Developer Tools

This page documents items that may be helpful to other developers, especially to those who are new to FOP. Exhaustive treatment of these topics is better suited to other fora, but the information presented here is intended to deal with FOP-specific issues related to these tools, especially "gotchas", and to help developers get jump-started.

Concurrent Versions System (CVS) -

Visit Apache XML CVS Repositories for useful information.

You will need a CVS client to be able to gain access to the FOP repository. For general CVS information, visit CVS Home. Nice GUI clients for Windows, Mac, and X(??) can be found at WinCVS.

Regardless of what platform you develop on, please be sure to submit patches that use Unix line endings. If you are using WinCVS, check code out this way by going to the Admin / Preferences menu item, clicking on the "Globals" tab, then select the "Checkout text files with the Unix LF (0xa)" option. You will also need to use an editor that supports opening and saving files using Unix line endings.

Step-by-step instructions for downloading FOP using WinCVS:

Select "Create / Checkout Module" menu item.
âCheckout Settingsâ Tab: +
+ General +
Visit Apache XML CVS Repositories for useful information.
+
You will need a CVS client to be able to gain access to the FOP repository. For general CVS information, visit CVS Home. Nice GUI clients for Windows, Mac, and X(??) can be found at WinCVS.
+
Regardless of what platform you develop on, please be sure to submit patches that use Unix line endings. If you are using WinCVS, check code out this way by going to the Admin / Preferences menu item, clicking on the "Globals" tab, then select the "Checkout text files with the Unix LF (0xa)" option. You will also need to use an editor that supports opening and saving files using Unix line endings.
+
+
+ Step-by-step instructions for downloading FOP using WinCVS: +
- Select "Create / Checkout Module" menu item.
- âCheckout Settingsâ Tab: +
  - âEnter the module name and path on the server:â
    + xml-fop +
  - âLocal folder to checkout to:â
    Enter your local directory
  +
- âCheckout Optionsâ Tab:
  - âEnter the module name and path on the server:â
    
    xml-fop
  - âLocal folder to checkout to:â
    
    Enter your local directory
  -
- âCheckout Optionsâ Tab +
- If you are checking out the trunk, unset all options.
- If you are checking out the maintenance branch (currently distributed code), check âBy revision/tag/branch:â and enter fop-0_20_2-maintain.
+
âGeneralâ Tab:
- If you are checking out the trunk, unset all options.
- If you are checking out the maintenance branch (currently distributed code), checkâBy revision/tag/branch:â and enter fop-0_20_2-maintain.
-
âGeneralâ Tab +
âEnter the CVSROOT:â
+ :pserver:anoncvs@cvs.apache.org:/home/cvspublic +
âAuthentication:â
+ âpasswdâ file on the cvs server +

+ +

âGlobalsâ Tab:

âEnter the CVSROOT:â

:pserver:anoncvs@cvs.apache.org:/home/cvspublic
âAuthentication:â

âpasswdâ file on the cvs server

âGlobalsâ Tab -

check âCheckout text files with the Unix LF (Oxa)â

Click "OK" and the download should begin.

- -

To create a patch to be submitted for consideration, do the following:

cd to a directory that contains all of the changes that you wish to include in the patch. To comprehend the entire distribution, cd to the directory above the "xml-fop" directory that was created when you checked out the code.
Run: cvs -q diff -wu <list of items to diff>

The <list of items to diff> is a space-separated list of files and directories relative to the current directory that you wish to include in the diff. For example, to include the entire distribution, assuming that you are in the directory, above xml-fop, simply enter "xml-fop". This will recursively go through the directories beneath xml-fop to diff each file.
If you are running WinCVS, select "Admin/Command Line" for a console in which to key the above command.
On a Linux/Unix machine, you will want to redirect the output from the above command into a file. If you are using GNU WinCVS, you can cut the output from the console window and paste it into a file. The "-w" ignores whitespace differences. The "-u" puts the diff in "universal" format. You may wish to use the "-N" option as well, which is supposed to treat new files as if there were an old 0 byte file -- in other words, it is supposed to include the new file in the patch. However, it only operates on files that have been "add"ed to the CVS repository, which cannot be done without commit access.

check âCheckout text files with the Unix LF (Oxa)â

+ + +

Click "OK" and the download should begin.

+ +

+ Creating Patches +

+ cd to a directory that contains all of the changes that you wish to include in the patch. To comprehend the entire distribution, cd to the directory above the "xml-fop" directory that was created when you checked out the code.
Run: cvs -q diff -wu <list of items to diff> +
The <list of items to diff> is a space-separated list of files and directories relative to the current directory that you wish to include in the diff. For example, to include the entire distribution, assuming that you are in the directory, above xml-fop, simply enter "xml-fop". This will recursively go through the directories beneath xml-fop to diff each file.
If you are running WinCVS, select "Admin/Command Line" for a console in which to key the above command.
On a Linux/Unix machine, you will want to redirect the output from the above command into a file. If you are using GNU WinCVS, you can cut the output from the console window and paste it into a file. The "-w" ignores whitespace differences. The "-u" puts the diff in "universal" format. You may wish to use the "-N" option as well, which is supposed to treat new files as if there were an old 0 byte file -- in other words, it is supposed to include the new file in the patch. However, it only operates on files that have been "add"ed to the CVS repository, which cannot be done without commit access.