Bug 129062 (Skia) - [META] Skia library bugs
Summary: [META] Skia library bugs
Status: NEW
Alias: Skia
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: graphics stack (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
7.0.0.0.alpha0+
Hardware: All All
: medium normal
Assignee: Not Assigned
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords:
Depends on: 98451 107198 132312 137536 137665 139997 141780 142789 143108 143525 145106 148957 149762 150531 150532 151328 151627 152033 152175 152422 153279 153813 154584 155320 155357 160762 160783 Skia-macOS 163165 164788 166122 167059 167473 167817 167990 169712 170126 171421 172270 172559 172560 172644 172804 105650 116133 117826 118536 129064 129074 129076 129077 129120 129211 129280 129345 129416 129439 129546 129863 129865 129929 130029 130051 130233 130430 130604 131287 131408 131419 131426 131543 131547 131579 131663 131696 131697 131705 131721 131753 131939 131952 132013 132051 132084 132115 132155 132197 132228 132241 132297 132323 132333 132334 132335 132367 132438 132439 132498 132529 132681 132856 133016 133152 133208 133215 133246 133254 133275 133289 133339 133399 133637 133848 133905 133908 133925 134129 134152 134160 134275 134335 134342 134346 134352 134363 134365 134366 134574 134631 135078 135351 135370 135395 135485 135487 135490 136036 136070 136081 136139 136171 136195 136222 136223 136240 136241 136244 136310 136326 136334 136369 136371 136381 136407 136458 136477 136479 136521 136523 136553 136575 136674 136767 136990 137005 137068 137122 137159 137177 137329 137559 137563 137672 137907 137934 137935 138022 138145 138219 138459 138581 138729 138973 139502 139917 140023 140129 140288 140300 140583 140753 140848 140917 140925 140930 140940 141090 141277 141680 141715 141980 142131 142174 142530 142835 143059 143084 143152 143396 143509 143837 144090 144145 144330 144598 144763 144923 145267 145794 145803 146036 146095 146183 146242 146402 146767 146786 147353 147608 147645 147714 148574 148624 149075 149527 149657 149833 149902 150111 150157 150178 150190 150555 150609 150645 150817 150821 150834 151153 151632 151703 151805 151868 151929 152040 152468 152559 152649 152688 152958 153306 153456 153554 153922 154378 154874 155070 155084 155143 155400 155661 155902 156215 156216 156365 156791 156881 156986 158231 158739 158942 158945 159214 159751 160036 160359 160525 160633 160665 160757 161135 161879 161988 163145 164394 164428 164552 166715 166803 166994 167860 168076 169532 169914 172008 172214 172239 172456 172836
Blocks:
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Reported: 2019-11-27 15:59 UTC by Roman Kuznetsov
Modified: 2026-07-18 10:54 UTC (History)
9 users (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


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Description Roman Kuznetsov 2019-11-27 15:59:07 UTC
Description:
[META] Skia library bugs

Let's collect here all Skia's bugs

Lubus, I CCed you to this META

Steps to Reproduce:
-

Actual Results:
-

Expected Results:
-


Reproducible: Always


User Profile Reset: No



Additional Info:
-
Comment 1 Aron Budea 2019-12-12 19:06:54 UTC
For the record, here's the announcement:
https://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/libreoffice/2019-November/083878.html

For now Skia can be enabled by setting the following environment variable: SAL_ENABLESKIA=1

And it's only enabled for X11 'gen' and Windows VCL backends.
Comment 2 V Stuart Foote 2020-03-30 14:19:32 UTC
Folks, when posting issues against Skia rendering (Vulkan h/w, or software only), please post GPU and driver details for your system

On Windows systems, os GPU and driver details can be found in a run of msinfo32.exe

OS and system hardware on the system summary. GPU hardware and driver on the components -> display tab

Simple select and copy/paste.

This will be needed to work out blacklist for Skia rendering.

Thanks!

Stuart
Comment 3 V Stuart Foote 2020-04-09 15:52:03 UTC
For maintaining a blacklist of GPU and Vulkan driver pairings, will need the Vulkan reported 'deviceID', 'vendorID' and 'driverVersion' -- these will not be the same as the os reported GPU and Driver details we'd used for OpenGL issues.

At the moment, they are not exposed for review from the LO Skia implementation.

The realtechVR OpenGL Extensions Viewer [1] now provides a reporting module for Vulkan resources.  After a run of rendering testing, clicking the submit button will generate a set of feature reports, including a "vkview" report that has the GPU's internal Vulkan details.   Those will be needed when reporting issues for potential Blacklisting.

