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I've basically settled into Unity, but one constant that is kind of giving me agita is that in LibreOffice Calc (and Writer) ctrl-f does nothing. I can go to edit > find ... and the edit menu even suggests ctrl-f as a keyboard shortcut, but actually typing it doesn't do anything. ctrl-alt-f works fine. The only thing that doesn't work is ctrl-f. I had a really hard time getting settled with Unity (mostly trying to get my old Gnome-do and Compiz settings back) so I spent a lot of time monkeying with the Compiz Settings Manager. But I can't figure out where I would have unset/ overrode this. Plus, it isn't like ctrl-f does something unexpected. It just does nothing.

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  • I also have this same problem, having come from OpenOffice (on Ubuntu and Windows). This is a 'feature', that I consider to be an annoying 'bug'. Some users clearly agitated for it. I'll see if there is a simple fix ..
    – david6
    Nov 22, 2011 at 2:40
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    This is clearly a bug which I reproduced as well. The Edit drop menu clearly indicates <Ctrl>F initiates Find.
    – fragos
    Nov 22, 2011 at 9:21

4 Answers 4

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You need to re-map the Ctrl-F keyboard action to 'Find & Replace'.

NOTE: The dialog box (Tools >> Customize >> Keyboard) is hard to use, and I was unable to find the existing 'quick find' that is currently mapped to Ctrl-F.

After several attempts, I was able to map:

  • Shortcut keys: Ctrl-F - to - Category: 'Edit', Function: 'Find & Replace'
  • Shortcut keys: F3 - to - Category: 'Edit', Function: 'Repeat Search'
  • Shortcut keys: Ctrl-Shift-F - to - ( left blank )

( This clearly needs work, by the LibreOffice maintainers. )

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  • 1
    Ctrl-F does appear to be mapped to "Find" in the keyboard, but as @geoffrey noticed, it pops you to a find box in the toolbar that may or may not be visible
    – Amanda
    Nov 22, 2011 at 23:20
  • The issue (as it affects me) is that 'Ctrl-F' does NOT open the Find & Replace dialog box. As a long term MS Office/OpenOffice user, that is what I expect when my fingers hit 'Ctrl-F'. The simple "find next" function is not as helpful ..
    – david6
    Nov 23, 2011 at 0:40
  • I voted this up, but let me say something in defense of LO. I like two things about the search toolbar: 1) it does not get in the way of text when you search (with the f&r box, sometimes the search term is hidden behind the box, or the box jumps all over the screen), 2) it's easy to search quickly both up and down (with the F&R box, you tick a box to search backwards, and sometimes you forget that box is ticked). I tend to use the simple 'search' function much more than find&replace, so I prefer the unobtrusive toolbar. Only negative in my view is that it takes up so much space on the toolbar.
    – geoffrey
    Nov 23, 2011 at 7:10
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    Okay, but then don't make ctrl-f go nowhere if the search bar isn't visible.
    – Amanda
    Nov 24, 2011 at 1:53
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    +1 - The 'F3' shortcut for "Repeat Search" saved my day.
    – paercebal
    Aug 28, 2013 at 17:24
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Try this: go to View > Toolbars and check 'Find'. This adds a 'Find' dialog on the toolbar. When you click ctrl-f the cursor jumps to that toolbar, then enter the search term, and hit enter, or use the arrows to search up or down.

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  • I'm kind of incensed that this worked, but it did. Why? Why hide the find dialog?
    – Amanda
    Nov 22, 2011 at 23:20
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    I'm realizing that I'm still not happy, so remapping ctrl-f to find and replace. In calc, ctrl-f doesn't switch focus to the find box so I do 'ctrl-f' and type something and I replace content. Not good.
    – Amanda
    Nov 24, 2011 at 1:48
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Here I found a simple solution: after deleting $HOME/.libreoffice it worked again. Magic.

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  • That seems to solve a different problem. ctrl-f is mapped to the toolbar find by default now. If you want to re-map it, doing that explicitly seems like a cleaner fix than killing your whole LibreOffice settings directory.
    – Amanda
    Jan 9, 2012 at 20:31
  • I agree that deleting the settings is far from convenient. But the search window came back (and I don't see why a user should remap an existing key setting...). The mapping just didn't work, maybe my settings contained the disabling somehow? Anyway...
    – markusN
    Jan 13, 2012 at 8:44
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I don't seem to have enough karma right now to comment after geoffrey's answer.

However, this could help: first I detached ("undocked") the Find toolbar. This seem to prevent it from materializing docked but out of signt.

Then, I noticed that pressing CTRL+F once make the toolbar appear, but not focus it; pressing it a second time does focus it.

Granted, this is a bug and should be fixed; but in the meantime, this workaround proved quite useful.

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  • 1
    the solution above does work, buggy as it all is.
    – Amanda
    Apr 1, 2012 at 16:32

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