Re: [office-collab] Compromise on change-tracking proposals

[Thorsten Behrens <tbehrens@novell.com>]

Svante Schubert wrote:
> After a thorough analysis of the ongoing discussion regarding
> change-tracking (CT), I would like to suggest a compromise between
> the two existing proposals.
> 
Hi Svante, all,

first off, I like your fresh view on this, and especially the
broader scope of collaboration you address. Please allow me a few
comments inline.

> 3. The changes are moved out of the "content.xml" and "styles.xml" into
>    an "undo.xml" file. This is to allow applications to load either the
>    ODF content or the changes.
> 
This is nice in and of itself. It makes it trivial for e.g. viewing
applications to ignore document history, and it conveniently
abstracts away change tracking from any specific rendering of a
document to odf. It's also quite terse. :)

> The ODF change-events will be defined in the ODF specification,
> especially including the mapping to the ODF XML change (and vice
> versa) via GCT.
>
If that yields a good, descriptive way to document change event
semantics, sure. Though it's not an end in itself, and I see the
same ambiguity problems for complex change events, as with GCT in
general. At the very least, I'd refuse mandating detailed infoset
changes, unless we're sure ODF is non-ambiguous in the document
feature at hand.

> 1. Changes made in real-time collaboration scenarios can use the same
>    change-events as specified for change-tracking.
>
A clear winner for me.

I'd actually like to see a few more examples of the more complex use
cases from http://wiki.oasis-open.org/office/ChangeTrackingUseCases
- especially those where one of the current contestants show issues.
I think that would help us all to better appreciate your proposal.

Cheers,

-- 

Thorsten Behrens

Novell GmbH, Nördlicher Zubringer 9-11, 40470 Düsseldorf; GF: Jeff
Hawn, Jennifer Guild, Felix Imendörffer; HRB 21108 (AG Düsseldorf)

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