=-ref-=
[1] http://www.realtech-vr.com/home/glview
Comment 4 Roman Kuznetsov 2020-04-10 22:00:18 UTC
(In reply to V Stuart Foote from comment #3)
> For maintaining a blacklist of GPU and Vulkan driver pairings, will need the
> Vulkan reported 'deviceID', 'vendorID' and 'driverVersion' -- these will not
> be the same as the os reported GPU and Driver details we'd used for OpenGL
> issues.
> 
> At the moment, they are not exposed for review from the LO Skia
> implementation.
> 
> The realtechVR OpenGL Extensions Viewer [1] now provides a reporting module
> for Vulkan resources.  After a run of rendering testing, clicking the submit
> button will generate a set of feature reports, including a "vkview" report
> that has the GPU's internal Vulkan details.   Those will be needed when
> reporting issues for potential Blacklisting.
> 
> =-ref-=
> [1] http://www.realtech-vr.com/home/glview

Lubos added (https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/91980) this:

"So just dump the info to
<cachedir>/skia.log (where on Windows the <cachedir> should be
AppData\Roaming\LibreOffice\4\cache)."

I think we should say to bugreporters just to give us info from that file if they wrote a skia bug reprot
Comment 5 Luboš Luňák 2020-04-14 09:42:29 UTC
Both ways are acceptable as long as they provide the necessary Vulkan information and not things like the marketing version numbers.
Comment 6 stragu 2023-05-16 13:27:29 UTC
Since version 7.6 and the fix for bug 155070, the Skia log can be copied from Tools ▸ Options... ▸ LibreOffice ▸ View.
Comment 7 R. Grafe 2026-07-10 18:23:31 UTC Comment hidden (obsolete)
Comment 8 V Stuart Foote 2026-07-11 13:07:24 UTC
(In reply to R. Grafe from comment #7)
> LO is under Windows 11 unusable for me and many others. Works fine under
> Linux, but not under Windows.
> ...
> That was also my experience. I disabled Skia and then it works.
> Incomprehensible!

Absolutely false FUD!

That bug 166932 was an issue with specific formatted document when opened with GDI+ rendering that exhausted GDI object handles. To resolve, filtering for the Style objects was changed. It had nothing to do with skia libs (Vulkan or fall back CPU raster rendering) which at that point was an alternative rendering mode.

At the 26.2 release, the deprecated GDI+ rendering paths were removed [1]. This was necessary for feature implementation of correct alpha channel color rendering that neither GDI+ on Windows, nor aqua on macOS could process. 

So it is legacy GDI+ rendering that is no longer present, but few users were actually using legacy GDI+ rendering paths with skia lib based rendering set disabled. Simply at this point skia graphics libs can not be fully "disabled", and activating legacy GDI+ rendering paths, they've been removed from source. 

Skia Vulkan/Metal accelerated hw rendering has been set enabled by default since implemented in 2020 at the 7.0 release (replacing Cairo lib tooling with skia lib), and *Vulkan is what causes* the LibreOffice issue for folks with marginal hardware and driver configurations. But, as with prior OpenGL hw accelerated rendering, the skia lib based Vulkan hw acceleration can be toggled enabled or disabled. Done by user action (from UI or in config file), or LibreOffice graphics test, or by deny list processing.

LibreOffice implements graphics functional testing on startup, and a deny listing registry, to force marginal systems fallback to skia CPU software rendering.

The "fallback" skia lib based CPU software rendered raster framing is much less sensitive to poorly supported GPU or outdated graphics drivers, and that keeps those systems functional.

Users can force skia CPU software rendering via the expert config stanza 'ForceSkiaRaster' set "true". Alternatively they can add the stanza in their per user LibreOffice profile "registrymodifications.xcu". A simple copy and paste of this stanza to the bottom of the .xcu will suffice:
 
<item oor:path="/org.openoffice.Office.Common/VCL"><prop oor:name="ForceSkiaRaster" oor:op="fuse"><value>true</value></prop></item>

The project has discussed setting the skia lib default rendering mode to non-accelerated CPU rendering; but consensus remains that keeping Vulkan hw accelerated rendering as default is more beneficial (it keeps the rendering most performant, and fosters the deny list process).

Folks experiencing issues with LO start-up or specific UI rendering issues remain encouraged to submit well described BZ issues.

