Description of the Update Information

OpenOffice.org Developer's Guide

Extensions

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• Extension Manager

• Extension Repositories
• The Active Extension
• Updating Extensions
• Processing Extensions
• Packaging Notes For Bundled Extensions
• Deployment Items
• Installing Extensions for All or a Single User
• Extension Manager in OpenOffice.org
• unopkg
• Location of Installed Extensions
• Extension Layers

• Checklist for Writing Extensions
• File Format
• description.xml

• Description of XML Elements
• Localized XML Elements
• Example

• Display Name
• Icon
• Extension Description
• Extension Identifiers
• Extension Versions
• Target Platform
• Simple License
• Dependencies
• Publisher Information
• System Integration
• Online Update of Extensions

• Running Online - Update
• Concept
• Example Scenario for Providing Updates
• Migration of Update Information
• Description of the Update Information
• Description of Atom Feed
• Examples

• Options Dialog

• Creating the GUI of the Options Page
• Saving and Reading Data for the Options Page
• Defining the Usage of Options Pages

• Adding a Leaf to an Existing Node
• Adding Several Leaves
• Grouping of Leaves
• Adding Nodes
• Adding Several Nodes
• Absolute Position of Leaves
• Grouping of Nodes
• Assigning Nodes to Modules
• Defining a Module
• Absolute Position of Nodes

• The Options Dialog of the Extension Manager

• Help Content

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The update information can be contained in a file which can be directly accessed through a URL or it can be generated on demand (HTTP get request). If it is a file then it could be named according to this pattern:

 <extension_file_name>.update.xml

For example, the update information file for the extension myextension.oxt is myextension.update.xml. The .oxt file extension is not used.

It follows the description of the XML structure of the update information data:

Element <description>

• XPath: /description
• Parent element: document root
• Child elements:
  • <identifier>
  • <version>
  • <update-download>
  • <dependencies>

<description> is the root element of the update information XML document.

Attribute <description>

Attribute	Description
xmlns	The default namespace of element description and all children must be defined as http://openoffice.org/extensions/update/2006
xmlns:dep	The namespace for dependency information must be defined as http://openoffice.org/extensions/description/2006
xmlns:xlink	The xlink namespace must be defined as http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink
other namespace definitions	Other namespaces can be added as necessary.

Element <identifier>

• XPath: /description/identifier
• Parent element: <description>
• Child elements: none

Attributes of <identifier>

Attribute	Description
value	Required. The extension identifier.

Element <version>

• XPath: /description/version
• Parent element: <description> (page 4)
• Child elements: none

Attributes of <version>

Attribute	Description
value	Required. A textual representation of the extension version.

Element <update-download>

• XPath: /description/update-download
• Parent element: <description>
• Child elements:
  • <src>

<code><update-download> must have one or more <src> children. The second, third, etc. <src> element are regarded as fallback, that is, the elements provide URLs to mirrors. The Extension Manager will try to download the extension by using the first URL and only uses the next URL if an error occurred, for example because the the connection was interrupted.

Element <dependencies>

• XPath: /description/dependencies
• Parent element: <description>
• Child elements:
  • <dep:OpenOffice.org-minimal-version>
  • others

Element <src>

• XPath: /description/update-download/src
• Parent element: <update-download>
• Child elements: none

Attributes of <src><code>

Attribute	Description
<code>xlink:href<code>	Required. The value is a URL which refers to the extension

Element <code><dep:OpenOffice.org-minimal-version><code>

• XPath: <code>/description/dependencies/dep:OpenOffice.org-minimal-version<code>
• Parent element: <code><dependencies>
• Child elements: none

Attributes of <dep:OpenOffice.org-minimal-version>

Attribute	Description
xmlns:dep	The namespace for dependency information (inherited from <description>) must be defined as http://openoffice.org/extensions/description/2006
dep:name	Required. The string “OpenOffice.org value” (where value is the value of the attribute value).
value	Required. The required underlying OpenOffice.org version (“2.1”, “2.2”, etc.), starting with OpenOffice.org 2.1.

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