[Scribus] xml workflow - best practices, experiences

[Craig Ringer]

Gabriele Francescotto - OpenContent wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> actually I'm building an eZ publish extension for Scribus: I hope it 
> helps. eZ publish is a powerful open source CMS and CMFramework that 
> uses php+mysql or postgresql, released under GPL license ( www.ez.no 
> <http://www.ez.no/>).
> 
> The idea is that the editors can build their contents' archive, with 
> images and articles, using the CMS like a platform indipendent from a 
> specific files' format, so that all the contents can be organized and 
> managed according to the different needs: the webmaster can use them for 
> the website (using the HTML format), the journalists to archive their 
> whole production and choose to download the materials as PDF, the 
> graphics can use some prefixed template to compose quite complex pages 
> and then download their compositions as SLA format (according to 
> Scribus' XML schema).

Sounds interesting. You'll want to look into the evolving new file 
format, as the 1.2.x and interim 1.3.x formats will not be the native 
and preferred format for 1.4.0. There are already preliminary DTDs etc, 
though things are still evolving. You'll be glad to know it'll be 
well-formed and valid XML.

I'd also be very interested to see the reverse - a Scribus plug-in that 
can pull resources from the CMS for use in documents, and even 
automatically assemble document skeletons (with content and rough 
styling) that can be tuned for good layout and print use. It's probably 
already possible, but it'd be really nice to be able to support remote 
images, linked text, etc to get the best results. You're not the only 
one interested in getting Scribus playing well with content management 
systems and finding ways to use it as part of larger systems, though 
there are many other problems to solve before much real work is likely 
to start happening on that. (If it's me doing the work, not least my 
workload dropping, probably when I finish uni).

--
Craig Ringer