Re: "dual" files

[robsta stereolyzer net]

I see and I get your point.
Added value would be minimal - especially considering the effort
which it would take.

Thanks, 
Rob


Am 09.06.2004 um 10:07 Uhr haben Sie geschrieben:

> >recently i was thinking about a generic file viewer/reader for
> GNOME.
> >Eog does this job for images but it would be really cool IMHO
> to be
> >able to view all kinds of files even though you might not have
> the
> >actual file-producing application installed.
> >
> >Two possible approaches came to my mind:
> >
> >What about including say an svg version within each document
> (or do
> >it optionally). The XML nature of the gnumeric and abiword file
> >format should allow for that pretty easily (in theory at least
> :-)
> >This way might overlap with the plans for svg based
> gnome-office
> >embedding. Of course the resulting document files would be a
> bit
> >"heavier".
> 
> I can say for the AbiWord folks - "no thanks". This is bad for at
> least the 
> following reasons:
> 
> *) Bloats the file format and size
> *) Bloats amount of code and complexity of code in the apps
> themselves
> *) Assumes that the apps can save or print as SVG and capture the
> output 
> (can't be done, but I have some experimental SVG printing support
> in 
> GnomePrint)
> *) Multi-page output requires use of the SVGPrint extension to the
> SVG 1.2 
> standard. I can tell you that nothing under the sun supports SVG
> 1.2 or 
> SVGPrint yet, and such support will likely be a long time coming.
> *) XML namespaces and document nesting give me the heebie-jeebies
> 
> I could go on for a while but by now you get my point...
> 
> I should make note that if Gnumeric and Abi start to use a compound
> document 
> format (i.e. JAR), it would be possible to create a "document
> thumbnail" 
> stream or similar within the file, ala PDF. Moving to such a
> compound format 
> won't happen in the near-term future.
> 
> >A second possibility might be to somewhow split out printing
> code and
> >create a set of "print drivers" for commonly used
> file formats 
> and
> >use them within the viewer and the respective application. An
> >intermediary solution could be the libegg way of including
> sources.
> 
> This is good on paper, until you realize that 80% of an app like
> AbiWord's 
> codebase is required to create such a print driver, in which case
> you've 
> essentially saved your user nothing and caused developers a great
> deal of 
> pain.
> 
> There are a few suggestions that I think are more prudent if you
> want to 
> have a generic "file viewer" application:
> 
> *) The major GO apps export a BonoboControl interface. Make your
> application 
> use a read-only BonoboControl container and embed apps as
> necessary. Be a 
> sport and take over maintainership of the BonoboPrint interface too
> while 
> you're at it and bring it back from the grave.
> 
> *) The major GO apps export (or will soon export) a cmdline printer
> 
> interface. Have the apps print to a PS, PDF, or SVG file. Pipe that
> to GGV, 
> GPDF, RSVG, or whatever suits your fancy.
> 
> Dom
> 
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