[Scribus] Scribus in "Page" -- Wow! (Update)

[Christoph Schäfer]

Am Montag, 8. Mai 2006 20:34 schrieb Louis Desjardins:
> Christoph Sch?fer a ?crit :
> > Hi all,
> >
> > the current issue of PAGE, the leading German magazine for designer and
> > publishers, contains an article on FOSS publishing software. Here are
> > some excerpts about Scribus:
> >
> > "The list of Scribus' features is really impressing."
>
> True.
>
> > "Hardly anything a publisher desires is missing."
>
> True.
>
> > And from the summary:
> >
> > "Designers and publishers are advised to watch the developments in the
> > open source area closely. The quality and the functionality of current
> > free offerings already covers a multitude of requirements. The layout
> > software Scribus has good chances to get a firm seat in professional
> > publishing. The open file format alone is a brilliant feature that
> > publishers have waited for a long time."
>
> Agree.
>
> > And I thought these guys wouldn't ever cover anything but the usual
> > suspects (Apple, Adobe, Quark...).
>
> Some people are starting to notice. This is cool. You know, I think LGM
> Second Edition will be very interesting from that perspective. And it's
> a year from now... Imagine! A year! What can be achieved in a year!
>
> Louis

OK, here's a summary of the whole article:

In the TOC, the authors state, that FOSS has to be taken seriously.

In the introduction,  they write that Linux already _is_ at home on the 
desktop, they also mention Apple's use of FOSS.

The Scribus review -- the first program reviewed -- is short of a praise. 
There is also some criticism, but it is ascribed to the early development 
phase. The authors are positive that all this will be resolved in 1.4.

Image editing. GIMP's image editing capabilities are equal to Photoshop, but 
CMYK and 16-bit support prevent it from being used in print workflows. A good 
text engine is still missing. Cinepaint: neutral description of its features 
and its main application area (movie production); colour management is 
professional grade. Krita: neutral description; in the summary mentioned as a 
(future) serious alternative.

Vector graphics: Inkscape: high quality drawing software, fast, comfortably 
operable; especially mentioned: included tracer, Inkboard (unique). Lack of 
CMYK mentioned. As with Scribus, the authors are fair enough to mention that 
Inkscape is still a development version. XaraLX: very fast, image editing 
features, thanks to CMYK support ready for printing jobs.

3-D: Blender: In general very postive. Criticised for missing translations and 
strange UI. Speed of development mentioned.

Summary: After all the buyouts and mergers, it's good to know that there's a 
growing counterpoise to the menace of future monopolies.

I still can't believe I read this in PAGE ;)

Cheers,

Christoph