Implement Cross-Platform PDF Generation without MS Word dependency

[abhijit9040]

Key Changes
PDF Conversion Engine:-

• Prioritized LibreOffice (headless mode) for PDF generation across all platforms.
• Added automatic detection of LibreOffice on Windows, including the default installation path when it is not available in PATH.
• Implemented a temporary user profile using -env:UserInstallation to:
• Prevent file locking
• Enable parallel and reliable PDF conversions
• Improve stability in CI/CD and Docker environments

Template Migration:-

• Replaced .docx guide templates with .odt (OpenDocument Text) to ensure consistent, pixel-accurate PDF output via LibreOffice.
• Updated scripts/convert.py to prioritize .odt templates for the guide layout.
• Enhanced XML Processing
• Refactored replace_text_in_xml_file to robustly support:
• ODT internal XML (content.xml, styles.xml)
• Existing IDML XML structures
• Optimized replacement logic by sorting keys from longest to shortest, preventing partial placeholder corruption during substitution.

Script Robustness:-

• Moved Microsoft Word–dependent imports (docx, docx2pdf) into targeted functions, allowing:
• The script to run without these libraries when LibreOffice is available
• Cleaner execution in Linux, Docker, and CI environments
• Improved metadata extraction and language file matching to better handle:
• Legacy naming conventions
• Edge cases such as against-security editions
• Variations in language code formats

Cleanup and Performance:-

• Automated cleanup of intermediate .odt files after successful PDF generation.
• Added more granular debug-level logging to improve observability and troubleshooting of the conversion pipeline.

Issue:-#2110 – Implement Cross-Platform PDF Generation without MS Word dependency

[sydseter]

Have a look at my comments. Thank you for your efforts!

[sydseter]

Remember to make sure you run the tests before pushing your commits.

[sydseter]

nc

[abhijit9040]

Hi @sydseter , Please review my PR and let me know if any further changes are needed.

[sydseter]

I will need some time to test it out. I'll get back to you.

[sydseter]

This works quite well. It would be great if we also could do a couple of the following things:
Could we document the installation for Libreoffice: here? https://github.com/owasp/cornucopia/blob/master/scripts/README.md

• Windows: winget install -e --id TheDocumentFoundation.LibreOffice
• Mac OS X: ?
• Ubuntu: ?

[abhijit9040]

Yes, that makes sense. I’ll add LibreOffice installation instructions to scripts/README.md

[abhijit9040]

Hi @sydseter , Take a final look ,I have updated LibreOffice installation instructions . Let me know if any further changes are needed.

[sydseter]

@abhijit9040 some of your commits aren’t signed. Could you do a git reset and recommit using git commit signing?

[abhijit9040]

The conflicts are due to recent upstream changes . I’ll push an update shortly.