src/documentation/content/xdocs/hwpf/index.xml - poi - Git at Google

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 <!DOCTYPE document PUBLIC "-//APACHE//DTD Documentation V1.1//EN" "../dtd/document-v11.dtd">

 <document>
  <header>
   <title>Apache POI - HWPF - Java API to Handle Microsoft Word Files</title>
   <subtitle>Overview</subtitle>
   <authors>
    <person name="Nicola Ken Barozzi" email="barozzi@nicolaken.com"/>
    <person name="Andrew C. Oliver" email="acoliver@apache.org"/>
    <person name="Ryan Ackley" email="sackley@apache.org"/>
    <person name="Rainer Klute" email="klute@apache.org"/>
   </authors>
  </header>

  <body>
  <section><title>Overview</title>

   <p>HWPF is the name of our port of the Microsoft Word 97(-2002) file format
     to pure Java.</p>

   <p>HWPF is still in early development. It is in the <link
      href="http://svn.apache.org/viewcvs.cgi/poi/trunk/src/scratchpad/">
      scratchpad section of the SVN.</link> You will need to ensure you
      either have a recent SVN checkout, or a recent SVN nightly build
      (including the scratchpad jar!)</p>

   <p>Source in the
      <em>org.apache.poi.hwpf.model</em> tree is the old legacy code refactored
      into an object model. Source code in the
      <em>org.apache.poi.hwpf.extractor</em> tree is a wrapper of this to
      facilitate easy extraction of interesting things (eg the Text).
      Source code in the <em>org.apache.poi.hdf</em> tree is the old legacy
      code.
    </p>

    <section>
     <title>HWPF Pointman Needed!</title>

     <p>At the moment we unfortunately do not have someone taking care for HWPF
      and fostering its development. What we need is someone to stand up, take
      this thing under his hood as his baby and push it forward. Ryan Ackley,
      who put a lot of effort into HWPF, is no longer on board, so HWPF is an
      orphan child waiting to be adopted.</p>

     <p>If <strong>you</strong> are interested in becoming the new HWPF
      pointman, you should look into the Microsoft Word internals. A good
      starting point seems to be Ryan Ackley's  <link
       href="docoverview.html">overview</link>. This document contains a link to
      a detailled Word format description you can find somewhere at
      <link href="http://www.wotsit.org/">http://www.wotsit.org/</link>. Please
      do not contact Ryan Ackley directly, because he is working for a company
      now that signed a NDA with Microsoft and thus he will be no longer able to
      answer questions.</p>

     <p>As a first step you should familiarize yourself with the source code,
      examples, test cases, and the HWPF patches available at <link
       href="http://issues.apache.org/">Bugzilla</link> (if any). Then you
      should compile an overview of</p>

     <ul>
      <li>the current HWPF status,</li>
      <li>the patches in <link
        href="http://issues.apache.org/bugzilla/">Bugzilla</link> to be checked
       in (and those that should better be ditched),</li>
      <li>the available test cases and the test cases still to be written,</li>
      <li>the available documentation and the docs to be written,</li>
      <li>anything else that seems reasonable</li>
     </ul>

     <p>When you start start coding, you will not yet have write access to the
      CVS repository. Please submit your patches to <link
       href="http://issues.apache.org/">Bugzilla</link> and nag <link
       href="mailto:klute@apache.org">Rainer Klute</link> until he commits
      them. Besides the actual checking in of HWPF patches Rainer will also do
      some minor reviews now and then of your source code patches, test cases
      and documentation to help ensure software quality. But most of the time
      you will be on your own.</p>

     <p>Please do not forget to write <link
       href="http://www.junit.org/">JUnit</link> test cases and documentation!
      We won't accept code that doesn't come with test cases. And please
      consider that other contributors should be able to understand your source
      code easily. If you need any help getting started with JUnit test cases
      for HWPF, please ask on the developers' mailing list! If you show that you
      are prepared to stick at it you will most likely be given CVS commit
      access.</p>

     <p><strong>Important:</strong> It is legally vital for POI that you have
      never seen any documentation or specification from Microsoft that required
      you or your employer to sign an NDA to get it. Please do read the <link
       href="../getinvolved/index.html">"Contribution to POI" page</link> for
      details! This page also contains further information for you to start POI
      development.</p>

     <p>Of course we will help you as best as we can. However, presently there
      is no committer who is really familiar with the Word format, so you'll be
      mostly on your own. We are looking forward for you and your contributions!
      Honor and glory of becoming a POI committer are waiting!</p>
    </section>
   </section>
  </body>
 </document>

