LibreOffice 4.2.0 beta1 available for testing

I'd like to encourage people on the Docs list, if you're not working
on the Calc 4.1 Guide or one of the books on Base (or even if you
are), to download and test LibreOffice 4.2.0 beta1. You will be
helping QA (by testing and reporting bugs) and, at the same time,
learning what features need to be written up for the next iteration of
the user guides.

To get the beta, go to http://www.libreoffice.org/download/ and click
on "Pre-releases:" which is several lines down from the big green
"Main installer" button.

This is the first of two betas (and thus a LibreOfficeDev build) and
can be installed alongside the stable version.

See https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/ReleasePlan/4.2#4.2.0_release
for the complete schedule.

--Jean

Hello

I've started to look at sections of the Getting Started guide with a view to updating it to the 4.2x branch.

I've made minor, preliminary edits to GS4001 and uploaded the chapter to the ODF Authors site for review and comment. It can be found here:
http://www.odfauthors.org/libreoffice/english/getting-started/draft-lo-4.2/gs4201-introducing-libreoffice/at_download/file

I've identified a few aspects that may need updating upon release of LO 4.2 and noted them in the document. I also tried to note them at https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/ReleaseNotes/4.2, but it appears that I'm unable to save changes.

Time permitting, I will continue through the Getting Started guide (skipping the chapters 4,6,7 and 8).

Regards,

Martin

Dear Martin,

as I have already informed on the libreoffice-documentation list, we currently translate the Getting started guide to Slovak. Currently, about 50% of the text is translated.

We decided to use OmegaT for translation, since it should enable, thanks to its translation memory, translate new guides using the old translated guides. We decided to do that this way, since we expected that one day somebody will start with the 4.2 version :).

The problem with the guide is, that the text is really poorly formatted - it uses a lot of useless direct formatting, which probably reflects its long history. Thus, in the original form it is not translatable by OmegaT. To do that, we had to clean the formatting, which took us tens of hours. Since CTRM-M does not in fact clear direct formatting, the work was done partially manually and partially by a script on the XML level. I've sent a message about that to the list a few months ago, unfortunately with no reaction: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/global/documentation/msg16573.html

In the cleaned version all formating is done by means of styles - there is no direct formating used. Otherwise, the documents are identical. If you use the cleaned version, it would enable to me, and also to other translators, to move smoothly to 4.2 - something which is otherwise not possible.

I will be happy to send to you the cleaned version - that one referred to in my older post is not actual anymore.

Best

Milos

Dňa 2013-12-06 20:02, Martin Saffron wrote / napísal(a):

Milos, my apologies for not paying more attention to your earlier note
and replying then. I am now downloading your cleaned files, which
should indeed be VERY helpful to us and save us a lot of work. I'll
put them on the ODFAuthors site and let the team know to use them as
the starting point when updating the Getting Started book.

Do you plan to clean up other books as well?

--Jean

Dňa 2013-12-07 02:30, Jean Weber wrote / napísal(a):

Milos, my apologies for not paying more attention to your earlier note
and replying then. I am now downloading your cleaned files, which
should indeed be VERY helpful to us and save us a lot of work. I'll
put them on the ODFAuthors site and let the team know to use them as
the starting point when updating the Getting Started book.

Dear Jean,

thank you for you kind answer. However, please, do not use that old version, because meanwhile I've created a new one: http://ubuntuone.com/0wKYgmWPo7jM03xNeUXqSU.

Do you plan to clean up other books as well?

I will help, of course. I can clean up also other guides - just let me know where to start. What I did was in fact quite simple. I've just changed the direct bold to either OOoStrongEmphasis or OOoMenuPath (by guessing which one) and similarly italics to OOoEmphasis of OOoKeyStroke and then run the script. Maybe, more shoud be done than this, for example there are two sets of styles defined now - the OOo styles and the LO styles. It would perhaps not be bad if each author would use character styles with differently colored background - in that case incorrect formating would be immediately visible.

best
Milos

PS: The cleanup in fact was done in 4 steps:
1. Set different background colors to the most important character styles (OOoMenuPath, OOoStrongEmphasis, OOoEmphasis and OOoKeyStroke, ...), so that one can see what is improperly formatted
2. Manual change of the directly formatted text to styles. Sometimes even whole paragraphs were formatted as OOoMenuPath, but redefined to default text.
3. Cleanup of the content.xml file using a python script. The reason why this step was necessary was, that LO keeps the structure of manual formating even if it is removed - it only changes it to a special style, which does not do any formating at all. There were hundreds of these special styles defined (labeled Txxx) - that was the reason, why the text was not translatable by OmegaT (too many tags, even within words). The script removes these styles and also the OOoDefault style (this was not used very often, but caused similar problems in OmegaT as the Txxx styles). The cleanup is not perfect, but the text is translatable by OmegaT now.
4. Comparison of the modified document with the original using the standard LO tool. It compares only content - no changes were observed

Dňa 2013-12-07 02:30, Jean Weber wrote / napísal(a):

please, do not use that old version, because meanwhile I've created a new
one: http://ubuntuone.com/0wKYgmWPo7jM03xNeUXqSU.

