SZERVAC Attila <sas@...506...> writes:
On Sun, 8 Aug 2004, J.M. Maurer wrote:
Q: Why Sodipodi & Sketch (Skencil) are "office" application
( http://gnome.org/gnome-office/ )
but Inkscape is not ?
drawing programs are essential "office" components, today.
If GNOME Office keeps `Vector Grachics' section (Sodipodi & Sketch (Skencil), Inkscape is also an important, good choice for GNOME Office Users
That page is really old, and does not reflect the current situation.
Currently, "GNOME Office" consists of AbiWord, Gnumeric and GDA
*only*.
We hope to update that website as soon as possible.
ohh, oops, okay-okay, i'm waiting for GNOME Art Suite! :)))
THANK You 4 Your advice, Bryce, J.M., Charlie & dear GNOME-Office list.
`apt-get install gnome-art' ! :-)
On Sat, 7 Aug 2004, Jody Goldberg wrote:
On Thu, Aug 05, 2004 at 10:19:08AM +0200, SZERV?C Attila wrote:
Inkscape 0.39 entered to sarge.
It is Killer. Maybe sketch [skencil] killer too.
Why Inkscape is not in GNOME-Office??
It has not asked to be part of gnome office.
We can evaluate it on it's
- merits
- use of gnome office technologies
- whether a drawing app is office-related or art-related
Since Inkscape started, I've had the opportunity to chat with a number of people, both developers and users, on the topic of integration with other applications. We've also received numerous feature requests from users for interoperability. These range from cut-and-paste, to file format compatibility, to even more elaborate interrelationships such as plug-in functionality.
On multiple occasions I've heard the idea of an 'Art Suite' posed. The idea generally identifies Inkscape, Gimp, Scribus, and perhaps one or two other tools such as Blender or Dia. The rationale for making them into a suite revolves around improving interoperability including cut and paste, common file formats, etc. Note though that several of these apps are not GNOME apps (Scribus is Qt, for example). Also, we haven't really talked about this much with the other apps. But this is an idea we've heard much about.
As can be expected, we have had many users ask about interoperability with OpenOffice (mainly for cut-and-paste). This is particularly ironic since OOo doesn't really support SVG, plus already has a drawing component, but there you go. Interoperability with Flash, Illustrator, and other proprietary tools have come up in user requests.
In a few cases there has been the question of Inkscape being part of GNOME Office. It sounds like the desire here is for Gnumeric and Abiword to gain a drawing plugin via Bonobo, which would help users of those apps. We're not really certain why this would help Inkscape but in general I don't think anyone from Inkscape is opposed to the idea (interoperability is a Good Thing). In weighing the requests from users and the interests of the developers, it has been viewed as a longer term priority; other things like layers, text-on-path, extensions, etc. have been more pressing needs. That does not mean that we could not do it today if a couple developers popped up that wished to focus on implementing it.
The one concern that a few of us have is that we're uncertain about the extra dependencies that would be added if we were required to adopt a bunch of GNOME Office libraries. We have a process for reviewing, testing, and adopting (or rejecting) new dependencies. An important consideration is whether they're available on Windows and Mac OSX, and if they have clean, stable APIs. As Alan mentioned, we've been slowly evaluating and adding libraries (including several low level GNOME libs), but we think it is important for Inkscape users that we do this with care. For 0.40 we're adding a number of new libs and are already spotting problems (i.e. one core dev on OSX can no longer compile the code).
Now, it's likely the GNOME Office libs have no problems, but we just haven't really analyzed them in detail yet so we don't know. But the concern is less about the particular libs and more about the process - being given a list of required libs that must be added to Inkscape in order for it to be acceptable as a GNOME Office application leaves some distaste in the mouth. Those may be great technologies to have, but maybe not, or they may be okay but require a lot of work to integrate them for low value, so we like having the option of picking and choosing, and are concerned that this freedom would be diminished or lost by becoming a GNOME Office application.
At one point someone identified Inkscape as a possible presentation component for GNOME Office. It is certainly true that people have used Inkscape's 'Inkview' component for doing presentations - I myself used it for my OLS presentation. But I don't think there's any desire to turn Inkscape into PowerPoint! ;-)
I think there had also been talk at some point about SVG-output from GNOME-Office applications, with the assumption that something like Inkscape would be needed for that. In truth, I don't think this is the case. SVG is a standardized format, so in theory the application could use rsvg, cairo, or other SVG renderers, and expect to be able to interoperate with tools like Inkscape. Where they don't, well, that's going to be someone's SVG compliance bug. ;-)
A while back we briefly looked at the bonobo bits in the codebase. They're not hooked up now, but could presumably be resurrected if someone was interested in working on it, especially if they were more experienced with Bonobo than us.
