Since I came to OpenOffice and Apache via my work on ODF at OASIS, I have some interest in this topic.
I share Sam Ruby's bafflement. Sustainability of a single committer curating the code base is certainly a concern. In November 2015, mentor Nick Burch challenged the podling with the thread starting at <http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/incubator-odf-dev/201511.mbox/%3Calpine.DEB.2.11.1510151050540.12251%40urchin.earth.li%3E>. The thread died out without any resolution other than to work on JIRA issues and their patches. - Dennis OBSERVATIONS (THE TL;DR) 1. There has been a fork of the significant ODFDOM portion of the ODF Toolkit and the fork is unwilling to contribute back to the ODF Toolkit, where new feature development seems to be dormant. 2. There seems some confusion about what going to the attic means. It does not mean that the codebase disappears, the expressed fear. It does mean that the code is frozen. That would eliminate the maintenance that is the prominent current activity. 3. The ODF Toolkit and the level of SDK support in AOO are fundamentally different, despite any similarity of function. There could be advantageous use of ODF Toolkit availability by the Apache OpenOffice project for utility, testing, and forensic activities on the project. That opportunity has not been taken and, based on that, I don't foresee it. 4. Blending into AOO would doubtless dilute the dedicated attention the ODF Toolkit now receives, especially from users and devs, without any benefit of AOO developer attention. (Merging the issue trackers would not be a plus either.) 5. It seems that ODF Toolkit is in a maintenance mode that does not lead to releases. That is evidently adequate for the current community. Since July 2014 all commits have been by two developers and since December 2014 only one of them. Many of the recent commits are application of patches provided by others on the Apache JIRA ODFTOOLKIT project, and working via JIRA seems to go well. In a brief exploration, I did not find any thrust toward expansion of ODF feature coverage. MORE BACKGROUND The ODF Toolkit came to the ASF after the Oracle licensing of OpenOffice.org to the ASF and the creation of the Apache OpenOffice podling. The ODF Toolkit is essentially a pure Java project (not a bad thing) and always had a small development community when it existed outside of Apache. It was convenient that the original ODF Toolkit project, sponsored by Oracle and IBM (whose copyright notices appear on files), was already licensed under ALv2. The ODF Toolkit shares with Apache POI the provision of APIs and low-level functions, in this case for manipulation of ODF-format documents. The ODF Toolkit does not deal with GUI or other types of user-facing functionality. It is mainly a stack for developer usage in ODF processing tools and utilities. The ODF Validator component of the project is user-operable when deployed. I do not know the state of coverage of the ODF 1.2 format or the quality of semantic validation beyond the schema level. I do not know the extent to which the profiles of ODF support by products like Microsoft Office and Apache OpenOffice are recognized. (That also applies with respect to feature coverage of the ODF Toolkit generally.) The ODF Toolkit is very different from SDK provided in Apache OpenOffice releases. The AOO SDK provides APIs into running instances of Apache OpenOffice and supports such things as headless operation, injection of extensions, etc. The ODF Toolkit is free-standing and lacks the complexity of the AOO SDK and the tight dependency on a full Apache OpenOffice instance. This is not a bad thing. There are also utility functions within the Apache OpenOffice code base and SDK that are usable apart from AOO. These are the AOO UNO tools, unique to AOO, along with additional source to make them operable independently with reliance on the AOO UNO library alone. The ODF Toolkit does not depend on UNO at all, providing greater fit into a Java-centric effort. > -----Original Message----- > From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Sam Ruby > Sent: Monday, March 28, 2016 05:48 > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: 54 podlings - too many? > > On Mon, Mar 28, 2016 at 8:37 AM, Harbs <[email protected]> wrote: > > What about recommending that it be adopted by OpenOffice? > > > > IIUC, ODF Toolkit predates OpenOffice becoming an Apache Project. It > seems (to an outsider like me) like the OpenOffice community would be a > good home for a related toolkit. > > It was proposed as a separate project from the beginning by a member > of the Open Office community. > > - Sam Ruby > > > Harbs > > > > On Mar 28, 2016, at 2:33 PM, Sam Ruby <[email protected]> wrote: > > > >> On Mon, Mar 28, 2016 at 6:44 AM, John D. Ament > <[email protected]> wrote: > >>> Both great ideas. Thanksfully, Whimsy helps a bit on the age part > >>> > >>> https://whimsy.apache.org/incubator/podlings/by-age > >>> > >>> It also gives a clean dashboard to display who the mentors are, etc. > Is it > >>> possible we can have the mentors of each project give this feedback > in an > >>> objective manner? > >> > >> Hmmm, that pie chart looks wonky. > >> > >> Second on the list is ODF Toolkit, with my name. Relevant links: > >> > >> http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/incubator-odf-commits/ > >> https://whimsy.apache.org/board/minutes/ODF_Toolkit.html > >> > >> Short summary: development continues in a slow, sometimes bursty, but > >> steady manner; hasn't had a release in nearly two years; hasn't added > >> any committers or PMC members in over three years; has an > >> understanding of what they need to do to graduate. > >> > >> Periodically I peek in expecting to make a recommendation one way or > >> another, but not seeing anything worth adding. I honestly don't know > >> what to recommend. > >> > >> - Sam Ruby > >> > >>> John > >>> > >>> On Mon, Mar 28, 2016 at 2:00 AM Jean-Baptiste Onofré > <[email protected]> > >>> wrote: > >>> > >>>> Hi, > >>>> > >>>> I agree with Justin. > >>>> > >>>> Maybe, we should do kind of audit: > >>>> - are the podlings actually active (commits, messages on the > mailing > >>>> list, releases, etc) ? > >>>> - for how long are they in the incubator ? > >>>> - how far are they from graduation ? > >>>> > >>>> We can spread this work with "buckets" assigned to volunteer > Incubator > >>>> PMC members. I would be happy to help there. > >>>> > >>>> Regards > >>>> JB > >>>> > >>>> On 03/28/2016 03:42 AM, Justin Mclean wrote: > >>>>> Hi, > >>>>> > >>>>>> We're currently at 54 podlings in the incubator. > >>>>> > >>>>> A more use stat would perhaps to see: > >>>>> a) How long they have been in incubation? > >>>>> b) How many releases have they made? > >>>>> > >>>>> May be easier to then target one that should graduate or perhaps > retire? > >>>>> > >>>>> Thanks, > >>>>> Justin > >>>>> > >>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------ > --- > >>>>> To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] > >>>>> For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected] > >>>>> > >>>> > >>>> -- > >>>> Jean-Baptiste Onofré > >>>> [email protected] > >>>> http://blog.nanthrax.net > >>>> Talend - http://www.talend.com > >>>> > >>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------- > -- > >>>> 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]
