Jeremias Maerki wrote: > On 11.02.2009 13:07:12 Vincent Hennebert wrote: >> Jeremias Maerki wrote: >>> On 10.02.2009 13:22:01 Vincent Hennebert wrote: >>>> Hi Jeremias, >>>> >>>> A few suggestions: >>>> >> <snip/> >>>>> <section id="introduction"> >>>>> <title>Introduction</title> >>>>> <p> >>>>> - The intermediate format (IF) is a proprietary XML format that >>>>> represents the area tree >>>>> - generated by the layout engine. The area tree is conceptually >>>>> defined in the >>>>> + Apache FOP now provides two different so-called intermediate >>>>> formats. The first one >>>>> + (let's call it the area tree XML format) is basically a 1:1 XML >>>>> representation of the FOP's >>>>> + area tree generated by the layout engine. The area tree is >>>>> conceptually defined in the >>>>> <a >>>>> href="http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-xsl-20011015/slice1.html#section-N742-Formatting";>XSL-FO >>>>> specification in chapter 1.1.2</a>. >>>>> - The IF can be generated through the area tree XML Renderer (the >>>>> XMLRenderer). >>>> Renaming this class into AreaTreeRenderer or AreaTreeXMLRenderer will >>>> probably allow to avoid confusion in the future. >>> -1 to that. Will break backwards-compatibility for those who are using >>> this renderer directly. It would break at least two pieces of software I >>> have. >> Breaking backwards-compatibility because of an important change in an >> API is a thing, simply have a class renamed is a non-issue if you ask >> me. It’s just a small search/replace and recompilation. > > Ok, then "simply" rename FopFactory to FormattingObjectsProcessorFactory > and see what the FOP users will tell you.
That has of course nothing to do. We are talking about a change that would bring some clarification. Admittedly small, but every little helps. >> To make things a little bit smoother though, XMLRenderer could be made >> deprecated with a suggestion to switch to AreaTree[XML]Renderer. > > And how would that make the situation any better? That would give users the time to plan the adaptation of their code. >>> If you you generate SAX events >>> (AbstractXMLRenderer.setContentHandler()), working with MIME types isn't >>> enough. >> I’m missing the point here? > > If you're selecting the XMLRenderer via its MIME type, renaming > XMLRenderer to anything else is a non-issue because it would be handled > inside FOP. But if you need to send the AT XML as SAX events somewhere > you have to instantiate XMLRenderer yourself. Hmmm. But can’t that be done through the renderer options? >>> Besides, I don't think that would really improve the whole thing >>> much. After all, with the new IF, we're not primarily talking about >>> renderers but something else (IFDocumentHandler/IFPainter). >> It’s never too obvious. After all, the two sections in the documentation >> are very similar. > > Yes, and there is just no way to make them any more dissimilar. Both are > XML-based intermediate formats. Both have their use cases. Better to > keep them close together so people know that there are two and how to > deal with them. Which is an additional reason why XMLRenderer could do with a name change IMO. However, I’ve just seen Chris’ answer, and the majority decides. Vincent