One of the conclusions we arrived at when looking at Bonobo was that Inkscape needed to present a better organized internal API (called AST), that other applications could connect to. This happens to be something we need in general for Extensions, and is an area we've been putting time into and plan to put additional work into over the next few releases. After that is done, adding a Bonobo interface should conceivably be quite straightforward.
Anyway, so if all GNOME Office really cares about is getting a drawing component for Gnumeric and Abiword, Inkscape will probably be there eventually (sooner if someone pops up to help). If the desire is to fill in a list of apps for GNOME marketing purposes, no issue there. If there is a desire to make Inkscape use certain libs or to be able to have say over the development priorities, that would probably not be well received. If the desire is to assist Inkscape in some other fashion, that'd be wonderful, just let us know; the project's been humming along well so far but there's still much needed.
Bryce
Bryce Harrington wrote:
Since Inkscape started, I've had the opportunity to chat with a number of people, both developers and users, on the topic of integration with other applications. We've also received numerous feature requests from users for interoperability. These range from cut-and-paste, to file format compatibility, to even more elaborate interrelationships such as plug-in functionality. ...[snip] Anyway, so if all GNOME Office really cares about is getting a drawing component for Gnumeric and Abiword, Inkscape will probably be there eventually (sooner if someone pops up to help). If the desire is to fill in a list of apps for GNOME marketing purposes, no issue there. If there is a desire to make Inkscape use certain libs or to be able to have say over the development priorities, that would probably not be well received. If the desire is to assist Inkscape in some other fashion, that'd be wonderful, just let us know; the project's been humming along well so far but there's still much needed.
The ideas for how Inkscape might possible 'integrate' with GO are just that... ideas. There is no desire, I'm sure, for Inkscape to be forced into using GO or AbiWord or Gnumeric libs just for the sake of it. Any ideas were only suggested with the best of intentions, as something that could potentially help the Inkscape project. There was certainly never an intended compulsory nature to any such thoughts. (Perhaps it was me being a bit gung-ho and dreamy about GO in the future that made you think it was so.)
On multiple occasions I've heard the idea of an 'Art Suite' posed. The idea generally identifies Inkscape, Gimp, Scribus, and perhaps one or two other tools such as Blender or Dia. The rationale for making them into a suite revolves around improving interoperability including cut and paste, common file formats, etc. Note though that several of these apps are not GNOME apps (Scribus is Qt, for example). Also, we haven't really talked about this much with the other apps. But this is an idea we've heard much about.
Inkscape could be in multiple 'suites'. Why not be in GO and a separate Art Suite? It's just extra marketing for Inkscape. Everybody wins. ;)
The one concern that a few of us have is that we're uncertain about the extra dependencies that would be added if we were required to adopt a bunch of GNOME Office libraries.
The only dependencies would be ones you (the Inkscape team) wanted. This is a proactive association of projects bonding to each other's benefit. There's no clauses, nothing compulsory necessities other than (probably) Gtk usage and slight HIG adheral.
being given a list of required libs that must be added to Inkscape in order for it to be acceptable as a GNOME Office application leaves some distaste in the mouth.
Nobody _ever_ said you _must_ have/use a set of required libs. Only ideas and suggestions have been brought up and all of those were done so with the best of intentions.
we like having the option of picking and choosing
And that's how Free Software works. ;)
At one point someone identified Inkscape as a possible presentation component for GNOME Office. It is certainly true that people have used Inkscape's 'Inkview' component for doing presentations - I myself used it for my OLS presentation. But I don't think there's any desire to turn Inkscape into PowerPoint! ;-)
I think the idea was to use Inkscape as a basis, not for Inkscape to be the actual presentation application. Like Inkview except taken a bit further, an adaption of Inkscape. The people, that I'm aware of, who are pursuing a presentation application are more oriented around adapting AbiWord somehow or starting afresh. There is a codebase (a module in Gnumeric CVS, I think) that uses (the soon to be) libgoffice.
Oh, and then there's also Criawips which is always threatening to raise it's profile.
So there's lots of ways in which it could be approached, and the bottom line is that they are all valid, and that whomever develops it will do it their preferred way. Nothing new there, that's how development works! But, again, nobody was actually saying Inkscape would be the presentation app... just that it contains a lot of the features that are key to creating presentations. But so does AbiWord. And Criawips. And (yet-to-be-named-or-announced) the code hiding in Gnumeric's CVS server, somewhere.
- Charlie
On Mon, 9 Aug 2004, Charles Goodwin wrote:
The ideas for how Inkscape might possible 'integrate' with GO are just that... ideas. There is no desire, I'm sure, for Inkscape to be forced into using GO or AbiWord or Gnumeric libs just for the sake of it. Any ideas were only suggested with the best of intentions, as something that could potentially help the Inkscape project. There was certainly never an intended compulsory nature to any such thoughts. (Perhaps it was me being a bit gung-ho and dreamy about GO in the future that made you think it was so.)
