F45 Change Proposal: LibreOffice html help (self-contained)

Project Discussion Change Proposals
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1

Provide LibreOffice help packages in HTML and noarch

This is a proposed Change for Fedora Linux.
This document represents a proposed Change. As part of the Changes process, proposals are publicly announced in order to receive community feedback. This proposal will only be implemented if approved by the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee.

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:link: Summary

This proposal aims to change how the LibreOffice package distribute its help files, from an embedded help system to html files which can be distributed as noarch packages.

:link: Owner

:link: Detailed Description

For historic reasons, we currently build and provide LibreOffice help as embedded within the program. From quite some time now, LO has the capability for a new help system based on HTML pages, which can be viewed from any web browser installed on system.

In this change, we want to switch to the new HTML help. This also enables us to switch from architecture dependent to noarch subpackages, thus saving a lot of space on repositories.

:link: Feedback

No negative feedback so far.

:link: Benefit to Fedora

Switching to HTML help / noarch subpackages can save a lot of space on repositories. User disk space is also happy with this, except for the default EN help packages, which shows a size increase. The following data compares help subpackage sizes for an x86_64 build (26.8.0.0.beta1). (comparison made by a python script, AI assisted by Claude)

Confronto dimensioni pacchetti help: arch-dependent vs noarch|Lingua|Dim. arch|Dim. noarch|Diff. %|
| — | — | — | — |
|ar|3.22 MB|2.67 MB|-17.1%|
|bg|3.95 MB|2.87 MB|-27.5%|
|bn|3.77 MB|2.80 MB|-25.8%|
|ca|3.84 MB|2.82 MB|-26.6%|
|cs|3.83 MB|2.80 MB|-26.9%|
|da|3.86 MB|2.79 MB|-27.7%|
|de|3.97 MB|2.84 MB|-28.6%|
|dz|3.95 MB|2.85 MB|-28.0%|
|el|4.68 MB|3.03 MB|-35.2%|
|en|3.22 MB|14.36 MB|+346.1%|
|en-GB|3.21 MB|2.67 MB|-16.7%|
|eo|3.55 MB|2.75 MB|-22.5%|
|es|3.86 MB|2.82 MB|-26.8%|
|et|3.78 MB|2.77 MB|-26.7%|
|eu|3.88 MB|2.78 MB|-28.3%|
|fi|3.77 MB|2.79 MB|-26.2%|
|fr|3.90 MB|2.80 MB|-28.3%|
|gl|3.72 MB|2.80 MB|-24.7%|
|gu|3.23 MB|2.73 MB|-15.4%|
|he|3.17 MB|2.61 MB|-17.8%|
|hi|3.37 MB|2.74 MB|-18.6%|
|hr|3.31 MB|2.73 MB|-17.4%|
|hu|3.99 MB|2.89 MB|-27.5%|
|id|3.61 MB|2.76 MB|-23.5%|
|it|3.88 MB|2.79 MB|-28.2%|
|ja|5.07 MB|3.06 MB|-39.6%|
|ka|3.40 MB|2.94 MB|-13.5%|
|ko|4.18 MB|2.80 MB|-33.1%|
|lt|3.86 MB|2.84 MB|-26.5%|
|lv|3.33 MB|2.73 MB|-18.1%|
|nb|3.80 MB|2.76 MB|-27.4%|
|nl|3.78 MB|2.80 MB|-25.8%|
|nn|3.78 MB|2.76 MB|-27.0%|
|pl|3.98 MB|2.84 MB|-28.7%|
|pt-BR|3.75 MB|2.78 MB|-25.8%|
|pt-PT|3.75 MB|2.80 MB|-25.2%|
|ro|3.22 MB|2.70 MB|-16.3%|
|ru|3.91 MB|2.90 MB|-25.9%|
|si|3.38 MB|2.79 MB|-17.7%|
|sk|3.70 MB|2.82 MB|-23.6%|
|sl|3.90 MB|2.79 MB|-28.4%|
|sv|3.70 MB|2.78 MB|-24.8%|
|ta|3.52 MB|2.91 MB|-17.4%|
|tr|3.91 MB|2.83 MB|-27.8%|
|uk|3.87 MB|2.89 MB|-25.2%|
|zh-Hans|5.02 MB|2.88 MB|-42.6%|
|zh-Hant|4.73 MB|2.90 MB|-38.7%|
|TOTALE|178.06 MB|143.56 MB|-19.4%|

The total space saved on repositories is much more greater, since we’ll have the noarch only without duplicating the arch packages for each architecture.

:link: Scope

  • Proposal owners:

Set LibreOffice configure script to produce help in HTML format and flag help subpackages as noarch.

  • Other developers:

Nothing.

Nothing.

  • Policies and guidelines: N/A (not needed for this Change)

No change.

  • Trademark approval: N/A (not needed for this Change)

N/A

  • Alignment with the Fedora Strategy:

:link: Upgrade/compatibility impact

Help subpackages will be switched to noarch on upgrade.

:link: Early Testing (Optional)

Do you require ‘QA Blueprint’ support? Y/N

:link: How To Test

Open LibreOffice help by F1 or by the help menu and observe a web browser is launched instead of the old help window.

:link: User Experience

:link: Dependencies

:link: Contingency Plan

  • Contingency mechanism: (What to do? Who will do it?) N/A (not a System Wide Change)
  • Contingency deadline: N/A (not a System Wide Change)
  • Blocks release? N/A (not a System Wide Change), Yes/No

:link: Documentation

N/A (not a System Wide Change)

:link: Release Notes

Last edited by @amoloney 2026-07-13T15:59:38Z

Last edited by @amoloney 2026-07-13T15:59:38Z

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How do you feel about the proposal as written?

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3

This change proposal has now been submitted to FESCo with ticket [#3651](Making sure you're not a bot!) for voting.

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4

This change has been accepted by FESCo for Fedora Linux 45. A full list of approved changes to date can be found on the [Change Set Page](Releases/45/ChangeSet - Fedora Project Wiki).

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