dependencies update

[rerouj]

Hi,

Collatex pom.xml setup seem on some parts outdated. It specially needs to include a javascript engine for running the javascript extension's option of the CollationPipe() script. Indeed, in an apple M1 machine, for instance, the default Java distribution comes with OpenJDK which dont include anymore a javascript engine.

I know that you are upgrading Collatex (#81), but are you open to new pull requests ? As I will probably use a lot Collatex for an academic project this year, could I propose some people of my dev team as maintainers ?

Regards,

rerouj

[rhdekker]

Hi. Thanks for bringing to my attention the JavaScript engine on modern VMs issue. I wasn't aware that this was an issue on modern devices like the Mx machines.

I would be open to having a maintainer of the current version. Some coordination might be required. The main branch currently consists of a mix of Java and Kotlin code. Does your team have experience with that or do you expect that to be a challenge? Maven and IntelliJ can build it.

Do you have a suggestion what to replace the option of using JavaScript for custom tokenizers with? The idea behind the feature was to allow users to easily write tokenizers without requiring Java knowledge. Maybe a Kotlin expression can accomplish the same goal. Or do you propose to drop it?

Best,
Ronald

[rerouj]

Hi Ronald,

Sorry for that very late answer, I was fully busy the last weeks. I'll answer straight away to your questions.

We have no experience in Kotlin but, I guess, we can upgrade our skills in that domain very quickly.

Concerning the JavaScript Collatex option. the option wasn’t my first concern when I was reviewing the code. The option was just preventing the app of running. I just had to get rid of the issue by updating the engine, but I didn’t explore that part of the code anymore.

Humbly, I don’t think that it’s a core and important feature of Collatex. I believe that tokenization should be done outside of the system – I mean if tokenization really matters for the user and must be done with special care.

What is for me more important and what I could suggest, is to implement or fix the I/O feature of Collatex, specially, the XML input/output logic and processing which was not working at the time that I have reviewed the code.

Finally, let me tell you that we’re still interested in participating in the Collatex project. Has you’ve said that will need a bit of coordination and most of all a clear project upgrade/maintenance target. It’s trivial but, on our side, human resource allowance will be granted more easily, if we can justify a collaboration based on common interest ground.

Thank you for your attention. I hope you’ll send us some information about the future of Collatex and I hope we’ll find a way of working together.

Best regards,

Renato

Ps: I think that that conversion is public. If you prefer switch to private messages, please send me your answer back to renato.diaz@unil.ch