Subject: Re: wv and .doc exports?
From: Caolan McNamara (Caolan.McNamara@ul.ie)
Date: Mon Dec 06 1999 - 06:34:51 CST
On 05-Dec-99 Justin Bradford wrote:
>> I was wondering if someone more familiar with the wv codebase might
>> comment on future possibilities of Word export functionality? Is there a
>> fairly straightforward way for this to happen, and it's waiting on
>> programmer time, or is this a complicated design problem in it's own
>> right. If someone wanted to start thinking about this, and poking around,
>> where would you recommend they begin?
>
>Yes, export is planned, and the limiting factor is programmer time.
>
>One would need to consult with Caolan about his specific plans, but here
>is a rough outline of implementation details:
>
>1. Replace laola OLE code in wv with libole2 from gnumeric.
> Most of the reads are already wrapped by some utility functions, which
>could just be replaced. However, getc is also used many times, which ought
>to be replaced with a wrapper function similar to the 2 and 4 bit read
>functions. Some seek functions might also need replacement.
> The OLE loader would need to be replaced, and the stream FILE handles
>would be replaced with libole2 stream handles.
I have just added 2 and 4 byte reads for little endian platforms which
give a good speed increase. Later I will make more speed increases by
reading input in much larger chunks.
>
>2. The various "chunks" of a word file have specific formats which, in
>the importer, are read from the file, and used to build in memory
>structures for use. These functions need complementary write versions,
>which takes the structs and writes out the data to the OLE stream.
>
>3. Export API should be the reverse of the import API. Simply, function to
>change character, paragraph, section properties, write a block of
>characters, insert a "special" character (which includes images, OLE
>objects, etc).
>
> a. Propably also need a function to set a style (just pass character and
>paragraph properties for it)
>
> b. Functions to set various other properties of the word file (password,
>encryption, name, etc)
>
>4. A function to write all of the little pieces we collect out the in
>right place and order.
>
>
>If you want to explore this more, I'd start with the wv source and some
>documentation on the Word file format. The latter can be found on
>wotsit.org. Just a warning, though, it is not a pleasant format.
>
>As for actually programming stuff, perhaps Caolan could give details on
>what he is planning. I imagine one could start on the write functions, as
>they are fairly self-contained.
Yep I would recommend by simply starting with a small line of text and creating
a correct FIB and CLX structures and attempt to write them. Many of the other
elements can remain blank for now.
C.
>
>Justin
Real Life: Caolan McNamara * Doing: MSc in HCI
Work: Caolan.McNamara@ul.ie * Phone: +353-86-8790257
URL: http://www.csn.ul.ie/~caolan * Sig: an oblique strategy
Cut a vital connection
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