the combination of RHEL 6.0 and OpenOffice 3.2 or 3.3, I am considerably less happy with OpenOffice and more unhappy with Red Hat. But a fair number of the visits to this 'blog are by people looking to install OpenOffice on RHEL, so this entry updates my suggested procedure for installing OpenOffice 3.2.x under RHEL 6.x:

1. If you don't have a JRE installed, then install one. As I write, Sun is at update 23 (while OpenOffice is at update 22), but check with Sun for a more recent version when you are installing OpenOffice. (I suggest that one use jdk-6uxx-linux-xxx-rpm.bin or jre-6uxx-linux-xxx-rpm.bin, rather than jre-6uxx-linux-xxx.bin.) The remainder of these instructions assume that one has a JRE installed.

2. Remove any earlier installation of OpenOffice. As root, enter these three commands:

   rpm -qa | grep openoffice | xargs rpm -e --nodeps
rpm -qa | grep ooobasis | xargs rpm -e --nodeps
rpm -qa | grep fake-db | xargs rpm -e --nodeps

3. Unpack OOo_3.3.x_Linux_x86_install_wJRE_en-US.tar.gz or OOo_3.3.x_Linux_x86-64_install_wJRE_en-US.tar.gz (or the version appropriate to a devil-language, if you use one of those) to your filespace.

4. Go into resulting OOO33x_mxx_native_packed-x_en-US.xxxx/RPMS/ (or to the OOO33x_mxx_native_packed-x_xx-xx.xxxx/RPMS/ corresponding to your devil-tongue).

5. As root, run these three commands

   find . -maxdepth 1 -name "o*.rpm" | xargs rpm -U
rpm -U desktop-integration/openoffice.org*-redhat-menus-*.noarch.rpm
rpm -U userland/*.rpm

6. Tell OpenOffice which JRE to use:

   • Launch OpenOffice:

     /usr/bin/openoffice.org3

   • Select

     Tools | Options… | OpenOffice.org | Java | Use a Java runtime environment

   • Choose one of the environments that is then listed.
   • Click the OK button.
   • Shut-down OpenOffice. (The selection of JRE will be in effect upon next launch.)

Tags: CentOS, Linux, OpenOffice, Red Hat, redhat, RHEL

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