LibreOffice's 'no AI' stance meets LLM-assisted code
Core developers avoid AI coding assistants, while community contributors face disclosure and review rules
In a recent development, The Document Foundation (TDF), the primary maintainer of LibreOffice, has clarified its stance on the use of AI tools in the creation of its codebase. Contrary to their public claims that LibreOffice has no built-in AI features and that its core developers do not use Large Language Models (LLMs), community contributors have been found to use LLM-assisted coding assistants.
In a post on the Fediverse, an individual with the handle argv[-1] pointed out three LibreOffice commits from 2023 that acknowledge the use of LLMs, with two of them crediting Claude and GitHub Copilot. TDF maintains that while they have no objections to the use of LLMs by community contributors, they require disclosure and human review of the code quality.
The foundation's approach resembles that of Debian, where LLM coding assistants are permissible for some contributors, provided they are disclosed and reviewed. This approach contradicts TDF's public message that LibreOffice is AI-free, leading to frustration among some users.
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