=-ref-=
[1] See https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/186250 (macOS) or https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/187176 (win)
Comment 9 Michael H 2026-07-12 17:57:19 UTC
What are the requirements for a Windows device to ensure that SKIA-HWRendering works properly? These requirements would certainly be helpful, especially for government organizations and companies that use LibreOffice with windows.
Comment 10 R. Grafe 2026-07-14 11:44:59 UTC Comment hidden (obsolete)
Comment 11 R. Grafe 2026-07-14 11:53:23 UTC Comment hidden (off-topic)
Comment 12 R. Grafe 2026-07-14 11:56:36 UTC Comment hidden (off-topic)
Comment 13 V Stuart Foote 2026-07-14 12:13:07 UTC Comment hidden (off-topic)
Comment 14 V Stuart Foote 2026-07-14 12:33:29 UTC
(In reply to Michael H from comment #9)
> What are the requirements for a Windows device to ensure that
> SKIA-HWRendering works properly? These requirements would certainly be
> helpful, especially for government organizations and companies that use
> LibreOffice with windows.

That is a moving target isn't it? LibreOffice updates the skia milestone build to remain current with skia projects Chromium release. But each installation of LibreOffice then relies on the combination of graphics processor and driver that os/DE is providing.

And in the case of Windows, the WDDM of the Windows release impacts things further.

Ending up with WDDM 2.7 Win10 drivers on a 25H2 build of Win11 is a proven recipe for Vulkan hw accelerated rendering to choke.

So I would generically say, on Win10 systems be sure you have the latest WDDM 2.7 driver for the GPU.  While on Win11 systems (24H2 or 25H2) be sure you have at least a WDDM 3.1 compliant driver installed and active for the GPU.

Simple run of dxdiag.exe will display details of what is installed and active on the Win os.
Comment 15 R. Grafe 2026-07-14 13:31:48 UTC
Sorry for my previous posts, would prefer you could delete them all.
 
1. Now I disabled ForceSkiaRaster again for testing and I can see no difference. It's like a ghost in the machine, but there is no virus or something else, it's only LO making a fool of me. I'm sure, you know such situations. I had no explanation anymore, maybe (my) rather naked Windows doesn't like LO, maybe rare problems within LO with some hardware drivers (see below) or something else? 
It seems to me, many others have the same or similar problems. I'm a little bit frustrated, but I give it up. LO is on this old computer only for testing purposes, under my new with Linux it runs out of the box fast, but have no long time experience, only in my short tests, will see. It seems, most problems with speed of LO on my old computer with Windows appear by and after using the menu Tools -> Customizing / Options. Maybe a hint for you. 
Under Windows LO plays only a minor role anyway. Most people have at least an old MS Office version and use this. 

2.Now I have read your comment 14. Means this, LO under Windows ist depending always on actual WDDM drivers? Mine ist 2.6, I think, there are no actual graphics drivers, that support newer WDDM. Has this to do with my problems?  I will not belief this.

Sorry again for my inconvenience.
Comment 16 R. Grafe 2026-07-15 14:17:58 UTC
My solution at the moment: Enabled ForceSkiaRaster
Important: After each change in LO start OS new, that was my fault in previous post.  No LO process in taskmanager, but maybe something remains in windows cache, I think, and despite that I have disabled such behaviour as far as possible.

Maybe it would be helpful when after installation of LO a clearly hint would given for enabling ForceSkiaRaster when LO menus run slow because of lacking hardware acceleration support on older machines?
For new users of LO on windows it is surely frustrating, when they install LO based on recommendation and then LO runs slow in comparison to other software. The consequence could be, they go immediately back to MSO or install other Office SW and additionally this damages unnecessarily the reputation. 
That's why I posted my first comment above, it's frustrating when you always here from open source supporters, "use LO" and you make then right at the beginning a disappointing experience. This should not be.
--
LO 26.2 (no hardware acceleration, greyed out ->)
Windows 23H2, nearly naked with many portable SW, runs very fast, no problems with other software
WDDM 2.6, no graphics driver update possible 
CPU Typ Mobile QuadCore (8 threads) AMD Ryzen 5 3500U, 3700 MHz
RAM 16GB
AMD Radeon(TM) Vega 8 Graphics (2 GB of RAM)
Comment 17 V Stuart Foote 2026-07-15 22:09:25 UTC
Like OpenGL before, skia/ganesh Vulkan tooled rendering is being deprecated.

LibreOffice had used the skia/ganesh Vulkan tooling, and the chromium project has deprecated ganesh in favor of more robust and multi-threaded graphite tooling--the hw accelerated rendering that chrome uses on Windows builds.

So, for the 26.2.5 [1] release and the 26.8.0 [2] release, Vulkan hw rendering will be placed under user experimental feature (Tools -> Options -> Advanced "Enable experimental features") with defaults now shifted onto skia / CPU raster framing.

