Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 25794
Support Mac screengrab/quicktime TIFF images embedded to documents
Last modified: 2013-02-07 22:39:40 UTC
I opened a document that I had written in MS Word for Mac OS X. I had added some screenshots made with the screen grabber application. But the image in OpenOffice just appears black. When I opened the document on MS Works on a older PC it is written that a QuickTime TIFF component is needed.
please attach one of the problematic tiff-images.
reassigned to mru
please attach the offending document to this issue, so that we can reproduce and fix the problem here. You can also send the document directly (mru@openoffice.org) for the case it contains confidential data. Feel free to re-open the issue when you've done. Thanks for supporting us!
Created attachment 13507 [details] Document containing a screenshot that need QuickTime to be seen.
please also supply a "plain tiff" image, e.g. the tiff itself, not the image embedded in a doc - Thank you. (don't forget to reopen the issue when you have done so)
Created attachment 13513 [details] A window screenshot from Mac OS X using the Grab application.
When I created the Word document (QuickTime.doc) I used copy-pase to get the picture from Grab (an application for taking screenshots included with Mac OS X) to Word (MS Office X). So it was never saved to disk. The TIFF-file (TIFF-example.tiff) shows another screenshot. Both screenshots are shots of a full window and therefore might be transparent because of the rounded corners.
The behaviour of our graphic filters must be changed AFAICS. A significant error message must be implemented for this.
The attached tiff is a "real" tiff and can be opened in OOo and other programs without problems. Please try to attach something that is similar to what is embedded to the document.
*** Issue 65981 has been marked as a duplicate of this issue. ***
There is a fundamental misunderstanding here on how this bug actually occurs. The original description is correct but may not be entirely clear, judging by later comments. The source of the bug is the actual copy/paste or drag-and-drop process, not necessarily any saved-to-disk format. On a Mac OS X uses built-in Quicktime libraries to handle image-based clipboard data. It is this processing by Quicktime that causes the issue. There is *never* a saved format involved in the process of creating these files and that in itself is what causes the issue. This issue does not occur when you use Insert->Image from a file on disk. Because of this it is difficult or impossible to actually attach an image with a similar problem. In fact it may be that no image has this problem, it is simply an issue of interpretation when a given image format is embedded in an Office format. The format of the image probably remains the same, it just gets marked as something proprietary to Quicktime and then OOo.org and Office don't know what format it is and do not attempt to read it. My guess is they both have the capability to read it, or if not then certainly libraries could be installed that would support reading it. I am told however that Quicktime on a Mac provides more image support than on a PC, so a Quicktime install on a PC may not in itself allow reading of this format. Still, there must be some solution. I think the important things to keep in mind about this bug are the following: 1: It occurs *only* with copy/paste or drag-and-drop, *not* with Image->Insert or with simple loading of an image from disk. No image on disk is ever involved, the image is taken directly from another application, and so the issue is tied to the transfer of the image through the clipboard. 2: It appears to be specific to documents originally created in MS Office, although I do not think the same functionality has been tested in OOo.org. In fact I'm not even sure such functionality (cut/paste image) would work in OOo. org for Mac, but it should be tested. 3: The attached documents here and at "duplicate" Issue 65981 are the best examples that exist of this problem and these should be used to diagnose and correct it. 4: No fix exists for this from Microsoft. MS's own Powerpoint and MS Word are also unable to deal with images formatted this way and this is the case with all PC versions of Office. This means there are a lot of unhappy Mac Office users trying to make presentations to view on PC's and there is a significant opportunity here for OOo.org to gain a notable advantage over even Office 2007. I suggest this bug be given a fairly high priority given the opportunity to develop a significant feature that MS Office does not yet have and the potential positive marketing that could bring.
No, there's no misunderstanding. But having the actual representation, the actual thing that is embedded would greatly facilate the task of adding support for that. Many clipboard applications support dumping the contents of the clipboard to a file. Maybe there is a similar functionality in MacOS clipboard manager or an external program.
Unfortunately in many cases there is no real source file. In the case of my files what is being done is the following: 1: User creates a presentation slide 2: User browses web to find image to include 3: User clicks image in browser and drags to Powerpoint to embed in presentation If there is a "source file" it is the file on the web page, either a .jpg or a .gif. So that is clearly not the problem as Powerpoint and OOo.org support both of those formats. If you saved the same image to disk and loaded it with "Insert Image->From File" it would work. So there is some kind of odd conversion that happens in the drag-and-drop process, apparently due to the use of Quicktime for processing clipboard images on Macs. Why a conversion is even necessary I don't know. I also don't know of a method to save the "converted" graphic, unless it could be saved directly out of Powerpoint after embedding. I'm not sure that would help either, but it may be worth a shot, so I'll look into this as soon as I can. Mind you I don't have consistent and direct access to a Mac so if someone else is more easily able to test this that would be great. The problem should be easy to reproduce. In the case of the original bug described here it's unclear whether saving the contents of the screen grabber application would provide any relevant files either. It's highly possible that the file "format" in question is a "live"- only format - that its characteristics do not directly translate to any saved document format, hence the problem with embedding. In other words if you go to save in screen grabber it probably offers you a choice of formats. Which do you choose to maintain the characteristics of this problem so that the file is of any help? I can all but guarantee you that any file format you chose could be embedded into Powerpoint properly (as long as the format was supported). Essentially it appears that using this clipboard method side-steps the format check to see whether Powerpoint supports the format in question. Since Quicktime does, Powerpoint on the Mac can display it. But that same functionality is not available on the PC side. Bottom line I am not sure what is being asked for is possible - i.e. an "example file" that would be embedded and would show this problem. The problem exists not in the file or an on-disk file with a given format, but rather in whatever format conversion goes on in the Mac's clipboard. Or at least that's what I've determined from my tests here.
Here is the MS knowledgebase article on this issue. It may contain more info useful in solving it. http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en- us;198204 Again note that MS has not solved this, even in Office 2007 beta 2. This would be a major coup for OpenOffice.org!
Created attachment 52165 [details] PowerPoint test file with image conversion problems in OOO
Problem occurs with Powerpoint as well as Word documents. Test document attached to this is issue. Not sure how helpful it is, but images in this document were created by grabbing image with copy and then using the 'paste as image' option from the paste-special menu in PPT. On Mac OOO they render as black boxes (with some line info showing). Not sure how they render on PC (don't have one). This using 2.2.1. Also, might be helpful to know that these documents import just fine into Keynote - suggests strongly that there is a way to fix this issue. Not sure how to work out how Keynote does this (presumably it calls on the necessary Quicktime features) but this suggests that it is something that can be fixed in the OOO version for Mac. Presumably if this can be done, the correctly rendering version in OOO Mac can then be used to save in (say) ODP format for opening on PC...? Just an idea... Fingers crossed that a solution materialises. Real pain in interim.
To grep the issues easier via "requirements" I put the issues currently lying on my owner to the owner "requirements".
has this issue been resolved yet, I have the same problem