AI agents get worktrees — for your spreadsheets

What it does

Univer Workspace is a self-hostable, Apache-2.0 Office suite written in TypeScript: Sheets, Docs, Slides, relational tables (Bases), and Boards (canvases) all run in one shared runtime, with references between artifacts staying connected as the workspace changes. There are three doors into the same server — a Browser for direct editing and co-editing, a local Agent app for chatting with documents and reviewing changes, and a CLI built for automation and other agents. The Server owns identity, permissions, and storage; the README is blunt that client-provided users, roles, and revisions are never trusted as authority.

The interesting bit

Agent edits go through a Worktree: the agent works in an isolated draft, verifies it, marks it Ready, and a human then reviews and either merges or reopens. It’s the pull-request workflow applied to spreadsheets and docs — intermediate changes never touch shared content until a person accepts them. Agents can also generate spreadsheet-backed mini-apps (dashboards, interactive reports) where metrics, charts, and controls are bound to cells.

Key highlights

• Sheets, Docs, Slides, Bases, and Boards in one runtime, with cross-artifact references kept connected
• Worktree review flow keeps agent drafts isolated from trunk until a human merges
• CLI ships version-matched Skills, structured JSON output, Facade API discovery, PNG/PDF rendering, and layout checks
• Contract-first HTTP: OpenAPI source, generated types, routes, Browser, and CLI must all describe the same behavior
• Login via password, GitHub, Discord, or application OAuth, with anonymous viewing supported

Caveats

• This repo is a product composition root over the upstream Univer SDKs — rendering, OT, and collaboration live in separate packages, by design. Don’t expect the whole engine in one checkout.
• Requires Node.js 24+ and pnpm 11, a notably fresh toolchain.
• The Agent app is built on DSH (DeepSeek Harness), and its file references point to the machine running it — fine solo, worth knowing before you assume it sees your server’s files.

Verdict

Worth a look if you want a self-hosted Notion/Office hybrid where AI does the drafting and humans keep the merge button. Skip it if you only need the spreadsheet engine — that’s the upstream Univer SDK, not this repo.