Databases must be registered in the openoffice registry of user oomailing The easy way to do that is to lunch openoffice as oomailing: As root, set a password: host:~# passwd oomailing Then login with an X display: user@host:~$ ssh -X oomaling@localhost Lunch openoffice oomailing@host:~$ soffice If necessary, load sdbc-postgres driver, using Tools/Package Manager from the menu, then click on "Add" and select postgres-sdbc-0.7.5.zip that you've downloaded from http://dba.openoffice.org/drivers/postgresql/index.html On modern distro, you might prefer to install the package: host:~# apt-get install openoffice.org-sdbc-postgresql You need to restart openoffice after that. Also restart oomailing server: host:~# /etc/init.d/oomailing restart You might need to register databases. Launch openoffice again: oomailing@host:~$ oowriter Then choose Edit/Select Database from the menu. Here you can add a database, such as /var/www/guideogm/static/guideogm.odb