docx-forge

Professional Word document engineering — create, edit, and analyze .docx files.

A comprehensive reference for generating Word documents programmatically, editing existing documents via XML, and mastering OOXML features like tracked changes, comments, tables, images, and multi-column layouts.

Features

Create

Generate .docx files with the docx (npm) library:

• Page setup (US Letter, A4, landscape)
• Table of contents
• Headers, footers, page numbers
• Tables with proper DXA-based sizing
• Bullet and numbered lists
• Images, hyperlinks, bookmarks
• Footnotes, tab stops, multi-column layouts
• 15+ critical gotchas documented from real-world usage

Edit

Modify existing .docx files through XML:

• Unpack → edit XML → repack workflow
• Smart quotes for professional typography
• Full OOXML element reference

Track Changes

Complete XML patterns for:

• Insertions and deletions
• Paragraph-level deletion marking
• Rejecting another author's changes
• Restoring deleted content
• Comments and threaded replies

Quick Start

Install project dependencies in the repository you are working from. The npm package is named docx; this skill is named docx-forge.

npm install docx

Create a document:

const { Document, Packer, Paragraph, TextRun } = require('docx');
const fs = require('fs');

const doc = new Document({
  sections: [{
    children: [
      new Paragraph({ text: "Hello, World!" }),
    ]
  }]
});

Packer.toBuffer(doc).then(buffer => {
  fs.writeFileSync("hello.docx", buffer);
});

Ask an agent to use the skill:

Use docx-forge to create a client-ready Word proposal with tracked-change notes and a table of contents.

For an existing document:

Use docx-forge to inspect this .docx, summarize its styles, and propose safe XML edits before changing anything.

When to Use Which Approach

You want to...	Use
Create a new document from scratch	docx (npm) library
Edit text in an existing document	Unpack → XML Edit → Repack
Review or accept tracked changes	pandoc --track-changes=accept
Extract content for analysis	pandoc -t markdown
Add complex tracked changes	Direct XML manipulation
Insert comments	XML comment markers

Dependencies

• Node.js — required for generation with the docx npm package
• pandoc — optional, useful for document reading and conversion
• LibreOffice — optional, useful for format bridging and PDF output
• Poppler — optional, useful for pdftoppm page rendering

Verification

Before handing off a generated .docx, check:

• the file opens in Word or LibreOffice
• headings and lists use real Word structures, not plain styled text
• tables fit the page width
• tracked changes and comments appear under the intended author
• exported PDF pages match the expected pagination

Install

npx skills add Jorgut/docx-forge

License

MIT — feel free to use, modify, and distribute.