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List:       koffice
Subject:    Re: another suggestion for writing new filters
From:       "Shaheed R. Haque" <srhaque () iee ! org>
Date:       2002-07-08 22:19:19
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Quoting Marco Zanon <info@marcozanon.com>:

> Hi,
> 
> since KOffice 1.3 is going to move towards OpenOffice format at 
> least for KWord, I tell you all an idea that I already exposed to 
> David Faure some weeks ago (he didn't like it very much :).
> 
> Since we would have to rewrite the filters from scratch or the 
> like, why not changing the idea behind them and create simple 
> command-line programs, instead of libraries?
> We could have, for instance:
> word97-2-openwriter
> rtf-2-openwriter
> wp-2-openwriter
> and so on... Those filters would return the converted file to 
> stdout, and that would be read by KWord.

I hate this idea for the same reason that I suspect David gave...its hacky and 
subject to data loss. Why do you assume that openwriter has the semantics 
required to support all these formats? Its pretty obvoous to me that all 
programs of a given class have different features. Reducing them to a single 
format is a bad idea - once you have lost data, there is no way back. 

> My idea is to group those filters into an external project 
> (hosted by Sourceforge?).
> 
> The advantages:
> a) filters made this way would be simpler to create, even for 
> beginners (like I am: I'm not saying that creating an actual 
> KWord filter is impossible, but a simple command line application 
> is better :)
> b) therefore, there would be more programmers (->manpower) 
> interested in writing filters made this way, because
> c) not only this project would be useful for KOffice, but also 
> for other apps (OpenOffice, AbiWord, etc.), and also
> d) the application themselves would be quicker to load (for 
> example, OpenOffice would not have to load the filters).
> 
> (Obviously, everything I said before could be done gradually, 
> first with KWord - which is the most used app.)

So there is already such a project. wv2 is on sf.net already as part of wv. But 
as I said elsewhere, that only helps if there are people who are prepared to do 
more than talk...




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