[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread] 

List:       koffice-devel
Subject:    Re: export excel
From:       "T.J. Mather" <tjmather () maxmind ! com>
Date:       2002-11-08 15:14:05
[Download RAW message or body]

Hi,

I have been thinking about writing an Excel Export
filter using Apache POI.  It is very difficult to develop
filters for MS Excel files, and it should be much easier to
write an maintain a filter that re-uses an widely used
and developed library (POI has several developers).  The
catch is that the MS Excel filter would depend on GCJ 3.2
or greater, but as all the major distros (Mandrake, Redhat, etc) have 
moved to GCC 3.2, I see this issue going away with time (especially
considering how much time it would take to develop a filter
as good as the POI library with such limited resources that
KOffice has).

Here how we could use the POI library:

1. Compile Apache POI using GCJ 3.2 with Ant/Ant-contrib/cpptasks.
(If Ant doesn't work out, we could also use RHUG), generate a
shared library than can be called from C++ code.  I didn't have
luck compiling *.java->*.class using GCJ, so I was trying to use
Javac for the *.java->*.class and GCJ for *.class->*.so
2. Use this shared library to develop an export filter for MS Excel.

Let me know if you have any questions, I'm available to help.
I'm planning on playing around with getting POI to work with
KSpread.

Thanks,
TJ

On Thu, 7 Nov 2002, Fred Malabre wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> Just subscribed to the list, so sorry if my question
> has already been discussed...
> 
> I would need an export filter for KSpread to Excel.
> Has anybody started to work on that?
> If not, I will give it a try.
> I've got a nice book about Excel 97, and they detail
> the Excel file format.
> 
> Is there any legal issue in writting an export filter
> for Excel?
> 
> I will probably need some help once in a while as I've
> never worked on a filter... That's why I subscribed to
> this list. Is that appropriate?
> 
> Thanks,
> Fred.

_______________________________________________
koffice-devel mailing list
koffice-devel@mail.kde.org
http://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/koffice-devel
[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]