Create a full copy of a spreadsheet in an ODF Spreadsheet document using the ODF Toolkit.

[pe1999]

I need to create a full copy of a table sheet in an ODF Spreadsheet document using ODF Toolkit.
I'm trying to clone like this:

ods.getContentRoot().appendChild(ods.getContentRoot().getChildNodes().item(1).cloneNode(true));

The copy is created, but incorrectly. When opening the saved file with OpenOffice Calc - the cell formatting is not copied, when opening in Microsoft Excel - the cells are not filled in the copy. I use ODF Toolkit version 0.12.0.

[svanteschubert]

Hi there, please add a GitHub branch (Draft Pull Request), which includes a test (and a test document) that makes the problem easily reproducible. If you do so, I promise to take a quick look at the problem immediately!
Manus lavat manum! :-)

Thanks in advance!
Svante

[pe1999]

Hi!
I can't make a Draft Pull Request yet.
I created a separate repository with a test project.
https://github.com/pe1999/odftoolkit-test

[svanteschubert]

@pe1999 Thanks for the test and test document!
Promise made, promise kept! I fixed the cloning problem! ;-)
Your test is now part of org.odftoolkit.odfdom.doc.table.TableTest I slightly varied to make it easier to read (but I am fully aware that this is totally subjective and beg your pardon if I made things worse ;-) )
The problem was that the OdfElement.cloneNode() function explicitly @office:value and @office:value-type not cloned - which is not only hard to understand but even wrong as @office:value-type is a mandatory attribute!
So many thanks for pointing this out! Have a nice week...

[pe1999]

Excellent!
Everything works great!
Thank you for the promptness!

[svanteschubert]

My pleasure, but the promptness was rather an accident...
In the future, you should be aiming to solve the problems yourself.

The recipe for solving:

1. Place the test in the latest ODF Toolkit environment (the loading/saving is a bit different, but simply copy paste from existing tests - odftoolkit/odfdom/src/test/java/org/odftoolkit/odfdom
   Choose java package
   • pkg: when the test is only related to the package layer not related with ODF XML
   • dom: when the test is (mostly) related with the generated ODF XML
   • doc: when the test is related to the usability doc layer
     And mostly pick an existing class and simply add a test method like I did
2. Helpful is to use an IDE for debugging, I use Netbeans and IntelliJ IDEA for this purpose (latter for multiple projects)
3. Take a look at the ODF XML output (here you can even compare it with the original) - I love JEdit with archive and XML extension to look into the ZIP without unpacking it explicitly and indent the XML (even edit and save back to ODF package).
4. Sometimes it is helpful to search in the sources, I use Linux bash for it (if you are on Windows I suggest a Linux subsystem or VirtualBox with Linux (I use the latter)) -
   This time I knew the method cloneNode have to be overridden somewhere in ODFDOM so I searched:
   find . -name "*.java" | xargs grep "cloneNode(boolean"
   and found:
   ./odfdom/src/main/java/org/odftoolkit/odfdom/pkg/OdfElement.java: public Node cloneNode(boolean deep) {
5. I double checked the ODF specification:

• https://docs.oasis-open.org/office/OpenDocument/v1.3/os/part3-schema/OpenDocument-v1.3-os-part3-schema.html#attribute-office_value-type
  Remember there is as well one for the package and the formulars.
• and the grammar:
  https://docs.oasis-open.org/office/OpenDocument/v1.3/os/schemas/OpenDocument-v1.3-schema-rng.html#15831
  which shows the attributes are optional - I was misread. Again there are more grammars, e.g. for Manifest and Signature
  and this directory.

You see? Easy-peasy fix! :-)

All the best,
Svante

[pe1999]

@svanteschubert
Thank you very much, I will definitely use your recommendations.
I just started using odftoolkit. I wanted to create a Draft Pull Request as you recommended, but I had an unexpected problem with access to the Maven repositories and I just couldn't build the project, I hope the problem will be solved by my Internet provider in the near future.