Replying to Mathias' comments (quoted from previous thread) and also following on from Bryan's (thanks):
Carefully (since this is a public list) I would just say that I am employed in a largish public sector organisation which standardises on Star Office and where there have to be reasons given (again I have to limit what I write here) for using products other than Star Office. Of course what happens in OOo is reflected in Star Office so this is where the relevance lies. (This mailing is strictly unofficial and my own opinion as that is all my remit will allow at this moment.) Now as a bit of a EAI developer I would like to be able to say that integrations can be frontended with SO (or OOo) because there is good support for designing forms which can send data to urls and send it using XML messages (because this is what my integrations tend to require). Not being able to really say this due to weaknesses in the XML Forms in OOo/SO is unfortunate. I do tend to want to see SO continue to be our standard so I tend to hold my tongue in the organisation regarding this but others in my position might use the lack of functionality in the XML Forms as a strong reason to ask for a replacement with a product which has better XML Forms support. I have a feeling this would be considered a justifiable reason for some users and there might be some maths done which says 'if there are a significant number who need an alternative, as there might be for the integration requirements, then there may be warrant for converting all to the alternative to get economy of scale'. Sorry I can't give official backing or more facts to this. Therefore it might not be considered valid as 'evidence' of a need to progress the XML Forms. I think verifying might even precipitate it which would be a shame and hopefully unnecessary. Plus it might land me in hot water. Perhaps you do need to wait for more verifiable evidence then. Thought I'd better mention it though. I'm very grateful that the XML Forms were put in in the first place and this was probably a factor in getting adoption to start with. All the best Stephen Green Mathias wrote "... It is unquestionable that XForms is more or less ignored currently. But the same is true for the several thousands of feature and enhancement requests and reported defects in our bug tracker and the many other interesting idea that developers, users and other people interested in OOo have. What we need is valid, understandable and perhaps verifiable data that can make us believe that assigning resources to XForms work and ignoring all the other things would be good for OOo. So far neither I nor (as I assume) Svante think that we have any evidence that this might be true. We have a lot of data that shows us that assigning resources to - fixing bugs - improving usability - improving Word/Excel/Powerpoint interoperability - implementing features with high visibility or vote count - working on meta data support - improving ODF compatibility - improving performance and modularization are important. Even all this would be enough to eat up all the resources we have. So if we assigned more resources to XForms, we would need to quit working on some of the other things I briefly summed up here. Where's the proof or at least the clear hint that this would be worth it? Of course if there were interested developers in the community that would work on this "community makeover" (including writing the code and integrating it), this could be a very interesting project that we surely would support. But don't expect many coding work from the project developers (mainly it would be XML and Writer) - I don't see a lot of available resources for that ATM in these teams. Ciao, Mathias 2008/7/10 bryan rasmussen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > how about this as a reason for why we should have XForms. > > Count up the metrics of emails exchanged over the last month to this > list. I haven't made the count yet myself, but it seems clear to me > that the last two threads on Xforms are pretty popular discussions (if > we count the thread on XSLT 2.0 which also veered off into XForms > prompting the start of this conversation) and furthermore everyone > taking part in the discussion is in favor. This indicates a strong > support level. Furthermore I have to think that the XML group is > probably more likely to be composed of the sorts of technological > early adopters, innovators and geeks that provide further value to a > product by building solutions on top of it or evangelizing for it when > it implements something they like. > > I know Stephen has made some XForms things for the british government, > I've made some for the Danish government but the current > implementation was not adequate to the stated requirements of the > project (support of every required element in UBL 2.0 Invoice and > Order) > > Finally I'm sure from different big meetings with important > governmental and business types I've been in that one thing that > always gets brought up is InfoPath. XForms is currently the best bet > for a competitor to InfoPath that OO has, but its not really > competitive currently. With XSL-T 2.0 already discussed and an > improved XForms engine we could build that competitor. > > > Cheers, > Bryan Rasmussen > > On Thu, Jul 10, 2008 at 8:43 AM, Jonathon Coombes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> >> On 10/07/2008, at 1:58 AM, Svante Schubert wrote: >> >>> Changed the topic and some comments.. >>> >>> Marcin Miłkowski wrote: >>>> >>>> Alexandro Colorado pisze: >>>>> >>>>> I think that XForms really need a community makeover. This feature is >>>>> highly ignored in the OOo component space. >>>>> >>>>> First we would need more templates