Flowchart Interchange Format
One of the shortcomings of OpenOffice Draw (another that can't be ascribed to the programmers) is that is doesn't export files to Word very easily. If you put together a flowchart (for instance), it loses all formatting and cohesion if you export it to Word via OpenOffice Writer.
I'm looking at ways of sorting this out, more as an exercise than as anything particularly immediately necessary. It is possible to export the file as a bitmap, then open it in Word, but that makes the file extremely heavyweight, and means that people with Word can't open the document and edit the flowchart.
I think the solution might be to export the file into an intermediate XML definition (of my own devising) using some Python code in Draw, then import the XML into Word using VBA. Now assuming that we write the import code in a rigorous and sensible way, this should give us a nice, attractive, flowchart rather than a horrible one that you get with the old method. It also means we've invented a graphics format in the meantime as a plus! More on this as it happens.
I'm looking at ways of sorting this out, more as an exercise than as anything particularly immediately necessary. It is possible to export the file as a bitmap, then open it in Word, but that makes the file extremely heavyweight, and means that people with Word can't open the document and edit the flowchart.
I think the solution might be to export the file into an intermediate XML definition (of my own devising) using some Python code in Draw, then import the XML into Word using VBA. Now assuming that we write the import code in a rigorous and sensible way, this should give us a nice, attractive, flowchart rather than a horrible one that you get with the old method. It also means we've invented a graphics format in the meantime as a plus! More on this as it happens.