--- On Tue, 8/16/11, Timothy Pearson <kb9vqf@...> wrote:

> From: Timothy Pearson <kb9vqf@...>
> Subject: Re: [trinity-devel] LibreOffice 3.4.2
> To: trinity-devel@...
> Date: Tuesday, August 16, 2011, 7:15 PM
> > Today I updated LibreOffice to
> version 3.4.2. The Slackware package is
> > nothing more than a converted RPM from the upstream
> Open Document
> > Foundation (ODF).
> >
> > There is no support for KDE3 file picker dialog boxes.
> No option even
> > exists in the Options.
> >
> > I'm using 3.5.10, which is not Trinity, but I'm
> guessing if the upstream
> > RPM from ODF is like this then Trinity likely gets
> miffed too.
> >
> > How do we convince the ODF developers to directly
> provide KDE3/Trinity
> > support upstream when they build their official
> release?
> >
> > Darrell
> >
> 
> By providing a plugin that is maintained by the official
> TDE project. 
> That is on our to-do list, but has not yet been started.
> 
> Essentially the following must happen:
> 1.) Pull the KDE3 picker code (including build script
> alterations) from
> the OpenOffice 3.2 / TDE 3.5.12 builds on QuickBuild.
> 2.) Ensure that they apply to LibreOffice and produce
> working binaries on
> TDE 3.5.13 with Qt3.
> 3.) Convert to TQt (a simple process that I can do in a day
> or so AFAIK)
> and rename all "KDE" strings to "TDE".
> 4.) Rebuild, test, etc. until everything works properly.
> 5.) Push the patches into our GIT and notify LibreOffice
> that we have a
> new plugin for them!
> 
> Volunteers are welcome as usual. ;-)
> 
> Tim
> 
> 
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> 

Thank you for all the responses.

The whole point of my question, which I did not emphasize, is end-users should not need to recompile LibreOffice to obtain native file picker dialog boxes. Support for native dialogs should be transparent to users.

That OpenSuse provides such support does not help people using other distros. :)

My point is why can't the official release upstream from the Document Foundation developers include that native support from the beginning? If we need to provide those patches and hooks then fine, but the official build release of LibreOffice should not need to be recompiled downstream.

If I understand correctly, compiling LibreOffice requires several hours, even on a modern system. End users are not going to bother. Also, LibreOffice is not a standard app in all distros. Therefore having native dialog box support upstream is best for all end users. That approach eliminates packaging issues downstream. Further, even for those distros that support LibreOffice, most if not all of the packagers could care less about KDE3/Trinity support. They will ensure only that KDE4/GNOME is supported.

I believe that whatever effort or patches we provide should support the original KDE 3.5.10 too. KDE 3.5.10 is not yet dead despite whatever KDE developers want to believe. If we provide patches that support both platforms then that shows we are embracing more than just "our little world," which should motivate LibreOffice developers to embrace our patches. At least support KDE3 in the beginning. I think once Trinity is again in the news with the next official release that upstream attitudes will change and LibreOffice developers will accept supporting native file pickers.

Although nice, I'm not concerned with complete look-and-feel compatibility with KDE3/Trinity (for example, icons), just the file pickers. The LibreOffice file pickers are sh*t. :)

Darrell