Hi all,
I have been thinking about updating itext from 2.1 7 to 5.0.1. It sounds like a huge jump but in reality, there was only one version it between, 5.0.0.
However, the 5.0.x update is not fully backward compatible. Here are the changes:
1- Instead of com.lowagie.text, the new itext uses the path com.itexpdf.text. This is easy to fix on dependent packages: - pdftk (I am a comaintainer. I already made a patch for this) - tuxguitar (I am the maintainer) - libfonts - liblayout
I don't maintain the last two but I can patch them up if it is okay,
2- We used to ship itext with xml support. This part of the code was not in the itext-2.1.7 tree but we had ported this over from a 1.x release [1]. I am not familiar with this part of the code and I was told that this add-on was needed by maven. Is this still valid?
The issue is, itext-5.0.0+ dropped some other part of its code, which our xml patch was depending on. In particular, the rtf support of itext moved to a separate project [2]
Now we have a few options: 1- Package the new project separately. And move the xml patch to this package. 2- Drop rtf bits from our xml patch (I don't know if this is possible. I didn't check. overholt?) 3- Don't update itext. Stick with 2.1.7 for now.
As I don't know what that xml patch does with maven, I hesitate updating itext. By the way, why does maven not require itext?
Here is an initial attempt for the 5.0.1 update without xml support: [3]
Please share your ideas, potential problems, solutions, proposals etc.
Cheers, Orcan
[1] http://cvs.fedoraproject.org/viewvc/rpms/itext/devel/itext-xmloutput.patch?v... [2] http://sourceforge.net/projects/itextrtf [3] http://oget.fedorapeople.org/review/itext-5.0.1-1.fc12.src.rpm
On 13 February 2010 15:05, Orcan Ogetbil oget.fedora@gmail.com wrote:
2- We used to ship itext with xml support. This part of the code was not in the itext-2.1.7 tree but we had ported this over from a 1.x release [1]. I am not familiar with this part of the code and I was told that this add-on was needed by maven. Is this still valid?
The issue is, itext-5.0.0+ dropped some other part of its code, which our xml patch was depending on. In particular, the rtf support of itext moved to a separate project [2]
Coincidentally, I'm actually playing around with building the newest maven-doxia stuff at the moment, and it looks like it does still require the XML classes. According to its pom.xml, it is still assuming itext 1.4, so I guess that's where the requirement comes from. I'm not sure whether it needs the rtf stuff too ...
So I think we do need to keep the XML stuff but I'm not sure about the rtf stuff.
MEF
On 17 February 2010 16:11, Andrew Overholt overholt@redhat.com wrote:
On Sat, 2010-02-13 at 15:53 +0000, Mary Ellen Foster wrote:
Coincidentally, I'm actually playing around with building the newest maven-doxia stuff at the moment
What's the SVN tag you're using? I'm going to investigate the Doxia + iText situation.
The SRPMS are here: http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/~mef3/maven/ The updated plexus-utils is also necessary because it depends on some newer classes. Actually it only needs 1.5.7, but 2.0.1 is the latest and also seems to work.
MEF
Hi,
On Sat, 2010-02-13 at 10:05 -0500, Orcan Ogetbil wrote:
2- We used to ship itext with xml support. This part of the code was not in the itext-2.1.7 tree but we had ported this over from a 1.x release [1]. I am not familiar with this part of the code and I was told that this add-on was needed by maven. Is this still valid?
Yes, Maven Doxia 1.1.2 still requires this XML support which, as you have noticed, is no longer in iText 5.x. A related Doxia JIRA is:
http://jira.codehaus.org/browse/DOXIA-53
The issue is, itext-5.0.0+ dropped some other part of its code, which our xml patch was depending on. In particular, the rtf support of itext moved to a separate project [2]
... and I can't make itextrtf build against iText 5.0.x :(
1- Package the new project separately. And move the xml patch to this package.
A lot of changes will need to be made to make it build against iText 5.0.x.
2- Drop rtf bits from our xml patch (I don't know if this is possible. I didn't check. overholt?)
This may be a good option but even without the RTF stuff, it will require patching to get the XML bits to compile. For one thing, the HTML stuff has changed; see:
http://itextpdf.com/history.php?branch=history.50&node=500
"* Removal of SimpleCell, SimpleTable. * Removal of Table, Cell, Row, PdfTable, PdfCell."
Would you like me to continue investigating this situation, with an end goal of being able to build Doxia 1.1.2 against iText 5.0.1?
3- Don't update itext. Stick with 2.1.7 for now.
This is easiest but until Doxia either moves to a newer iText (which I'm not sure is even possible) or uses fop instead of iText, this will still be a thorn in our side.
Another option is maintaining iText 2.x as "itext2" and moving the main itext package to 5.x. We can also go back to the Doxia people and ask them about this situation.
Thanks for doing this work and for investigating possibilities, Orcan!
Andrew
On Wed, Feb 17, 2010 at 2:55 PM, Andrew Overholt wrote:
The issue is, itext-5.0.0+ dropped some other part of its code, which our xml patch was depending on. In particular, the rtf support of itext moved to a separate project [2]
... and I can't make itextrtf build against iText 5.0.x :(
1- Package the new project separately. And move the xml patch to this package.
A lot of changes will need to be made to make it build against iText 5.0.x.
Uh oh. Not good.
2- Drop rtf bits from our xml patch (I don't know if this is possible. I didn't check. overholt?)
This may be a good option but even without the RTF stuff, it will require patching to get the XML bits to compile. For one thing, the HTML stuff has changed; see:
http://itextpdf.com/history.php?branch=history.50&node=500
"* Removal of SimpleCell, SimpleTable. * Removal of Table, Cell, Row, PdfTable, PdfCell."
Would you like me to continue investigating this situation, with an end goal of being able to build Doxia 1.1.2 against iText 5.0.1?
It is all up to you. I don't. know of anybody who really needs itext5 for the time being. I am totally fine staying with 2.7. So, other than maven doxia stuff there are the following packages that depend on itext:
- pdftk: dead upstream. It is already patched to the extent that almost half of its code is written by us. More patching won't hurt :) - tuxguitar, libfonts, liblayout: I just verified that upstreams of these project didn't convert to itext5 yet.
I wrote patches for the above for itext5 (just changed the include paths) and they seem to be operational. So for the time being (again), we are in good shape if we are to stay with 2.7.
3- Don't update itext. Stick with 2.1.7 for now.
This is easiest but until Doxia either moves to a newer iText (which I'm not sure is even possible) or uses fop instead of iText, this will still be a thorn in our side.
Another option is maintaining iText 2.x as "itext2" and moving the main itext package to 5.x. We can also go back to the Doxia people and ask them about this situation.
Eh... I don't like doing this if there is really no need to have two versions simultaneously. We may consider this in the future.
Thanks for doing this work and for investigating possibilities, Orcan!
No problem. Let us stick to 2.7 and wait until someone yells at us :)
Cheers, Orcan
* Orcan Ogetbil oget.fedora@gmail.com [2010-02-18 04:29]:
No problem. Let us stick to 2.7 and wait until someone yells at us :)
I agree.
Andrew
java-devel@lists.fedoraproject.org
-
Andrew Overholt -
Mary Ellen Foster -
Orcan Ogetbil