GSOC 2014 Ideas

This is the place for ideas regarding GSOC 2014. They have been sorted by difficulty:

• Simple means that choosing one idea won't be enough, and an applicant needs to tackle at least three of those to be considered.
• In the category Medium at least two ideas must become part of a potential GSOC project.
• Picking up an idea from the High category could be enough to qualify, although it may be necessary to add an idea from Simple.
• Demanding will be definitively enough for a single project, but applicants need to prove their skills before they can be considered.
• TBD ("to be determined") is a category which will take some investigation to decide its difficulty, and also means that it can be reassigned once this is determined.

Simple

• Fix bugs in existing import filters.
• CVS importer for Scribus tables.
• Create an import filter for InCopy ICML files, which are a subset of IDML. Renaming ICML to IDML or IDMS works already partially (font substitution).

Medium

• Rewrite/update the SXD and ODG importers.
• Rewrite/update the SXW and ODT importers.
• Update the Text Filter code to reflect the new features of Scribus.
• Create ODT export filter for formatted text.
• Clean up the UI of the Picture Browser and add tooltips.
• Fix the XTG importer.
• Add support for freedesktop libraries like libcdr or libvisio (the Scribus plug-in interface has been prepared for their integration).
• Improve the Table functionalities.
• Add XMP metadata support.
• Create an iTunes/iPod-like page selector with page preview (example) for Scribus documents, multi-page file import and perhaps the template dialog (preview only). Not too difficult with Qt – there used to be a prototype for Scribus by Pierre Marchand.

High

• Create RTF import and export filters (formatted text only).
• Update/improve the existing export filters for SVG and EPS and integrate them with PDF, XPS, as well as the supported bitmap formats into a single export dialog.
• Debug and fix style management during page import and copy and paste from one doc to another.
• Create a feature-rich online importer for Google Fonts and Open Font Library.
• Add support for Symbol Libraries from common vector drawing programs (most importantly Illustrator, but also CorelDraw, Xara Designer, Visio, perhaps even CAD formats).

Demanding

• PDF/A, PDF/E, and PDF/X-5 exporter.
• Create import filters for SXC and ODS spreadsheet files.
• Create import filters for XLS and XLSX spreadsheet files.
• Add support for advanced typographic functions for European languages (e.g. user-defined kerning tables), including automatic OTF features.
• Add support for Arabic and Hebrew typesetting, including bidirectional text.
• Add support for CJK typesetting.
• Rewrite the Story Editor.
• Colour-managed bitmap export (including spot colours).
• Rewrite the styles structures and the styles management.
  • Including: Nested Styles.
  • Including: Creating a style from formatted text.
• Rewrite the Colour Palette/Swatch code to support real CIE L*a*b* colours and add import filters for CIE L*a*b* swatches (e.g. current Adobe Swatches or BCS files).
• Add paragraph-based typographic optimisation and an option to switch between line-based and paragraph-based.
• Rewrite/fix the direct-to-printer "Print" code to avoid the failures often encountered by users.
• Add support for libmwaw to enable import of Mac OS-related formatted text formats.

TBD

• Finally finish the IDML importer. With many people looking for alternatives to InDesign, we miss an opportunity to catch them with this.
  • The IDML importer already works astonishingly well and only needs some tweaks, at least as regards features Scribus already supports. "Finishing" will be an impossible task unless Scribus tries not only to copy every feature of InDesign, but also to behave identically. This is neither feasible nor desirable. --C schaefer (talk) 07:57, 3 December 2013 (CET)