[CREATE] Status of libora?

[Boudewijn Rempt]

On Mon, 24 Sep 2012, Jon Nordby wrote:

> The Krita guys did at some point plan to use OpenRaster as the native
> file format (don't know the current viewpoint),

When ora took off as an interchange format, it quickly became apparent
that it would never be able to represent everything that can be done in
Krita, so no, it won't be the native file format for Krita either.

The interchange role is much too important to me to burden ora with all
kinds of optional features.

> but I don't think this
> has ever been the plan for GIMP. In my opinion OpenRaster has value as
> an interchange format. For simple applications like MyPaint using it
> as a native format is useful, but for advanced applications like GIMP
> I think it would be more pain than gain. It might even break the
> exchange promise as simpler applications rarely are able to implement
> everything more advanced applications would want in a native format.
>

Right.

> I have not seen any interest from proprietary companies. But then
> again, they rarely communicate with open source projects, so it could
> be they are paying close attention for all I know. Realistically
> though, if anyone wants OpenRaster support for Adobe Photoshop I think
> it is best to just do it yourself. I believe it would be possible with
> the Photoshop SDK.

We did have an Adobe representative present at the ora discussion at LGM 
in Brussels, though. But you're right again -- I doubt that photoshop will 
ever support ora. It would be an interesting challange to implement it as
a 3rd party plugin. I think you're right when you think it should be 
possible. But I am not even going to think of doing it. It would mean 
coding on Windows. Eek!

Boudewijn