Abiword version 2.0.10 and 2.0.7 do not allow for the importing of OpenOffice .sxw files (and possibly others) if it is emerged without gnome support. It lacks a file->import menu option, and .sxw is not listed as a compatible format in the file->open dialogue. This is NOT the case if Abiword is emerged WITH gnome support. See the forum thread: http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=1474371#1474371 Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Emerge Abiword (2.0.10 or 2.0.7) without GNOME use flag (-gnome) 2. Attempt to open or import .sxw file Actual Results: OpenOffice document is displayed as giberish. Expected Results: "import" should be present under file menu, which should then allow me to import OpenOffice .sxw files, or the file->open dialogue should list OpenOffice .sxw files as a compatible format. bash-2.05b# emerge info Portage 2.0.50-r10 (default-x86-2004.2, gcc-3.3.4, glibc-2.3.3.20040420-r1, 2.6. 8-gentoo) ================================================================= System uname: 2.6.8-gentoo i686 AMD Athlon(tm) XP 2500+ Gentoo Base System version 1.4.16 Autoconf: sys-devel/autoconf-2.59-r4 Automake: sys-devel/automake-1.8.5-r1 ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86" AUTOCLEAN="yes" CFLAGS="-march=athlon-xp -mcpu=athlon-xp -O3 -fprefetch-loop-arrays -fomit-frame -pointer -ftracer -pipe" CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu" COMPILER="" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb /usr/kde/2/share/config /usr/kde/3/s hare/config /usr/share/config /var/qmail/control" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/gconf /etc/terminfo /etc/env.d" CXXFLAGS="-march=athlon-xp -mcpu=athlon-xp -O3 -fprefetch-loop-arrays -fomit-fra me-pointer -ftracer -pipe" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" FEATURES="autoaddcvs ccache sandbox" GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://gentoo.osuosl.org http://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/dis tributions/gentoo" MAKEOPTS="-j2" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" PORTDIR_OVERLAY="" SYNC="rsync://rsync.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage" USE="3dnow 3dnowex X alsa apm avi cdr crypt cups dvd encode foomaticdb gif gtk g tk2 imlib java jpeg libg++ libwww mad mikmod mmx mpeg ncurses oggvorbis opengl p am pdflib png quicktime sdl spell sse ssl svga tcpd truetype x86 xinerama xml2 x v zlib"
i can't reproduce this with 2.0.10 , i can just open them via the file menu & also the import function is available. mg, does this mean anything to you ?
It's nonsense. If the sxw plugin is working, you have the format in file->open. If not, you don't. Gnome doesnt have the slightest thing to do with it.
Of course it has nothing to do with gnome, but it could be a strange issue with the ebuild. The forum http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=1474371 confirms another user was able to reproduce the problem. It doesn't make any sense to me either, but I haven't found any kind of solution.
Okay, well, I haven't the faintest about the apparently ebuild issue, but I suppose the best way to go about it would be for you to determine where the problem actually occurs (ie, does the plugin get built? if not, does configure give a reason? If so, is there an error at runtime?) Actually, I can conceive of how using gnome might affect it, but I'd rather not go into that if not necessary. Just need to find out where the problem is.
according to the readme found in the OpenWriter plugin source, it requires libgsf, could it be that is missing? Maybe that should be added to the depend list?
Created attachment 45900 [details] ebuild for abiword 2.0.14 with libgsf rdepend here's an ebuild for abiword 2.0.14 with libgsf added to rdepend. can someone with a system that still have this problem try it?
Created attachment 45901 [details, diff] diff and here's the diff
The current method is that whatever plugins can be built are. If you have libgsf, it builds the plugin, if not it doesn't. I didn't know that's what this bug was about. What you're doing is making an optional (and barely working) plugin mandatory. AbiWord already sets a policy of mandatory importers and exporters - they're called .doc, .rtf, and .html, and they're the ones that are _not_ plugins.
in that case have a use flag for it?
foser, what do you say to IUSEing "gsf"?
I'm not much in favor of adding USE flags over trivialities. Especially if the plugin is as you say immature I don't see the need to promote it in such way.
then can we disable it all togather? The way it is now, is worst in my opinion.
I don't get it. How is the possibility, if slightly inconvenient, of using the immature plugin if you fully intend to worse than the impossibility, in which case opening a .sxw as what it is cannot even be attempted? IOW, I fail to see how disabling it would be an improvement on the status quo.
sxw files are quite common in the linux world, as is abiword... it seems rather silly to disable support for sxw in abiword. I would vote to make it a dependency, I dont see why we need a use flag for it...
for current status of .sxw support see http://bugzilla.abisource.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2183#c21
Not to discredit the prior developers of the plugin, myself included in small part, but in addition to that list of stuff still not supported, there's more, and many things regardless of whether or not they're supported don't work properly and can even cause crash. This is why I'm not in favor of a hard dependancy. Furthermore, one of the chief values of plugins is that they're optional. That said, I'm not in favor of disabling it. Gentoo currently reaches a nice bslance of this by pulling in plugins, but only those that build and work to some extent (even if not very well), and for which the dependancies are already available. In the future abiword itself really will depend on libgsf. At that time, this will be a nonissue, but until then, my vote is for the status quo.
how about a use flag like ooo-experimental ? Or at the very least document this issue somewhere so that users who emerge abiword without first emerging libgsf will know that they are not getting OpenOffice support.
with mg's veto i'd say the plugin is not fit to be supported 'officially' at this point and so won't we.
wrt "document this issue" <-- I wouldn't be against a one-liner info message post-merge telling the user something to the effect of "if you need the SXW plugin, make sure you have libgsf merged before abiword." Don't have a patch for that on hand though - perhaps basic you'd like to attach one for foser's consideration (he's no less busy than I am).