Hi all, Today we released the 0.12.0-alpha build of the POI project (www.sourceforge.net/projects/poi). POI is a project seeking to provide pure-java ports of the OLE 2 Compound Document Format and its derivatives (such as XLS spreadsheets). It currently consists of an OLE 2 Compound Document format API called POIFS, an XLS implementation and an XML->XLS Cocoon2 Serializer.
The 0.12.0-alpha, released today, marks a point near the end of the POI 1.0 development cycle. We have not yet released a working version of the Serializer but it is nearly complete. The POIFS API has a very full feature set for reading and writing the OLE 2 Compound document format. So far as I'm aware there is not yet a more complete and correct open implementation of this. The author of the current version, Marc Johnson has spent countless hours ciphering through hex dumps and scattered bits of documentation. He and I have authored a document fully describing what we know about this format. The HSSF API has reached feature-complete for the 1.0 cycle. It allows you to read, write and modify XLS files (most commonly used by Microsoft Excel). There are still some structures it does not yet understand that will not be implemented in the 1.0 cycle (most notably formulas); however, its very usable and can now style spreadsheets as well as read and write them. It is my hope that users will continue sending the great feedback and information they've sent me to make it even better! The HSSF-Serializer once complete will allow you to use simple XSL files to transform XML data sources (such as an ESQL query or XML file) into XLS files. Although we do not yet have any specific plans, the POI project is intent on providing other developers the tools they need to port other OLE 2 Compound Document based formats to pure java (such as DOC files, etc) so that they too can be accessible as Cocoon 2 serializers. It is also our hope to merge this into the Cocoon project at some point once it's been proven. Please feel free to use this release and by all means send us feedback, suggestions and bug reports (preferably ones that contain more than "I tried to create a spreadsheet and it didn't work when I got to row 104"). You can get a copy of the sources or build from sourceforge (www.sourceforge.net/projects/poi) and read more about the project on javalobby (http://javalobby.org/discussionContext/showThreaded/frm/javalobby?folderId=20&discussionContextId=11162) Thanks, Andrew C. Oliver POI developer PS: POI stands for "Poor Obfuscation Implementation", HSSF stands for "Horrible SpreadSheet Format". -- www.superlinksoftware.com/cocoon/andy/resume.xml?src=tg1 - Need a Java developer? www.sourceforge.net/projects/poi - port of Excel format to java http://developer.java.sun.com/developer/bugParade/bugs/4487555.html - fix java generics! The avalanche has already started. It is too late for the pebbles to vote. -Ambassador Kosh --------------------------------------------------------------------- Please check that your question has not already been answered in the FAQ before posting. <http://xml.apache.org/cocoon/faqs.html> To unsubscribe, e-mail: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For additional commands, e-mail: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
