Alas, not if the computer has an old version of Xubuntu -- it will have an old version of LO.
You *might* want to upgrade Xubuntu itself -- but you might not care
-- it doesn't really matter if you are using a slightly old version of LO. You can open a MS Office 2010 DOCX on a computer that has MS Office 2007 installed, right? Same goes with LO.
Besides, any version of Xubuntu will have an old version of LO, it is the sacrifice you pay for stability. Otherwise known as
FeatureFreeze, it means things that work, get left that way.
The latest shiny toys get saved for newer versions of Xubuntu which are receiving developer testing anyway.
Again -- it doesn't really matter which version of LO you have -- they are all relatively new, and the differences aren't that great
your documents will open on either version, and the new features are likely not things you are actually using.
If you truly desire the latest and greatest, you can of course install it manually as you tried. Just a couple things:
There is a README file (in the READMES folder) with helpful information. It has a section on installing to Debian- and Ubuntu- based linux systems. The relevant info is as follows:
(disclaimer: I am looking at the main, LO 4.4.2.2 download)
If you
really want, you can do it all using the terminal:
You already extracted the files, so we can skip that.
The only thing there appears to be a folder, so type "cd LibreOffice_4.2.3.3_Linux_x86_deb/DEBS/"
Don't use apt-get install, that is for the software center. Instead, use "sudo dpkg -i *.deb".
dpkg is for installing .deb files, apt-get is for installing program names ffrom the software center repositories.