Feature Request: Main Files references to on-disk directories

[chrispitude]

We share a common Oxygen .xpr file across multiple Git repositories. We try to avoid placing group-specific information in the .xpr file, so that this single .xpr file can be centrally updated and shared across all repos.

Currently, Main Files support on-disk file references, but not on-disk directory references. Main Files file references have the following drawbacks:

• The .xpr file must be modified to add/remove individual file references, but writers are not permitted to modify the .xpr file.
• An .xpr file cannot be shared across multiple repos when individual file references are repo-specific.

To resolve this, perhaps Main Files could also support on-disk directory references, such that the contents of the directory are included in the Main Files list:

oxygen_main_files_directories.png

This would allow the Oxygen .xpr file to include standardized Main Files directory locations, with the contents of those directories varying from repo to repo. The .xpr file remains static, writers can add/modify/remove DITA-OT project files (and their referenced ditamaps) as much as they want, and Main Files adapts to the updates automatically:

Some aspects to be considered are:

• Should the inclusion recurse into subdirectories? (I think it should, or maybe it could be specifiable somehow.)
• If there are multiple file types in the directory, does Main Files ignore types that aren't relevant to its analysis?

Radu captured this idea as

EXM-50611 Link to an entire folder in the "Main Files" folder

in the following discussion thread:

feature-request/topic24311.html

but I created a separate post here to untangle the discussions.

Radu also mentioned that the .xpr file could possibly contain a path from which to obtain Main Files. I think I might prefer the original solution because (1) it readily supports multiple directories, and (2) there is no "action-at-a-distance" where something is included in Main Files that is not explicitly shown in the Project view, but perhaps this could be addressed with an .xpr-based solution too.

A testcase is included:

oxygen_main_files_directories.zip

[Radu]

Hi Chris,

Thanks, I added the extra details on the internal issue. Looking at our code this would not seem hard to implement.

Regards,
Radu

[Cosmin Duna]

Hi Chris,
Oxygen XML Editor 25.0 is out now and contains the improvement you requested in this post.
Best regards,
Cosmin

[chrispitude]

Hi Cosmin,

This feature provides exactly what we needed. Thank you!