When I put some text into a cell that includes a URL, the text in the cell becomes silver-gray, it will not wrap, it becomes very difficult to edit or copy.
It's like the URL just cannot be properly handled.
I would add that I do NOT want it to act as a link. In fact I would normally want to disable hyperlinks entirely. The "feature" of trying to embed a hyperlink is a curse, probably inherited from Excel, where it is also a curse.
From OO Help:-
Turn off URL Recognition
1.Load a document of the type for which you want to modify the URL recognition.
If you want to modify the URL recognition for text documents, open a text document.
2.Choose Tools - AutoCorrect.
3.In the AutoCorrect dialog, select the Options tab.
4.If you unmark URL Recognition, words will no longer be automatically replaced with hyperlinks.
In OpenOffice.org Writer there are two check boxes in front of URL Recognition. The box in the first column is for later post-editing and the box in the second column is for AutoCorrect as you type.
It seems that once you do this, the setting is remembered.