[Scribus] Mac OS port

[Kevin Walzer]

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Please sign me up for the porting/testing effort for the native Aqua
Scribus. I spent months last year trying to get it to build. Alas, I
don't know C++ at all, and always had to stop when I ran into the
screenpaint/X11 calls: just didn't know how to work around them.

I've gotten pretty knowledgable about building and deploying app bundles
from Qt, however: I'm comfortable with Qt/Mac from a build standpoint,
so I think I can help there.

It may not be possible to have the ideal binary distribution, which is a
~ standalone, drag-and-drop app bundle. One can do that if you compile Qt
to be statically linked, rather than dynamically linked. However, I know
Scribus has other external dependencies as well. Still, if Scribus can
be built against a static Qt, then it should be simple to isolate the
other external dependencies (libtif? etc.) into a Mac pkg installer. A
standard Mac user in Scribus' target market (publishing, graphics) isn't
going to want to install all of Qt just to run Scribus, even if you
provide a binary installer (I maintain PyQt for the Mac with a binary
installer, so I have some insight here).

The example of Gimp.app (a Mac app bundle of Gimp 2.2.x) is instructive
here: it's become wildly popular in terms of downloads because it wraps
all the Gimp binaries and GTK libraries into a single app bundle. Its
only external dependency is Apple's X11 environment.

One area where we'd have to tread carefully is if the Scribus build
links to Fink libraries. That complicates matters, for several reasons.
One, the goal should be to make Scribus as standalone/isolated as
possible; I don't think that requiring a separate installation of Fink
should be part of this. Also, the Fink leaders are serious about
enforcing GPL on their packages: I was warned last year when I asked
about making an X11 app bundle of Scribus that I'd have to carefully
document all my steps, make all my source code available, etc. I decided
all that was too complex for me to undertake by myself. If Fink winds up
being part of this equation, then I just want to highlight the due
diligence that would need to be taken.  Perhaps Martin can provide
advice on this front.

Another question: where should this project be hosted? My little
AquaScribus app launcher is available from the Scribus site, as well as
from my own server, but it's a very small download. Depending on the
libraries, a Mac pkg installer of Scribus could be 20-50 megabytes to
download. Can the Scribus servers in the UK handle this, or should a
Sourceforge project be set up for the back end?

I'm incredibly excited about this: I've been wanting to ditch my
Microsoft/Adobe toolchain in my publishing business (I publish about 50
poetry books per year via POD) for some time, but Scribus hasn't been
quite mature enough for my needs. (I have used it successfully with
cover design only, so I know that Scribus can handle commercial work,
but those covers were more work than a comparable version in InDesign
would be.) With 1.2.1 supporting styled text import, it looks like
Scribus may have crossed that threshold. And with NeoOffice J running
natively on the Mac, that and Scribus.app would allow me to ditch X11
for everything except Gimp.

So, just let me know what I need to do! I can't wait!

- --
Cheers,

Kevin Walzer, PhD
WordTech Software--Open Source Applications and Packages for OS X
http://www.wordtech-software.com
http://www.smallbizmac.com
http://www.kevin-walzer.com
mailto:sw at wordtech-software.com
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