14 DAY TRIAL // The Document Foundation released today the LibreOffice 6.2 open-source and cross-platform office suite, a major release that introduces several new features and lots of improvements.
Six months in developmnt, the LibreOffice 6.2 office suite is now available for download and features a new user interface called NotebookBar, which is based on the MUFFIN concept and was previously an experimental feature. The NotebookBar UI is optional, not enabled by default, and comes in three different flavors, Tabbed, Grouped and Contextual.
"The Tabbed variant aims to provide a familiar interface for users coming from proprietary office suites and is supposed to be used primarily without the sidebar, while the Grouped one allows to access “first-level” functions with one click and “second-level” functions with a maximum of two clicks," said The Document Foundation.
Here's what's new in LibreOffice 6.2
Highlights of the LibreOffice 6.2 release include revamped Elementary and Karasa Jaga icon themes, better compatibility with Microsoft Office documents like charts and animations, document security features thanks to encryption and HMAC verification implementation, as well as faster filtering of indexed keywords and highlighting search terms.
The Writer now lets users copy spreadsheet data into tables rather then inserting them as objects. Calc now supports multivariate regression analysis via the regression tool and features a new REGEX function that lets you match text against regular expressions, and the analysis output now contains numerous statistical measures. Impress and Draw now lets users modify the motion path of animations by dragging the control points. Draw also received a Format Table submenu.
Last but not least, LibreOffice 6.2 makes the context menu more consistent across various components of the office suite, improves the performance of the change tracking, especially when dealing with large documents, and improved the cloud-based LibreOffice Online suite with a revamped on-screen keyboard, as well as a simplified and more responsive user interface for mobile devices.
LibreOffice 6.2 is the second point release in the LibreOffice 6.x series and will be supported until November 30, 2019, with no less than seven maintenance updates, the first one, LibreOffice 6.2.1, being scheduled for the end of the month. You can download LibreOffice 6.2 for GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows right now from our free software portal. Also today, The Document Foundation released LibreOffice 6.1.5.
