Struggle to install LibreOffice on the PinePhone

[Peter Gamma]

So, the magical code to run LibreOffice in Posh on the PinePhone seems to be:

OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome-wayland libreoffice

I reeinstalled Posh, after I had and Ubuntu Toch on the Phone, and failed to install LibreOffice with Libertine, as I described above, and then stuck at the same step as above. I tried to type the magical line:

OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome-wayland libreoffice

I have connected a PinePhone keyboard to the phone, which works. But I cannot print a «_». It is on the keyboard, but neither control, Fn, Alt, AltG nor the special Pine key works to get the sign.

Also, there is no software keyboard there to type the magical line.

How can I type:

OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome-wayland libreoffice

on Posh, if LibreOffice seems to prevent the start of the GUI ?

[Peter Gamma]

I made another trial to find a way to type the magic line to start Libreoffice.

After I could not start the GUI after the LibreOffice installation, I reinstalled Posh.

Then I paired an Elecom Cap Clip Bluetooth mouse:

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?...ight=mouse

which worked fine.

Then I installed this Bluetooth keyboard which trackpad:

https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?...t=keyboard

I was able to connect it. But only for a view seconds. Then it disconnected again. I tried several times. The same thing happened.

I tried the different PostmarketOS distros of the Multiboot SD card. There was at least one distro on which I could connect a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse without any troubles, I don t remember which distro it was.

Is there a way to make the Bluetooth keyboard stable on Posh? Update a Bluetooth driver or a similar option .

[Peter Gamma]

Quote wibble:

«If phosh used to be detected as gnome it may have 'just worked' in the past»

Martijn Braam has two Youtube videos with demos of a running LibreOffice. There are also Youtube videos, in which Martijn Braam demonstrates gnome running on the PinePhone. The vides of Martijn are 1-2 years old.

Unfortunately, I cannot find a gnome image for the PinePhone:

https://images.postmarketos.org/bpo/v21....pinephone/

Where can I find a gnome image for the PinePhone ?

[wibble]

I don't know if there any you can just download. You may find installation instructions though, like:
https://wiki.mobian.org/doku.php?id=desk...nome-shell

[Peter Gamma]

Thanks for your answer, Wibble. I am looking for the easiest way to start LibreOffice on the PinePhone, even if the easiest way is a workaround.

You said, on mobian, you also managed to run LibreOffice, which is great.

You said:

«If I ssh in with X forwarding I can start libreoffice with everything appearing on my desktop, so it can run».

How can I ssh in with X forwarding on mobian to start libreoffice so it can run LibreOffice on my PinePhone?

[Peter Gamma]

There is another chance for LibreOffice on the PinePhone, which works right away:

Matthew Higgins showed a demo of LibreOffice running on Fedora on the PinePhone on Youtube (one year ago).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2ZyZo1r5KY&t=326s

Unfortunately Matthew has no time for PinePhone app developement until the end of his PhD thesis, as he told me on his Youtube channel. Therefore I ask my question here:

According to the PinePhone Software Releases:

https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/PinePhone_S...ses#Fedora

in the PinePhone wiki, it should be possible to download flashable Fedora images from here:

https://github.com/nikhiljha/pp-fedora-sdsetup/releases

But at this location I can only find PinePhone Pro flashable Fedora images, but not PinePhone standard edition images:

fedora-ppp.img.zst

Is there also a Fedora image available for the Pinephone standard edition?

[Peter Gamma]

I suppose the easiest solution to be able to start LibreOffice on a PinePhone is for instance to install PostmarketOS with phos, install LibreOffice, after restart, find an option to type:

OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome-wayland libreoffice

Then, LibreOffice should start. Unfortunately, I failed to this date to execute LibreOffice. Developers wanted.

[wibble]

Thanks for your answer, Wibble. I am looking for the easiest way to start LibreOffice on the PinePhone, even if the easiest way is a workaround.

You said, on mobian, you also managed to run LibreOffice, which is great.

You said:

«If I ssh in with X forwarding I can start libreoffice with everything appearing on my desktop, so it can run».

How can I ssh in with X forwarding on mobian to start libreoffice so it can run LibreOffice on my PinePhone?

Use the -X switch when you ssh into the pinephone from the desktop:
ssh -X mobian@pinephone_name_or_address

This will forward the display to the desktop for applications using X but not those using native Wayland. If you want to launch it with the display on the phone, and to keep running after you disconnect from ssh, you don't want the -X. Instead in the ssh session you would run:
DISPLAY=:0 OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome-wayland libreoffice &

You can also modify the .desktop files for whichever libreoffice component you want to set the environment. It's probably best to copy them from /usr/share/applications/libreoffice-whatever.desktop to ~/.local/applications/ and edit the copies rather than editing the system ones. When editing you need to find the Exec lines and add the necessary environment at the start, so for example:
Exec=libreoffice --writer %U
becomes:
Exec=env OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome-wayland libreoffice --writer %U

When testing this I accidentally hit the icon for one that I hadn't edited, and it still launched properly on the phone, so it seems an update has fixed this issue, and that libreoffice now 'Just Works' on mobian. I'll leave the above for reference in case it breaks again.

[Peter Gamma]

Thank you very much for your help and for sharing your experience, Wibble.

I started also a thread in the LibreOffice forum about the PinePhone and LibreOffice:

https://ask.libreoffice.org/t/how-to-ins...hone/78115

I did not test to install LibreOffice on Mobian as you did. I reinstalled the following posh image:

pine64-pinephone-20210810-phosh-keyboard.img

but I experienced the same failure as described above. Then I installed the following postmarkedOS image, it is only two days old:

20220601-0442-postmarketOS-v21.12-phosh-17-pine64-pinephone-installer.img

I don t know how I came across the first image, but I thought it should work with the PinePhone keyboard I already have.

I was asked to set a password during installation. After the reboot I was asked for the passkey, 147147 did not work, there is no option to type in a password.

Reinstallation required. The second time I choose only a passcode, and it worked.

Also the installation of LibreOffice worked, and the phone was rebootable .


After a first short test I can say:


- the Pinephone keyboard works with LibreOffice


- unfortunately, the keyboard has no arrow down keys for the menus, but they can be accessed by shortcuts


- then I tried to install a Bluetooth mouse


- my Polar OH1 heart rate sensor as well as my Stryd running foot pod where discovered immediately, but the Elecom Cap Clip mouse only after 5 more minutes, but then it worked.


- I tried the last time also to install a Bluetooth keybord, which was not stable when I used the first mentioned installation image. This time I didn t. But since I have the PinePhone keyboard it is not necessary.


- The Menus are large for the phone screen, but with the mouse it worked to use those during a first test. I was at least able to save a file .

[Peter Gamma]

I am new to Linux, but I am experienced in using Android phones with Office applications with keyboard and mouse, and I use such a setup for many years.

I now installed LibreOffice with the aid of the Pine64 community on a PinePhone with PostmarketOS. Thanks for your support.

I made first tests with LibreOffice on a PinePhone with PostmarketOS. I had issues, especially how to use it with a keyboard and a mouse.

I wrote a list of issues which I experienced, and some proposuals, who they could be resolved on my personal website:

https://petergamma.org/libreoffice-on-a-...os-issues/