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	<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
	<!--
	====================================================================
	Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
	contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file distributed with
	this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
	The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
	(the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
	the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

	http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

	Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
	distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
	WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
	See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
	limitations under the License.
	====================================================================
	-->
	<!DOCTYPE document PUBLIC "-//APACHE//DTD Documentation V1.1//EN" "../dtd/document-v11.dtd">

	<document>
	<header>
	<title>Apache POI - HWPF - Java API to Handle Microsoft Word Files</title>
	<subtitle>Overview</subtitle>
	<authors>
	<person name="Nicola Ken Barozzi" email="barozzi@nicolaken.com"/>
	<person name="Andrew C. Oliver" email="acoliver@apache.org"/>
	<person name="Ryan Ackley" email="sackley@apache.org"/>
	<person name="Rainer Klute" email="klute@apache.org"/>
	</authors>
	</header>

	<body>
	<section><title>Overview</title>

	<p>HWPF is the name of our port of the Microsoft Word 97(-2002) file format
	to pure Java.</p>

	<p>HWPF is still in early development. It is in the <link
	href="http://svn.apache.org/viewcvs.cgi/poi/trunk/src/scratchpad/">
	scratchpad section of the SVN.</link> You will need to ensure you
	either have a recent SVN checkout, or a recent SVN nightly build
	(including the scratchpad jar!)</p>

	<p>Source in the
	<em>org.apache.poi.hwpf.model</em> tree is the old legacy code refactored
	into an object model. Source code in the
	<em>org.apache.poi.hwpf.extractor</em> tree is a wrapper of this to
	facilitate easy extraction of interesting things (eg the Text).
	Source code in the <em>org.apache.poi.hdf</em> tree is the old legacy
	code.
	</p>

	<section>
	<title>HWPF Pointman Needed!</title>

	<p>At the moment we unfortunately do not have someone taking care for HWPF
	and fostering its development. What we need is someone to stand up, take
	this thing under his hood as his baby and push it forward. Ryan Ackley,
	who put a lot of effort into HWPF, is no longer on board, so HWPF is an
	orphan child waiting to be adopted.</p>

	<p>If <strong>you</strong> are interested in becoming the new HWPF
	pointman, you should look into the Microsoft Word internals. A good
	starting point seems to be Ryan Ackley's <link
	href="docoverview.html">overview</link>. This document contains a link to
	a detailled Word format description you can find somewhere at
	<link href="http://www.wotsit.org/">http://www.wotsit.org/</link>. Please
	do not contact Ryan Ackley directly, because he is working for a company
	now that signed a NDA with Microsoft and thus he will be no longer able to
	answer questions.</p>

	<p>As a first step you should familiarize yourself with the source code,
	examples, test cases, and the HWPF patches available at <link
	href="http://issues.apache.org/">Bugzilla</link> (if any). Then you
	should compile an overview of</p>

	<ul>
	<li>the current HWPF status,</li>
	<li>the patches in <link
	href="http://issues.apache.org/bugzilla/">Bugzilla</link> to be checked
	in (and those that should better be ditched),</li>
	<li>the available test cases and the test cases still to be written,</li>
	<li>the available documentation and the docs to be written,</li>
	<li>anything else that seems reasonable</li>
	</ul>

	<p>When you start start coding, you will not yet have write access to the
	CVS repository. Please submit your patches to <link
	href="http://issues.apache.org/">Bugzilla</link> and nag <link
	href="mailto:klute@apache.org">Rainer Klute</link> until he commits
	them. Besides the actual checking in of HWPF patches Rainer will also do
	some minor reviews now and then of your source code patches, test cases
	and documentation to help ensure software quality. But most of the time
	you will be on your own.</p>

	<p>Please do not forget to write <link
	href="http://www.junit.org/">JUnit</link> test cases and documentation!
	We won't accept code that doesn't come with test cases. And please
	consider that other contributors should be able to understand your source
	code easily. If you need any help getting started with JUnit test cases
	for HWPF, please ask on the developers' mailing list! If you show that you
	are prepared to stick at it you will most likely be given CVS commit
	access.</p>

	<p><strong>Important:</strong> It is legally vital for POI that you have
	never seen any documentation or specification from Microsoft that required
	you or your employer to sign an NDA to get it. Please do read the <link
	href="../getinvolved/index.html">"Contribution to POI" page</link> for
	details! This page also contains further information for you to start POI
	development.</p>

	<p>Of course we will help you as best as we can. However, presently there
	is no committer who is really familiar with the Word format, so you'll be
	mostly on your own. We are looking forward for you and your contributions!
	Honor and glory of becoming a POI committer are waiting!</p>
	</section>
	</section>
	</body>
	</document>

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