Quartam PDF Library Unicode Support

[reidit]

Please can you give an update on the status of Unicode support by the PDF library. It seems that Unicode development has been under way for several months (since August 2014), but there hasn't been any news about this.

Now that LiveCode 7, which supports Unicode, is stable (and LC 7.0.1 is close to release), do you have any estimate of when Unicode will be supported by the PDF library?

Thanks

Peter

[JanSchenkel]

Hi Peter,

My apologies for the ridiculously late reply. I've been lost in personal issues and am only now finding back the energy to spend time on my LiveCode projects.

LiveCode 7 finally has everything that is needed, but it's tougher than I initially thought to implement this.
The 'standard' font definitions do not include the required character width information to properly position strings and determine the placement of text underlines.
Now I have two options:
1. include the Deja Vu open source fonts (which do have extensive unicode character width data) and force you to use those for Unicode PDF documents
2. pick up where I left off with my TrueType font parsing effort, but that will take considerably more time to complete before I can tackle the Unicode part.

I hope this clarified the situation. I do plan to update Quartam PDF Library for Unicode, but under the current circumstances I cannot commit to a timeframe.

Best regards,

Jan Schenkel.

[reidit]

Hi Jan

I'm delighted to hear from you again but very sorry to learn of your personal issues. I sincerely hope that you're getting ahead of such difficulties – real life is much more important than any amount of IT problems!

Thanks for the update and the honesty regarding forward progress with Unicode support. I'll accept whichever you think leads to the more stable future for such support.

Please keep me informed of progress however slow or otherwise it may be. I'd rather know what's happening even if the news is still less than ideal.

With my very best wishes

Peter

[reidit]

Hi Jan

Any updates on the state of development of Unicode support, it's been about 4 months since we last heard anything?

Best regards

Peter

[Scott_Morrow]

Hello Jan,

Just a word of encouragement and to let you know that your Quatam PDF Library is a real lifesaver when it comes to android development! Having Unicode support would certainly by a wondrous thing.

Scott Morrow

[JanSchenkel]

Thank you for your kind words, Scott - it is good to hear that the library is useful, even in its current state.

The simple truth -without going into detail- is that my life changed considerably in the past four years, and that my 'after hours' development time is severely constrained.
Don't think I've been sitting still: I've been digging around in Unicode, and there are unfinished updates pending for all the quartam libraries, as well as some completely new ones.
And my mind has a tendency to absorb ideas and ponder how I can incorporate these new insights in future releases.
I love building software: solving the riddles and assembling the pieces of the puzzle, that's what makes me 'tick'

Putting together an ambitious roadmap is no problem, but executing it is another matter entirely.
Unfortunately, I do not control my time - making it hard to commit to a timeline.
I hesitate to make empty promises, but I will set aside time this week-end to draw up a feasible plan.

Step 1 will be to put the current public version 'as is' on GitHub.
Step 2 will be to decide on a good approach regarding branching (I experimented with 'gitflow' but that is not a good fit IMO)
Step 3 will be to draw up a reasonable roadmap (deciding which versions would contain which features in a logical sequence)

To be continued...

Jan Schenkel