What is different or new in your new version? I have already gone
through the earlier version and found and corrected some things that I
had not noticed before.

Also, the "clean" files have incorrect outline heading levels; they
have the ones for a *book* file, not a *chapter* file, so the tables
of contents are wrong if you update them in a chapter. And the "clean"
files have incorrect spacing of the chapter title, because they are
using the spacing for a book file, not a chapter file. I fixed these
things too.

I can do all of this again if necessary, if the new set of "clean"
files has important changes in it.

Do you plan to clean up other books as well?

I will help, of course. I can clean up also other guides - just let me know
where to start.

Writer Guide, please.

What I did was in fact quite simple. I've just changed the
direct bold to either OOoStrongEmphasis or OOoMenuPath (by guessing which
one) and similarly italics to OOoEmphasis of OOoKeyStroke and then run the
script. Maybe, more shoud be done than this, for example there are two sets
of styles defined now - the OOo styles and the LO styles.

We are working on a new template. Our plan is to use the built-in
styles as much as possible, so we plan to replace all the OOo-styles
and LO-styles if we can. Several translators have asked for this
change, and I think it will help when exporting to ePUB and other
formats. Will this also be better for your use? Or do you think it
might cause problems for you?

--Jean

Hi,

please, read below.

Dňa 2013-12-08 01:01, Jean Weber wrote / napísal(a):

Dňa 2013-12-07 02:30, Jean Weber wrote / napísal(a):

please, do not use that old version, because meanwhile I've created a new
one: http://ubuntuone.com/0wKYgmWPo7jM03xNeUXqSU.

What is different or new in your new version? I have already gone
through the earlier version and found and corrected some things that I
had not noticed before.

The difference between the old and new "clean" is that I've improved the clean up. It influenced about 5-10 sentences per chapter in comparison to the old version.

Also, the "clean" files have incorrect outline heading levels; they
have the ones for a *book* file, not a *chapter* file, so the tables
of contents are wrong if you update them in a chapter. And the "clean"
files have incorrect spacing of the chapter title, because they are
using the spacing for a book file, not a chapter file. I fixed these
things too.

It seems that the TOC problem was introduced by my manual editing (no idea how, I've just changed the directly formatted text to styles and did not do anything with section styles) and not by the script (it modifies only content of paragraphs).
So, I've rerun the script on the fresh files. Afterwards, I've visually compared the files and updated the TOC (without saving). I did not observe any differences - the modified files can be downloaded from here: http://ubuntuone.com/5tbEhRZsEm56kPfKjx7stK

I will help, of course. I can clean up also other guides - just let me know
where to start.

Writer Guide, please.

Ok, I've just returned from a hospital after a small hearth surgery and should stay for a week at home. So I have plenty of time :D.

We are working on a new template. Our plan is to use the built-in
styles as much as possible, so we plan to replace all the OOo-styles
and LO-styles if we can. Several translators have asked for this
change, and I think it will help when exporting to ePUB and other
formats. Will this also be better for your use? Or do you think it
might cause problems for you?

Any formatting of this kind is OK, except for 'default' styles, as OOoDefault - instead, one should rely on the default paragraph style.

The problems are caused by direct formatting and by its removing. This is a typical example:
Original:
<f0>Use </f0><f1><f2>File </f2></f1><f3><f4>></f4></f3><f5><f6> Wizards</f6></f5><f7> </f7><f8>on the main menu bar a</f8><f9>nd </f9><f10>select</f10><f11> the type of document </f11><f12>from the context menu.</f12>

Here, <f0>...</f0> are placeholders, by which OmegaT simplifies the text for translation.
These stand for, for example <text:span text:style-name="T123">...</text:span>.
In this segment only <f2> is useful, which stands for OOoMenuPath.

Obviously, this is untranslatable, since one should keep the tags.

After clean up, the same segment looks like this:
Use <f0>File > Wizards</f0> on the main menu bar and select the type of document from the context menu.

best
Milos