effect-libreoffice

A Effect-based wrapper for LibreOffice, providing multiple strategies for document conversion.

Implementations

This library offers two distinct implementations for interacting with LibreOffice:

1. LibreOfficeCmd (Default): Uses the soffice command-line tool directly.
2. UnoClient (Uno): Connects to a running unoserver instance.

Comparison

Feature	LibreOfficeCmd (Default)	UnoClient (Uno)
Method	Spawns a new process for each conversion	Connects to a long-running server
Performance	Slower (~440ms/file)	Fast (~60ms/file)
Setup	Requires LibreOffice installed locally	Requires unoserver
Best For	CLI tools, low volume, simple setup	Servers, high volume, performance critical

Usage

Default Implementation (CLI)

Best for quick scripts or when you can't run a unoserver.

import { NodeContext } from "@effect/platform-node";
import { Effect, Layer } from "effect";
import { LibreOffice } from "effect-libreoffice";

const program = Effect.gen(function* () {
  const libre = yield* LibreOffice;
  yield* libre.convertLocalFile("input.docx", "output.pdf");
});

const Layers = LibreOffice.Default.pipe(Layer.provide(NodeContext.layer));

program.pipe(Effect.provide(Layers), Effect.runPromise);

Uno Implementation (Start Server)

Best for servers, has a lot better performance. This starts a unoserver for you. You will need to have unoserver binary installed and available in your PATH.

import { NodeContext, NodeHttpClient } from "@effect/platform-node";
import { Effect, Layer } from "effect";
import { LibreOffice, UnoServer } from "effect-libreoffice";

const program = Effect.gen(function* () {
  const libre = yield* LibreOffice;
  yield* libre.convertLocalFile("input.docx", "output.pdf");
});

const Layers = LibreOffice.Uno.pipe(
  Layer.provide(UnoServer.Default), // This will start a unoserver
  Layer.provide(NodeContext.layer),
  Layer.provide(NodeHttpClient.layer)
);

program.pipe(Effect.provide(Layers), Effect.runPromise);

Uno Implementation (Remote)

If you want to manage the unoserver yourself, you can use the remote implementation of Uno.

# compose.yml
services:
  unoserver:
    image: libreofficedocker/libreoffice-unoserver:3.22
    ports:
      - "2003:2003"
    volumes:
      - /tmp:/tmp # some shared directory where files can be written and read

import { NodeHttpClient } from "@effect/platform-node";
import { Effect, Layer } from "effect";
import { LibreOffice, UnoServer } from "effect-libreoffice";

const program = Effect.gen(function* () {
  const libre = yield* LibreOffice;
  yield* libre.convertLocalFile("input.docx", "output.pdf");
});

const UnoLayers = LibreOffice.Uno.pipe(
  Layer.provide(NodeHttpClient.layerUndici),
  Layer.provide(UnoServer.Remote) // Defaults to localhost:2003
  // or: Layer.provide(UnoServer.remoteWithURL("http://localhost:1111/custom/RPC2"))
);

program.pipe(Effect.provide(UnoLayers), Effect.runPromise);