Ah, that could be that it's just miscommunication, but I did definitely get this sense from a few sources. For example, Jody's recent comment about judging worth based on "use of GNOME Office technologies" seems to imply this as a requirement.
On multiple occasions I've heard the idea of an 'Art Suite' posed. The idea generally identifies Inkscape, Gimp, Scribus, and perhaps one or two other tools such as Blender or Dia. The rationale for making them into a suite revolves around improving interoperability including cut and paste, common file formats, etc. Note though that several of these apps are not GNOME apps (Scribus is Qt, for example). Also, we haven't really talked about this much with the other apps. But this is an idea we've heard much about.
Inkscape could be in multiple 'suites'. Why not be in GO and a separate Art Suite? It's just extra marketing for Inkscape. Everybody wins. ;)
Actually, I have some doubts about the marketing value of suites, but who knows. ;-)
To me and others I've chatted with about it, the primary benefit to an Art Suite would be that it would serve as a vehicle to coordinate interoperability between the participating applications, and as a way to explore sharing of widgets and file format code. Of course, such sharing can occur regardless of whether the apps are in a suite - that's just plan open source good sense. :-)
At one point someone identified Inkscape as a possible presentation component for GNOME Office. It is certainly true that people have used Inkscape's 'Inkview' component for doing presentations - I myself used it for my OLS presentation. But I don't think there's any desire to turn Inkscape into PowerPoint! ;-)
I think the idea was to use Inkscape as a basis, not for Inkscape to be the actual presentation application. Like Inkview except taken a bit further, an adaption of Inkscape. The people, that I'm aware of, who are pursuing a presentation application are more oriented around adapting AbiWord somehow or starting afresh. There is a codebase (a module in Gnumeric CVS, I think) that uses (the soon to be) libgoffice.
I've also spoken with Keith Packard and Carl Worth about an SVG presentation tool that they used at OLS, that iirc is part of xsvg. The cool thing about it is that it supported a stylesheet approach that made editing the presentation in a text editor very easy. The downside was that it requires a lot more coding before it could be generally useful.
Thanks, Bryce
Bryce Harrington wrote:
Ah, that could be that it's just miscommunication, but I did definitely get this sense from a few sources. For example, Jody's recent comment about judging worth based on "use of GNOME Office technologies" seems to imply this as a requirement.
I think he meant that an application that relies heavily on various GO technologies has a strong case for inclusion. It definitely wouldn't be a requisite. The whole purpose for sharing technologies is to reduce work by sharing load, not generate load for the sake of it. Right Jody? :)
I've also spoken with Keith Packard and Carl Worth about an SVG presentation tool that they used at OLS, that iirc is part of xsvg. The cool thing about it is that it supported a stylesheet approach that made editing the presentation in a text editor very easy. The downside was that it requires a lot more coding before it could be generally useful.
I'll keep a look out!
- Charlie
Charles Goodwin <charlie@...342...>
On Sun, Aug 08, 2004 at 12:39:55PM -0700, Bryce Harrington wrote:
Why Inkscape is not in GNOME-Office??
It has not asked to be part of gnome office.
We can evaluate it on it's
- merits
- use of gnome office technologies
- whether a drawing app is office-related or art-related
The one concern that a few of us have is that we're uncertain about the extra dependencies that would be added if we were required to adopt a bunch of GNOME Office libraries.
Lets be very clear here. There is no 'require' about any of this. I see two reasons to form a suite rather than contining as distinct projects. 1) The marketing meme that it must be a suite 2) Decreasing the development burden and improving quality of common features. The only reason to adopt libgsf or the upcoming libgoffice would be to make lives easier.
Now, it's likely the GNOME Office libs have no problems, but we just haven't really analyzed them in detail yet so we don't know.
libgsf-1 has been api stable for a long time and should be ready for discussion. libgoffice is still in a state of flux and there is no point in discussing it's use beyond making feature requests.
concern is less about the particular libs and more about the process - being given a list of required libs that must be added to Inkscape in order for it to be acceptable as a GNOME Office application leaves some distaste in the mouth.
I hope I've aleviated those concerns. The goal with goffice is to allow all of us, as a group to polish our feature set with less effort. eg Gnumeric has File -> SendTo support that should expand to properly handle more mailers and better handle different encodings. Why write this twice ?
Abiword had some nice ideas for a font name combo box
etc..
If the tools are useful use them, if not don't. There are valid reasons to consider inkscape for inclusion without using the libraries. My point was that using and contributing to the development of these sorts of shared tools would improve interoperatbility and consistency, and hence make a stronger case for apps to be included.
participants (3)
-
Bryce Harrington -
Charles Goodwin -
Jody Goldberg