[Solved] LibreOffice installed from Debian repo looks atrocious and tiny, but looks normal when installed from deb files

[Enigma83]

OK, so, in the last few days I've reinstalled 12 Bookwork from the stable netinstall iso, and getting it configured for my needs. I chose a minimal install with standard system utils only. Followed by xorg, lxqt-core, and sddm as a login/display manager. Today I installed LibreOffice from the official repos via apt. As soon as I fired up Writer, the UI was just way too tiny to be usable. I could read it if I squinted, and even despite me having 20/5 vision, I knew it wouldnt be optimal for daily usage. No matter what settings I changed, I couldnt get the UI/toolbars/etc to be big enough for me to consider it acceptable. So I purged libreoffice with apt, then found this page:

https://wiki.debian.org/LibreOffice

Specifically, the section titled "using the project's own deb packages". I figured the Debian maintainers wouldnt even mention this as an alternate install approach, if it werent safe/would break the system/etc.

I then went to this page:

https://www.libreoffice.org/download/do ... lang=en-US

And downloaded the Linux 64 bit deb file, along with the Linux 64 bit deb offline help file. After unpacking them, it was just a simple "sudo apt install ./*.deb", first for the main program, then the offline help. After launching Writer again, I noticed everything was scaled appropriately, needing no obvious manual configuration changes by me. As is, it's usable "out of the box".

What could be the difference between the Debian repo version and the deb files version? Specifically relating to why one has horrible scaling and the other doesnt. I'd like to try the official repo version again, for update support, but with the UI being so small, it's just not usable as-is.

Edit: The LO version I used from the official website is v7.6.6.

[lindi]

There are many possibilities. In Debian upstream software is often split to multiple packages so that it is possible to take only the parts you need and avoid embedded code copies. However, this means you need to know what each of these packages do, or just install a sane default collection of packages instead of minimal.

If you have time you can run

Code: Select all

strace -o libreoffice.strace -s4095 -f libreoffice

And exit libreoffice as soon as you observe the problem. Then you can use

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grep " open" libreoffice.strace | cut -d " " -f 2 | sort -u > libreoffice.fileaccess.mimimal

To get all the files that libreoffice opens. Now repeat this with the default desktop where libreoffice works (not with upstream packages). Compare the filelists with

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meld libreoffice.fileaccess.minimal libreoffice.fileaccess.default

and use "dokg -S" to find out what packages provide the files that could not be opened in your minimal installation. Installing those most likely fixes your problem.

[Enigma83]

There are many possibilities. In Debian upstream software is often split to multiple packages so that it is possible to take only the parts you need and avoid embedded code copies. However, this means you need to know what each of these packages do, or just install a sane default collection of packages instead of minimal.

If you have time you can run

Code: Select all

strace -o libreoffice.strace -s4095 -f libreoffice

And exit libreoffice as soon as you observe the problem. Then you can use

Code: Select all

grep " open" libreoffice.strace | cut -d " " -f 2 | sort -u > libreoffice.fileaccess.mimimal

To get all the files that libreoffice opens. Now repeat this with the default desktop where libreoffice works (not with upstream packages). Compare the filelists with

Code: Select all

meld libreoffice.fileaccess.minimal libreoffice.fileaccess.default

and use "dokg -S" to find out what packages provide the files that could not be opened in your minimal installation. Installing those most likely fixes your problem.

I wouldnt consider what I did a minimal installation. The command I used when installing from the official repo was "sudo apt install libreoffice". No picking and choosing, I just assumed it would install every LO has on offer. I don't really care about how much space it would use, I have over 1.7TB free space, so it's not an issue for it to be install packages I wont explicitly use. I was just puzzled by the stark difference in UI scaling between the 2 install options.

Yes, I do have time, tomorrow, I'll uninstall the deb version and try what you've mentioned. The Debian LO wiki page does specifically mention possible scaling issues. I know LXQT uses the QT toolkit, I'm not sure if LO is GTK toolkit-based, or something else. I do have a few other programs that look "off", but it is OK enough that I'm not bothered much by it.

