Browser-based version back on the menu, reopening questions about TDF's relationship with Collabora

The Document Foundation (TDF) has pulled LibreOffice Online out of its "attic" – its term for retired projects – and is resuming development.

LibreOffice Online (LOOL) is the cloud-based version of LibreOffice. You could be forgiven if you haven't heard of it. Its development has been largely dormant since 2020. That will soon change. Earlier this week, TDF announced that LOOL is getting a fresh start.

The news follows a Document Foundation community vote earlier this month. Back in 2020, the organization decided to freeze development of LOOL, and despite an open letter calling for its revival in 2022, in TDF's attic it has remained.

What makes the decision a little stranger than it may seem, though, is that there already is an existing online browser-based flavor of LibreOffice. It's called Collabora Online, or COOL for short. It was announced in 2015 and has been updated regularly since: it ...