[CREATE] Re: Open File Format for Raster/Bitmaps Graphics

[Alexandre Prokoudine]

On 3/21/06, Larry Ewing wrote:

> > * Paths (the gimp uses svg here, right? That should suffice for all purposes)
>
> SVG is a huge spec (and references a huge number of other specs) and
> covers most of what this format you are describing can do itself.
> Including it as a path format is overkill and would make it trivial to
> write files that no two programs could render the same way.  Is there
> even a fully complaint SVG renderer in existence?

IIRC, Batik usually works as reference renderer

I agree about SVG - it's really huge, and even SVG Mobile will be too
much. I'd say, paths and text on path should be enough, if we are not
trying to create a composite raster/vector file format (are we not
trying?).

> > * embedded documents (either vector graphics or other) -- this is handled by
> > OpenDocument already, we just need to keep it possible.
>
> Making generic container formats quickly runs into a couple of problems.
> One is that parts of the file will quickly get out sync with other parts
> (especially metadata) try to be very explicit about what to do with
> metadata that the program doesn't understand.

I'm pretty sure that OpenDocument already handles this. Has to be
investigated thoroughly, however.

Okay, I'm adding "* embedding documents within OpenDocument framework"
to "Other" category at the working page and those of Cyrille's items
that were not debated. Please have a look:
http://create.freedesktop.org/wiki/index.php/General_multilayered_bitmap_exchange_format

Alexandre