While on master, toward the 27.2 release [3] , the default will be skia / CPU raster framing with a new UI checkbox toggle (Tools -> Options -> View 'ForceSkiaGPU') to enable skia / ganesh Vulkan tooling.

Some dev discussion of pursuing a skia/graphite Vulkan tooling to track with chromium skia offerings, or possibly a move on Windows builds to skia/D3D12 as a bridge.

Thanks Xisco for giving this a tweak! It should help stabilize folks on marginal hw with balky drivers while others can continue with Vulkan acceleration. 

Just hope we can stir up some additional dev interest to move the skia hw accelerated rendering onward to refactor with graphite.

=-ref-=
[1] https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/208146
[2] https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/208133
[3] https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/208148
Comment 18 V Stuart Foote 2026-07-16 14:33:35 UTC
(In reply to R. Grafe from comment #16)
>
> LO 26.2 (no hardware acceleration, greyed out ->)
> Windows 23H2, nearly naked with many portable SW, runs very fast, no
> problems with other software
> WDDM 2.6, no graphics driver update possible 
> CPU Typ Mobile QuadCore (8 threads) AMD Ryzen 5 3500U, 3700 MHz
> RAM 16GB
> AMD Radeon(TM) Vega 8 Graphics (2 GB of RAM)

Interesting, a check on the AMD site suggests that Ryzen 5 3500U APU is supported by the Adrenalin Edition driver suite through WDDM 3.2, so should support WDDM 3.1 on your win11 23H2 system (though I would update the os).

Current 26.5.2 WHQL drivers for your hw and os are [1].

And this page from AMD details the Vulkan feature support implemented at each release. [2]

=ref-=

[1] https://www.amd.com/en/support/downloads/drivers.html/processors/ryzen/ryzen-3000-series/amd-ryzen-5-3500u.html

[2] https://www.amd.com/en/resources/support-articles/release-notes/RN-RAD-WIN-VULKAN.html
Comment 19 R. Grafe 2026-07-17 11:36:33 UTC Comment hidden (obsolete)
Comment 20 R. Grafe 2026-07-17 12:33:36 UTC
(In reply to V Stuart Foote from comment #17)
Puuh, after all, anyway not my fault, I'm happy. My research was right. Please set comment 19 to hidden.
Radeon(TM) Vega 8 Graphics was still installed, only not to see in windows system settings, but in hardware manager.
AMD Driver (old from 2019)
https://www.amd.com/en/support/downloads/drivers.html/processors/ryzen/ryzen-3000-series/amd-ryzen-5-3500u.html#amd_support_product_spec 
installed new, but updated (only) WDDM from 2.6 to 3.1 (strange, why so old on mine). Anyway no hardware acceleration. Google AI says, there ist no hw acceleration for this integrated GPU in Ryzen 5 3500U.
Update to Windows 25H2 therefore senseless and not desired anyway because this computer get's no more updates from M$. And yes, you can use it safely also in the internet, if you know, what to configure and what points you have to consider ;-)
Comment 21 V Stuart Foote 2026-07-17 13:04:24 UTC
(In reply to R. Grafe from comment #20)
>...
>Anyway no hardware acceleration. Google AI says, there ist no hw acceleration  
>for this integrated GPU in Ryzen 5 3500U.
>...

OK, well not so sure about that. But the tweaks to rendering defaults noted comment 17 should give relief to users for the 26.2.5 and future builds.
Comment 22 R. Grafe 2026-07-17 15:23:54 UTC
The graphics should support Vulcan, shows GPU-Z, but it isn't. No hints anywhere in the net, no helpful tips by AI. 
Your announced changes in new version is the right solution. 
I hope my annoying comments here could help ;-) (Advocatus Diaboli) 
Best regards.
Comment 23 R. Grafe 2026-07-17 15:55:34 UTC
(In reply to V Stuart Foote from comment #21)
I forgot in addition to my comment 22:
Thank you and the LO team very much - I believe, in the name of all (new) LO users with older CPU / APU.
Comment 24 R. Grafe 2026-07-18 10:54:21 UTC
(In reply to V Stuart Foote from comment #21)
I tested again, disabled ForceSkiaRaster again - and what a surprise - no difference, fast as before after restart. Opening skia.log:

RenderMethod: vulkan
Vendor: 0x1002
Device: 0x15d8
API: 1.3.260
Driver: 2.0.279
DeviceType: integrated
DeviceName: AMD Radeon(TM) Vega 8 Graphics
Denylisted: no

But Checkbox Hardware Acceleration still greyed out.
Anyway, your solution in comment 17 is the best.