I actually don't have an issue with keeping the deb files installed version. It was installed by apt, so the files are "tracked" and "known" to apt's package install mechanism, even if not from the official repos. I think the only downside is, I would have to be vigilant when checking the LO website for new releases. Of course any future deb packages would have to be manually installed in the same way, I assume they wont be automatically updated along with the rest of the packages installed from the official repos. But just for the sake of learning/testing, I will try what you've said anyway.

[bbbhltz]

I have experienced this before as well.

apt install libreoffice will install the meta package (https://packages.debian.org/bookworm/libreoffice) and doesn't install the libreoffice-gtk(2|3) package or whatever UI enhancement you need. It also doesn't install interface translations.

[pwzhangzz]

I've reinstalled 12 Bookwork from the stable netinstall iso

Yes, the version of LibreOffice automatically installed from netinstall iso always has this menu-fonts-too-small problem. You can do a sudo apt purge libreoffice then reinstall it to (hopefully) fix it.

However, LibreOffice is a very much involved program, doing the above purge-then-reinstall steps may cause some other problems.

Since LibreOffice is the most critical app for our desktops, we always install Debian from the hybrid live iso:

https://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/cu ... so-hybrid/

and never from the netinstall iso. No such problem was experienced.

As I mentioned in a separate thread, we now always run LibreOffice from its appimage.

[Enigma83]

I've reinstalled 12 Bookwork from the stable netinstall iso

Yes, the version of LibreOffice automatically installed from netinstall iso always has this menu-fonts-too-small problem. You can do a sudo apt purge libreoffice then reinstall it to (hopefully) fix it.

However, LibreOffice is a very much involved program, doing the above purge-then-reinstall steps may cause some other problems.

Since LibreOffice is the most critical app for our desktops, we always install Debian from the hybrid live iso:

https://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/cu ... so-hybrid/

and never from the netinstall iso. No such problem was experienced.

As I mentioned in a separate thread, we now always run LibreOffice from its appimage.

Sorry, but you misread my first post. I said that I installed *ONLY* essential system utilities from the netinstall iso. No desktop environment, window manager, office suite, etc. Just the baseline system. My first boot was into a terminal, from there I installed lxqt-core, followed by other packages like libreoffice, after LXQT was set up. The netinstall iso has nothing to do with LibreOffice, in my case.

[pwzhangzz]

I don't know if LibreOffice can adequately run without a proper DE (as I mentioned even the default gnome install under netinstall iso wouldn't cut it). Also, although appimages are supposed to be distro-agnostic, I don't even know if the LibreOffice appimage will run under LXQT.

[Enigma83]

I don't know if LibreOffice can adequately run without a proper DE (as I mentioned even the default gnome install under netinstall iso wouldn't cut it). Also, although appimages are supposed to be distro-agnostic, I don't even know if the LibreOffice appimage will run under LXQT.

It probably would run, I've used other appimage programs with LXQT, they all ran fine. The whole point of an appimage/Flatpak/Snap is that they are supposed to already include everything that's required to run the software. Thereby making them agnostic by their nature. I was also able to run LibreOffice while using openbox as my "desktop environment", LO most certain doesn't require a proper DE.

[pwzhangzz]

Of course you can run LibreOffice 5.0 (?) or earlier without a proper DE. Gtk2 was all you need. This is a different era. I have been running LibreOffice and its progenitors since the StarOffice/StarSuite days (which were designed to be run in a text console, and Star Suite was designed for CJK languages).

[Enigma83]

Of course you can run LibreOffice 5.0 (?) or earlier without a proper DE. Gtk2 was all you need. This is a different era. I have been running LibreOffice and its progenitors since the StarOffice/StarSuite days (which were designed to be run in a text console, and Star Suite was designed for CJK languages).

