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  <header>
    <title>Apache POI - the Java API for Microsoft Documents</title>
    <authors>
      <person id="AO" name="Andrew C. Oliver" email="acoliver@apache.org"/>
      <person id="GJS" name="Glen Stampoultzis" email="user@poi.apache.org"/>
      <person id="AS" name="Avik Sengupta" email="user@poi.apache.org"/>
      <person id="RK" name="Rainer Klute" email="klute@apache.org"/>
      <person id="DF" name="David Fisher" email="dfisher@jmlafferty.com"/>
    </authors>
  </header>

  <body>
    <section><title>Project News</title>
      <section><title>28 February 2015 - POI 3.12-beta1 available</title>
      <p>The Apache POI team is pleased to announce the release of 3.12-beta1. 
         Featured are a handful of new areas of functionality, and numerous bug fixes.</p>
      <p>A summary of changes is available in the 
        <link href="http://www.apache.org/dyn/closer.cgi/poi/dev/RELEASE-NOTES.txt">Release Notes</link>.
        A full list of changes is available in the <link href="changes.html">change log</link>. 
        People interested should also follow the <link href="mailinglists.html">dev list</link> to track progress.</p>
       <p>See the <link href="download.html">downloads</link> page for more details.</p>
      </section>
      <section><title>21 December 2014 - POI 3.11 available</title>
       <p>The Apache POI team is pleased to announce the release of 3.11,
        our next stable release. Featured are a several new areas of
        functionality, and numerous bug fixes.</p>
       <p>A summary of changes is available in the 
        <link href="http://www.apache.org/dyn/closer.cgi/poi/release/RELEASE-NOTES.txt">Release Notes</link>.
        A full list of changes is available in the <link href="changes.html">change log</link>. 
        People interested should also follow the <link href="mailinglists.html">dev mailing list</link> to track further progress.</p>
       <p>See the <link href="download.html">downloads</link> page for more details.</p>
      </section>
<!--
      <section><title>28 August 2015 - The Apache POI project is celebrating its 15th anniversary</title>
       <p>
        The Apache POI project is celebrating its 15th anniversary! On the 
        28th of August 2001, the first 0.1 alpha version of POI was released. 
        <em>New Blog Link here</em>
        <link href="https://blogs.apache.org/foundation/entry/the_apache_software_foundation_announces14">Read more...</link></p>
      </section>
-->
    </section>

    <section><title>Mission Statement</title>
      <p>
      The Apache POI Project's mission is to create and maintain Java APIs for manipulating various file formats
      based upon the Office Open XML standards (OOXML) and Microsoft's OLE 2 Compound Document format (OLE2).
      In short, you can read and write MS Excel files using Java.
      In addition, you can read and write MS Word and MS PowerPoint files using Java.  Apache POI is your Java Excel
      solution (for Excel 97-2008). We have a complete API for porting other OOXML and OLE2 formats and welcome others to participate.
      </p>
      <p>
      OLE2 files include most Microsoft Office files such as XLS, DOC, and PPT as well as MFC serialization API based file formats.
      The project provides APIs for the <link href="poifs/index.html">OLE2 Filesystem (POIFS)</link> and
      <link href="hpsf/index.html">OLE2 Document Properties (HPSF)</link>.
      </p>
      <p>
      Office OpenXML Format is the new standards based XML file format found in Microsoft Office 2007 and 2008.
      This includes XLSX, DOCX and PPTX. The project provides a low level API to support the Open Packaging Conventions
      using <link href="oxml4j/index.html">openxml4j</link>.
      </p>
      <p>
	For each MS Office application there exists a component module that attempts to provide a common high level Java api to both OLE2 and OOXML
	document formats. This is most developed for <link href="spreadsheet/index.html">Excel workbooks (SS=HSSF+XSSF)</link>.
	Work is progressing for <link href="document/index.html">Word documents (HWPF+XWPF)</link> and
	<link href="slideshow/index.html">PowerPoint presentations (HSLF+XSLF)</link>.
      </p>
      <p>
	The project has some support for <link href="hsmf/index.html">Outlook (HSMF)</link>. Microsoft opened the specifications
	to this format in October 2007. We would welcome contributions.
      </p>
      <p>
        There are also projects for 
        <link href="hdgf/index.html">Visio (HDGF)</link>,
        <link href="hmef/index.html">TNEF (HMEF)</link>,
        and <link href="hpbf/index.html">Publisher (HPBF)</link>.
      </p>
      <p>
         As a general policy we collaborate as much as possible with other projects to
         provide this functionality.  Examples include: <link href="http://xml.apache.org/cocoon">Cocoon</link> for
         which there are serializers for HSSF;
         <link href="http://www.openoffice.org">Open Office.org</link> with whom we collaborate in documenting the
         XLS format; and <link href="http://tika.apache.org/">Tika</link> / 
         <link href="http://lucene.apache.org/">Lucene</link>,
         for which we provide format interpretors.  When practical, we donate
         components directly to those projects for POI-enabling them. 
      </p>
      <section><title>Why should I use Apache POI?</title>
      <p>
	A major use of the Apache POI api is for <link href="text-extraction.html">Text Extraction</link> applications
	such as web spiders, index builders, and content management systems.
      </p>
        <p>
		So why should you use POIFS, HSSF or XSSF?
        </p>
        <p>
		You'd use POIFS if you had a document written in OLE 2 Compound Document Format, probably written using
		MFC, that you needed to read in Java. Alternatively, you'd use POIFS to write OLE 2 Compound Document Format
		if you needed to inter-operate with software running on the Windows platform. We are not just bragging when
		we say that POIFS is the most complete and correct implementation of this file format to date!
        </p>
        <p>
		You'd use HSSF if you needed to read or write an Excel file using Java (XLS). You'd use
        XSSF if you need to read or write an OOXML Excel file using Java (XLSX). The combined
        SS interface allows you to easily read and write all kinds of Excel files (XLS and XLSX)
        using Java. Additionally there is a specialized SXSSF implementation which allows to write
        very large Excel (XLSX) files in a memory optimized way.
        </p>
      </section>
      <section><title>Components</title>
	<p>
	  The Apache POI Project provides several component modules some of which may not be of interest to you.
	  Use the information on our <link href="overview.html#components">Components</link> page to determine which
	  jar files to include in your classpath.
	</p>
      </section>
    </section>

    <section><title>Contributing </title>
        <p>
		So you'd like to contribute to the project? Great! We need enthusiastic, hard-working, talented folks to help
		us on the project. So if you're motivated, ready, and have the time time download the source from the
		<link href="subversion.html">Subversion Repository</link>, <link href="howtobuild.html">build the code</link>,
		join the <link href="mailinglists.html">mailing lists</link> and we'll be happy to help you get started on the project!
        </p>
      <p>
	Please read our <link href="guidelines.html">Contribution Guidelines</link>. When your contribution is ready
	submit a patch to our <link href="https://issues.apache.org/bugzilla/buglist.cgi?product=POI">Bug Database</link>.
      </p>


    </section>
  </body>
  <footer>
    <legal>
      Copyright (c) @year@ The Apache Software Foundation. All rights reserved.
      <br />
      Apache POI, POI, Apache, the Apache feather logo, and the Apache 
      POI project logo are trademarks of The Apache Software Foundation.
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