Printing consensus poll

Problem

Bryce has pointed out that good PDF/PS support is the #1 feature need for Inkscape right now (in his 2005.11.30 email to the inkscape lists). This ConsensusPoll exists to enable the community to efficiently create and commit to a plan of action to resolve this issue.

Contract

• >= 20 inkscape enthusiasts
• >= 4 developers with commit access
• >= 95% yes
• all conditions in plan are met
• 72 hour GO timer
• 80% cloture

ContractExplanation

Because this contract defines what it means to participate in this poll it will never be changed. If it turns out to be inadequate, this poll must be canceled and a new poll with a new contract must be drafted.

Yes/No Poll

Participation in this poll is open to anyone who wants to participate.

Voting yes in this poll means that you believe the community created plan is ready for implementation, and that you will do your part to support its execution. Voting no in this poll means that you have outstanding concerns about the community created plan. You can change your vote at any time. All votes are transparent so that those voting yes can listen to the concerns of those voting no.

No ... BrandonCsSanders - There is no plan yet
No ... BryceHarrington - The plan is not fully baked
No ... AlexandreProkoudine - There is no plan yet
No ... ColinMarquardt - There is no plan yet
No ... EricWilhelm - The plan needs salt
No ... MenTaLguY - This isn't much of a plan...
No ... JonCruz - Plan? Not quite yet
No ... JonPhillips - no plan...
No ... NicuBuculei - so far the plan is weak
No ... RalfWStephan - isolated thoughts don't make a plan

Plan

• Identify exactly what sort of PDF support is required
• Research what is in Cairo right now compared to these requirements
• Collect a few dozen examples to use as PDF test cases
• Decide the best strategy for achieving this PDF support
• Find a developer with the right skillset for implementing the strategy
• Determine what funding is needed to enable them to complete the work
• Establish a contract with the selected developer to perform the work
• When the developer is done, verify that all test cases pass, then pay developer
• If this process was successful in meeting our needs, and if new needs are identified, repeat this process again

Background Information

• SOC_Original_Project_Prompts
• PrintingSubsystem
• Roadmap (Milestone 11) Import/Export Feature Enhancements
• Uberconverter

Adequate Technical Solutions

What solutions would be fine?

Possible Strategies

• Raise money and hire a developer to implement it
  • Collect pledges, once we are over threshold collect funds (http://fundable.org/)
  • Need to decide what the funds would be spent on ahead of time
  • Mercenaries that would do this for us?
    • BrandonCsSanders ... I'd do it for $2000, half up front, half once it meets spec. Caveat: it would take me six months to complete because my plate is pretty full right now and I'll be snatching a week here and a week there.
    • EricWilhelm ... This will be a lovely fit for the UberConverter. I'm guessing $5k would get it to about the same level as XAR and SVG in chromista. Caveat: Those aren't done yet. Check back in Jan. I would also be happy to oversee/direct the work of someone else wanting to write this as a pair of UberConverter connectors (crs2pdf, pdf2crs.)
    • /other mercenaries?/
• Use Cairo as the presentation layer and use its support for pdf/ps
• Pull out the scribus pdf support into a libpdf that can be shared by both scribus and Inkscape
• /other strategies?/

Questions/Brainstorms

• What about what inkscape earned through SoC? What's the status of this?
  • $2000 earned; there has been no plan or concensus for what to use it for
• Does Cairo have pdf export already? What about to use cairo for just this job? and later then use cairo for the whole presentation layer? Instead of creating an interims solution?
  • Yes, Cairo has pdf export capabilities; it's unknown if it's significantly better than our current (poor) pdf export functionality
• Investigate ps2ai, pstoedit and ai2svg conversion options (potential EPS support?)
• Import of native Adobe Illustrator files
• Other RFE's related to Import/Export?
• Add extension for use of VDX2SVG (http://vdxtosvg.sourceforge.net/)
• Add extension for use of PDF2SVG (http://www.solidcode.net/pdf2svg/)
• UberConverter