Got a Mac and a curious mind? Build your own Collabora Office and see the magic happen.
Build Collabora Office
This is the Collabora Office macOS desktop app (macos/).
Requirements
- Node.js — needed for building the JavaScript parts in
browser/. Install Node.js (20.x) by downloading the macOS.pkgfrom thePrebuilt installertab at https://nodejs.org/en/download. It provides thenpmandnodecommands. - libtool — for
./configure:brew install libtool - The Python helpers used by the build:
/opt/homebrew/bin/pip3 install --break-system-packages lxml /opt/homebrew/bin/pip3 install --break-system-packages polib - The Command Line Tools for Xcode:
xcode-select --install- Afterwards you might need to update them in System Settings > General > Software Update.
Clone the monorepo
All the source code now lives in a single Gerrit monorepo; the former Collabora Office core is the engine/ subdirectory of the online repo, so there is no separate repository to clone any more. Code review happens on Gerrit, not GitHub pull requests; see the first contribution guide for the full workflow.
For an anonymous read-only clone:
git clone https://gerrit.collaboraoffice.com/online collabora-office
cd collabora-office
If you have a Gerrit account and plan to push changes for review, clone over SSH instead:
git clone ssh://YOUR_USERNAME@gerrit.collaboraoffice.com:29418/online collabora-office
cd collabora-office
Build the engine
Move into the engine/ subdirectory of the monorepo and build the main branch with the following autogen.input.
If you want a localized (translated) user interface, also clone the translations repository into engine/translations from the top of the clone before building, and replace --without-lang with --with-lang (see the autogen.input below); the engine picks up the .po files from there:
git clone https://gerrit.collaboraoffice.com/translations engine/translations
autogen.input:
# Distro
--with-distro=CPMacOS-LOKit
--disable-mergelibs
# Overrides for the debug builds
--enable-debug
#--enable-dbgutil
--enable-werror
--enable-symbols
# For an en-US-only build (no localizations):
--without-lang
# For a localized UI, drop the line above and list the languages instead, e.g.:
#--with-lang=de fr es
For dependency installation, refer to https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/BuildingOnLinux
Build Collabora Office
Configure
Run this from the top of the monorepo (one level up from engine/):
./autogen.sh && ./configure \
--enable-macosapp \
--enable-experimental \
--with-app-name="Collabora Office" \
--with-app-package-name=com.yourpackage.name \
--with-vendor="Your Name" \
--with-lo-path=engine/instdir/your-built-lo.app
POCO, zstd and libpng are built as part of the engine and taken from its workdir, so they no longer need to be installed (via Homebrew or otherwise) or passed on the configure line.
Adjust your-built-lo.app to match the app bundle name produced by your engine
build.
Build the JavaScript bits
Just run make from the terminal.
Build the Desktop Edition
Open the macos/coda/coda.xcodeproj project in Xcode and choose Build and Run current scheme.
That’s it!
Pre-built download
If you just want a pre-built macOS version instead of building locally, please use the TestFlight preview build: 👉 https://testflight.apple.com/join/sbkwMzMt

