Subject: StarOffice import, first thought
From: Hubert Figuiere (hfiguiere@teaser.fr)
Date: Sat Feb 10 2001 - 17:09:37 CST
I will discribe the result of my investigations for a StarOffice import filter.
There are 2 file format: StarOffice 5.x and below and OpenOffice 6.0.
The first is an OLE based binary file format with NO documentation,
the later is an XML variant with documentation being written, but not
frozen.
The binary format, aka SDW when it comes to word processors.
It is an OLE file format with several streams inside. This allow to
have embedded objects and other stuff.
There is NO documentation for SDW, but there is complete source code
implementation available, under GPL (and Sun's own license). For
those who are interested, they can browse it at
<http://www.openoffice.org/source/browse/sw/sw/source/core/sw3io/>
This should be IMHO a starting point to write a documentation to then
rewrite the import filter.
Q: Why not just using the existing code ?
A: Look at the code dependencies and you'll see that AbiWord may
double of code size if you add these.
The problem is that this implementation will require adding OLE as a
module of AbiWord, not only of wv. It will require also to implement
the StarOffice metafile, available elsewhere
(http://www.openoffice.org/source/browse/graphics/), because it is
used by graphics.
The XML file format, aka SXW.
This is a ZIP archive with an XML content and images inside. Images
may be in PNG or in SO graphic metafile.
So implementing this would require to put unzip code inside AbiWord.
Personnally I recommand waiting as specifications are still work in progress.
Hub
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