to show the power of Xforms. Also >>>>> some more documentation on the wiki and even codesnippets (OOoBasic >>>>> snippets?, Java). >>> >>> Yes, same templates to be shown, even better larger scenarios would be >>> helpful, that's why I asked Jonathon about details of his interests in >>> XForms. >> >> I agree that much of the problem is that there are no good examples, >> particularly above simple data entry forms. I hope to rectify this in the >> coming weeks/months to create some better examples that people will be able >> to see and utilise, but it is somewhat of a "catch 22" situation. That is, >> we need to create more advanced examples, but it is difficult to create >> these (simply at least, as defined by the complete standard) as some of the >> major features are not implemented in OOo. We can look at showing >> workarounds with these more advanced features using OOoBasic, but it just >> creates confusion and complexity that users don't want to see or use. >> >>>> Well, if you're composing anything than a trivial data entry form, XForms >>>> implementation in OOo is seriously crippled due to the lack of >>>> xforms:repeat >>>> as you cannot really edit any XML document that contains recursive >>>> structures. Otherwise, you could, for example, implement an xforms-based >>>> editor of ODF files - a kind of WordPerfect Reveal Codes on steroids ;) >>> >>> ;-) >>> >>> We have two basic scenarios: >>> 1) Form editing (lacking of usability) >>> 2) Form usage >>> >>> We might start even earlier in asking ourselves, why do we need forms (and >>> as implementation detail XForms). >>> >>> What I am asking you (with an answer in my mind), what is the great >>> benefit of XForms, why should we go further with it with OOo? >> >> Well, the simple answer I would have for why we need XForms is that it >> correlates directly to much of the real world. Working with government >> offices, large business and even small businesses, all are based around >> forms. Much of the newer technologies are based around processes within >> business and each step of the process often involves forms in some way. Some >> obvious examples in real life are invoices, purchase orders, receipts, >> inventories, quotes, licenses, medical records, school records, tax records >> and the list goes on. What XForms is designed to do is to allow much of the >> real world paper reports into an electronic form that is usable online with >> the new XML technologies. XForms offers all the advantages that were >> required for this process to happen - validation, calculation, and data >> separation, plus more. I think the big issue is people don't have a way of >> making this technology easily available in a platform agnostic, easy to >> build and use way be it on the desktop (OOo) or online (Mozilla or other >> technologies). >> >> Regards >> Jonathon >> >>> >>>> So it's not only about awareness - many xforms examples from a nice >>>> wikibook on xforms simply won't work in OOo as nicely as they do in >>>> Firefox. >>>> We need better compliance as well. >>>> Regards, >>>> Marcin >>>>> >>>>> This will hopefully increase the awareness of the tool and then we could >>>>> have some real techncial features request. >>>>> >>>>> On Wed, 09 Jul 2008 08:00:32 -0500, Svante Schubert >>>>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> Jonathon Coombes wrote: >>>>>>> >>>>>>> On 08/07/2008, at 6:40 PM, Svante Schubert wrote: >>>>>>> ... >>>>>>> Hi Svante, >>>>>>> I am glad to see that more development is happening with the >>>>>>> associated XML technologies here. I understand that much more >>>>>>> capabilities >>>>>>> will be possible with the newer specifications and better processor in >>>>>>> Saxon. My main question is will these new capabilities be implemented >>>>>>> in the >>>>>>> XForm part of OpenOffice.org? My main interest is having not just the >>>>>>> xform >>>>>>> backend, but other features such as the xforms:repeat capabilities and >>>>>>> other >>>>>>> more advanced operations. Is this something that will be coming with >>>>>>> the new >>>>>>> Saxon processor? >>>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> Hi Jonathon, >>>>>> >>>>>> I am a big fan of XForms, but AFAIK for OOo 3.0 there will be no update >>>>>> on the OOo XForms implementation. >>>>>> >>>>>> Only the XSLT filter will profit from the new specifications. >>>>>> >>>>>> But may I ask what you plan to use XForms for, what features you desire >>>>>> in detail? >>>>>> >>>>>> Aside of being curious, I would like to have some feedback and as well >>>>>> some evidence/proof that it is worth to move resources from other areas >>>>>> of >>>>>> OOo development to XForms. >>>>>> >>>>>> Kind regards, >>>>>> Svante >>>>>> >>>>>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >>>>>> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>>>>> For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >>>> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>>> For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>> >>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >>> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>> For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> >> -------------------------- >> Jonathon Coombes >> OOo Knowledgebase:- http://mindmeld.cybersite.com.au >> http://www.cybersite.com.au >> http://www.training4linux.com >> >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- >> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> >> > -- Stephen D. Green Partner SystML, http://www.systml.co.uk Tel: +44 (0) 117 9541606 Associate Director Document Engineering Services http://www.documentengineeringservices.com http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew+22:37 .. and voice
