Re: [office] "document template"

[Jomar Silva <jomar.silva@br.odfalliance.org>]

On Thu, Jul 14, 2011 at 5:41 PM, Patrick Durusau <patrick@durusau.net> wrote:
> Jomar,
>
> On 7/14/2011 4:09 PM, Jomar Silva wrote:
>>
>> Hi Dennis
>>
>> On Thu, Jul 14, 2011 at 4:45 PM, Dennis E. Hamilton
>> <dennis.hamilton@acm.org>  wrote:
>>>
>>> A case that interests me is what happens if the template is changed after
>>> a document that depended on it is produced?  What if a template of the same
>>> name exists at the consumer who opens a document that was produced from a
>>> template of the same name (the famous normal.dot comes to mind)?
>>
>> As far as I remember, a template is only used to format the document
>> during it's initial creation, and to provide for users a special set
>> of pre-defined styles that they can use on the document. I never heard
>> (or saw) an office document use case as you present here.
>>
> The problem is that we define "pointing" at a template from inside an ODF
> document.
>
> Question: What is the "thing" being pointed at?
>
> Is it an ODF document?
>
> If so, we have an ODF document pointing at an ODF document.
>
> Recalling that we define the contents of templates, which seems to me to
> point towards a template being an ODF document.
>
> I don't think there is an answer in the current text, hence the reason I
> started this line of questions before formulating a proposal.

OK... I understand the issue now, but I don't see how Dennis use case
affects that (shame on me).

>> The way you're explaining here looks like the .css usage on HTML
>> files, but I don't think that we have something similar to that in the
>> real world of office documents.
>>
>>> None of these behaviors or anything else is addressed in the
>>> specification, and I'm not sure that it can be.
>>
>> I have serious doubts if this is something that we may address in the
>> specification:
>>
>> 1. Do we need really to explain to people how-to use templates ?
>>
>> 2. If we do so, how big is the risk of halting innovation on this area ?
>>
>
> Well, if we aren't going to define templates and at least how they are
> invoked by ODF documents, why mention them at all?
>
> You can have all the "innovation" you want by simply saying nothing.
>
> That does create interoperability problems.
>
> Just off the top of my head, I was thinking of proposing that that a
> template be defined as styles, content, forms, etc., prior to the entry of
> user created content. Once a document has user created content, unless saved
> as a template, it is simply an ODF document, etc. OK, would have to define
> ODF document to exclude templates.

+1 on that... BTW this is how I understand document templates, and
this is something that we should define on the standard seeing that
this understanding may not be the same everywhere.

This raised another question: Does anyone there knows if (and how)
applications uses the template-related elements ? (I did some quick
tests with OpenOffice saving document templates and I didn't saw any
template element used there).

> From my perspective, templates involved assumptions about application
> behavior that are not defined in the standard. What I want to do is put
> everyone on an explicit and even footing with regard to those assumptions.
> That involves making them explicit.
>
> We could abandon templates entirely to the realm of application behavior,
> although I think that would be a bad solution. But it would be an explicit
> solution.
>
> Hope you are having a great day!
>
> Patrick
Best,

Jomar