The version I used with openbox was certainly newer than 5.0, this was less than 2 months ago. I'm not open to using an appimage for LO, and I already clarified that my LOs didn't come from the netinstall iso, so there's nothing more to discuss. I will try the advice suggested to me by lindi, if that doesn't sort it out then I'll just continue using the manual deb approach.

[pwzhangzz]

I am definitely not making any suggestions to you or anyone one way or another but just to make a point that LibreOffice has progressed a lot and for those of us whose livelihood depends on it, it involves quite a complicated dependency.

[Enigma83]

I am definitely not making any suggestions to you or anyone one way or another but just to make a point that LibreOffice has progressed a lot and for those of us whose livelihood depends on it, it involves quite a complicated dependency.

Perhaps your livelihood depends on it, I'm sure some organizations use LO too. But mine doesn't, for me it is purely for personal use, and not used on a day to day basis.

[fabien]

What @bbbhltz said:

apt install libreoffice will install the meta package (https://packages.debian.org/bookworm/libreoffice) and doesn't install the libreoffice-gtk(2|3) package or whatever UI enhancement you need.

Do you have libreoffice-gtk3 installed?
It is automatically installed only under specific conditions:

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$> apt --no-conflicts --no-breaks --no-replaces rdepends libreoffice-gtk3
libreoffice-gtk3
Reverse Depends:
  Recommends: task-xfce-desktop
  Recommends: task-mate-desktop
  Recommends: task-lxqt-desktop
  Recommends: task-lxde-desktop
  Recommends: libreoffice-gnome
  Recommends: liblibreofficekitgtk
  Depends: design-desktop
  Depends: parl-desktop

although it is necessary to achieve a good appearances.

[dlu2021]

Since you are running lxqt, there is also qt integration if you prefer as well:

libreoffice-qt5
libreoffice-qt6

[pbear]

... doesn't install the libreoffice-gtk(2|3) package or whatever UI enhancement you need. It also doesn't install interface translations.

Not something I would anticipate from a meta-package. Confirmed by apt show libreoffice, though, so a conscious decision, not an oversight.

[Enigma83]

Problem fixed, libreoffice-gtk3 was what corrected the appearance. Even though I'm using LXQT, which uses the QT toolkit, not GTK.

My most recent commands were (prepended by sudo, ofc):
apt install libreoffice
apt install libreoffice-help-en-us
apt install libreoffice-qt5
apt install libreoffice-gtk3

The hope now is that since I've already manually installed all of these myself from the Debian repo, future updates to these should "just work" and not break the appearance.

[fabien]

The hope now is that since I've already manually installed all of these myself from the Debian repo, future updates to these should "just work" and not break the appearance.

There's no reason for anything to break, at least I've never had a problem.
I'm glad you found a solution, don't forget to mark your topic as [Solved].

[Enigma83]

The hope now is that since I've already manually installed all of these myself from the Debian repo, future updates to these should "just work" and not break the appearance.

There's no reason for anything to break, at least I've never had a problem.
I'm glad you found a solution, don't forget to mark your topic as [Solved].

How to mark as solved? I dont see a button for it in the thread. I'm sure I've probably looked right over it and missed it. Or it's buried?

[FreewheelinFrank]

How to mark as solved? I dont see a button for it in the thread. I'm sure I've probably looked right over it and missed it. Or it's buried?

You have to edit your first post and add [Solved] to the title.

[pwzhangzz]

The libreoffice-gtk3 package is included in the debian-gnome-live iso:

ryzen@L32:~/Downloads$ cat debian-live-12.5.0-amd64-gnome.iso.packages | grep libreoffice-gtk3
libreoffice-gtk3 4:7.4.7-1+deb12u1

Live-built has been in Debian's DNA for quite some time now. I suppose when Debian developers build the live iso, it went through an additional level of testing under the real work environment, vis-a-vis the netinstall iso.