openpreserve/sheets-preservation-spec

Consider special handling of Libre Office settings.xml file

carlwilson opened this issue · 1 comments

The settings.xml files found in ODF documents may require special handling, or even removal(??). Things to considers:

  • how universal is the use of such a file, test other creating applications:
    • Excel (Doesn't create)
    • Open Office
    • Libre Office (Does create)
  • the file itself is part of the config namespace and only provides a way of encoding "implementation specific settings", these aren't to any schema or specification and their interpretation depends on the rendering software.

I also tried the applications

  • ONLYOFFICE
    creates settings.xml.
    creates a config:config-item-set called ooo:view-settings.
    creates attribute ActiveTable among others. Does not create attributes EmbedFonts, EmbedOnlyUsedFonts, IsDocumentShared nor LoadReadonly.
  • Calligra Sheets
    creates settings.xml.
    creates a config:config-item-set called view-settings.
    Does not create attributes ActiveTable, EmbedFonts, EmbedOnlyUsedFonts, IsDocumentShared nor LoadReadonly.
  • Gnumeric
    creates settings.xml.
    creates two config:config-item-set called ooo:view-settings and gnm:settings.
    creates attribute ActiveTable among others. Does not create attributes EmbedFonts, EmbedOnlyUsedFonts, IsDocumentShared nor LoadReadonly.

As a side note, none of the applications created the XML attributes for counting sheets, cells or objects in the meta.xml file.

Apache OpenOffice replicates LibreOffice exactly (also counts sheets, cells and objects in meta.xml) on the above checks, except it does not create EmbedFonts and EmbedOnlyUsedFonts.