This page contains notes about a framework for handling XMP metadata.
Goal
In order to satisfy the PDF/A-1 specification Apache FOP needs a small XMP metadata framework. A generalized framework for XMP could be used inside the whole XML Graphics project and in other projects such as [http://www.pdfbox.org PDFBox].
Existing Efforts
So far, there are no major open source XMP toolkits in Java around. [http://www.lowagie.com/iText/ iText] has some code and Ben Litchfield's [http://sourceforge.net/projects/jempbox JempBox] is another effort. Ben offered to work with us on this.
Requirements
Mandatory
- compatible with JDK 1.3 and higher
- parsing XMP (both from a SAX stream as well as XMP packets loaded from arbitrary files)
- writing XMP (both as XMP snippets and XMP packets)
- a suitable in-memory representation of XMP
- user-friendly read/write access to XMP values through XMP schemas
- Merging of two XMP documents
- Use case: The main XMP document is contained in an XSL-FO file but the user agent (FOP) has additional values that need to be merged in (FOP's values overriding the ones from the FO file).
- Use case: The main XMP document is contained in an XSL-FO file but the user agent (FOP) has additional values that need to be merged in (FOP's values overriding the ones from the FO file).
Optional/Future
- extension schema support as required by PDF/A-1
- validation
Links
[http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/xmlgraphics-general/200605.mbox/%3c20060519140259.6C13.DEV@jeremias-maerki.ch%3e The initial mail on general.at.xmlgraphics.apache.org]
[http://www.adobe.com/products/xmp/index.html Adobe's XMP website]
[http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/xmp/sdk/index.html XMP specification]