User:Sallewell/SymbolEditor File Format

 

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The SymbolEditor application was originally written to provide symbol libraries for the KXStitch application. If anyone else finds these symbol libraries useful, these are the file format used. Have a look at the code in the two applications for examples of their usage.

Versions of the format

There are currently two versions of the file format. Version 100 is deprecated and it is unlikely that any symbol libraries will exist in the wild. Version 101 is the current format.

Version 100

Format uses QDataStream::Qt_4_0

file {

char[15] containing 'KXStitchSymbols'

qint32 file_version = 100

qint16 next_symbol_id

QMap<qint16 index, QPainterPath path> pathsMap

}

Version 101

Format uses QDataStream::Qt_4_0

file {

char[15] containing 'KXStitchSymbols'

qint32 file_version = 101

qint16 next_symbol_id

QMap<qint16 index, symbol> symbolMap

}

The index can be used by applications to reference a symbol in a library.

Warning

SymbolEditor can be used to remove symbols from a library, so this needs to be accounted for in code that uses them.

Symbol Definition

The symbol definition only has one version at the moment, version 100, which is defined as

class Symbol
{
    qint32 version;
    QPainterPath path;
    bool filled;
    qreal lineWidth;
    Qt::PenCapStyle capStyle; // streamed as qint32
    Qt::PenJoinStyle joinStyle; // streamed as qint32
};

QDataStream &Symbol::operator<<(QDataStream &stream, const Symbol &symbol);
QDataStream &Symbol::operator>>(QDataStream &stream, Symbol &symbol);

The coordinates of the QPainterPath will be in the range 0.0 .. 1.0 in both the x and y directions. The QPainterPath can be scaled to suit the destination. Both SymbolEditor and KXStitch use a transformation matrix on the QWidget to achieve this.