Posted: May. 12 by Kevin McArthur
We're definitely still working on making REFW the best PDF generation framework around. To that end, we've been keeping things pretty under wraps -- maybe a little too much.
The current status is that a lot of development has been done on our unstable branch -- we're aiming for a release in the next few months -- but REFW is a 'when-its-ready' product. That said, I know a lot of you want to try out and play with the various new features we're working on. More, you demand docs so we've been working on that too.
Until now, we've been keeping the documentation back a bit -- to release it with the next version of REFW. But since there's such demand, you can access our unofficial documentation at http://beta.refw.org. Just use login: demo password: demo.
We'll have more to share soon, but in the mean time, just check in with us on IRC.
Posted: Aug. 29 by Kevin McArthur
Hey guys and gals,
I'm excited to let you know that we've finally shipped RE Framework 0.1. Ok, it's not really a framework yet, as it consists of only a handful of really cool components – but it will be.
Willie Alberty and I, with Streamflow's commercial backing have been working on a PDF library for over 10 months now, and its pretty wicked. We started with Zend_Pdf 1.0.4, gutted it, added a ton of features and then optimized the whole thing for performance. The result is, in our opinion, the best open-source PDF library on the market today.
The new library has
We've also forked the license, and we're now releasing under the LGPL V3. Theres a lot of reasons for a license fork, but for us it came down to the need for independence. Willie and I are both big contributors [and fans] of the Zend Framework, and feel that as it grows the need for agile change in this component is being lost. The projects motivations are reasonable, and obvious, but with this API change being significant and a 2.0 version (where this component could reasonably be included) likely between 6 and 12 months away we just weren't willing to wait. Beyond that, we're really quite concerned with what happens if some corporation snaps up the code and starts to develop the library based on our work, but not keeping it open-source. We didn't think that sounded cool so, enter the LGPL.
The LGPL as opposed to the BSD license here means that, while you're more than free to use our work in your commercial projects – should you want to continue developing the library, you'll have to keep it open source. But, unlike the GPL, the LGPL does not require you to release the source of applications you build, only the changes you make to the library.
In the coming months, we'll be listening very closely to the community and adding new components and features as quickly as we can. We'll also be writing more documentation, but until then, both Willie and I are available on IRC (#refw@freenode), and while we can't promise to solve every problem, we'll do our best to help you get going with the REFW. Just check the FAQ first =P