wb$open() failing to open libreoffice (not openxlsx2 error)

[J-Moravec]

tl,dr: system2("soffice") cannot find libre office libraries, but soffice works from terminal.

Freshly reinstalled openxlsx2, libreoffice works from terminal with both soffice and libreoffice (Ubuntu 22.04 LTS "Jammy")

When trying to run an openxlsx2 example with wb$open(), it fails with:

wb = wb_workbook()
wb$open()

# /usr/lib/libreoffice/program/javaldx: error while loading shared libraries: libreglo.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
# Warning: failed to read path from javaldx
# /usr/lib/libreoffice/program/soffice.bin: error while loading shared libraries: libreglo.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Since libreoffice works from the command line, this has to do something with running the binary from R,
since when drilling down, openxlsx2's wb$open() just runs system2("usr/bin/soffice") (in my case).
And running it this way reproduces the error:

system2("soffice")
# /usr/lib/libreoffice/program/javaldx: error while loading shared libraries: libreglo.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
# Warning: failed to read path from javaldx
# /usr/lib/libreoffice/program/soffice.bin: error while loading shared libraries: libreglo.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
# Warning message:
# In system2("/usr/bin/soffice") : error in running command

openxlsx2 and ubuntu version:

packageVersion("openxlsx2")
# 1.10

lsb_release -a
# Distributor ID:	Ubuntu
# Description:	Ubuntu 22.04.5 LTS
# Release:	22.04
# Codename:	jammy

Help is greatly appreciated.

[JanMarvin]

Hi @J-Moravec , I haven’t used a Debian based desktop Linux in ages, but it looks like whatever is found in /usr/bin/soffice is missing libreglo.so. But this should trigger an error if you run /usr/bin/soffice in the terminal. Maybe your system is missing libreglo-dev?

[JanMarvin]

Do you have another soffice installation as well? Maybe via flatpak or snap?

[JanMarvin]

Or maybe this is the issue: https://askubuntu.com/a/1495121

not sure how R handles environment variables like LD_LIBRARY_PATH

[J-Moravec]

See above, I can run libreoffice just fine, from GUI or command line. Both through soffice and libreoffice.

libreglo.so is present in its cozy place at /usr/lib/libreoffice/program/libreglo.so.

I can just save it and open it manually, so it is not that of a big deal, I just hoped that someone had a similar problem in past.

[JanMarvin]

See a similar issue with an older Ubuntu version: https://stackoverflow.com/a/42044762

In your R environment the shared library is not found. It should work if you run R in the console where you can open soffice. But the shared library is not found from wherever you tried to run R in the opening post. Maybe an issue with your ide or some misconfiguration. Either way, I move this to the discussion section as it’s not an openxlsx2 issue.

[J-Moravec]

Thanks. Couldn't find the Dirk's answer.

Yes, something was weird with the library linkage, but couldn't figure out what exactly.