[scribus] Using Scribus 1.3.5svn Productively

[Benjamin Dumke]

Helge Hielscher schrieb:
> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 15:04:25 +0200, Benjamin Dumke wrote:
>> 2. You have to be able and willing to dig into the source code. Using a
>> precompiled version, I could not have worked on this project, as there
>> where several things I stumbled upon that simply were not working for me,
>> and that I had to have changed, obviously without waiting for a fix in the
>> official svn version, if one were to happen at all. So I am using
>> 1.3.5svn, but I'm using it with some changes applied, including changes in
>> the hyphenator and the object placement algorithm, as well as additions to
>> the scripter and the "Move Pages" dialog.
> 
> Are these patches available somewhere?

My patch to add a "swap pages" function is attached to issue 7388 in the
bug tracker. Issue 7389 describes another thing I changed and why I did
so (without a patch, though). Apart from a small thing (issue 7429) that
has been applied in the meantime, I have not submitted any other changes
I made. This is why:
Since I'm not a developer, the source code to me is tens of thousands of
C++ lines of which I only try to understand those few lines that might
do what I want when I change them. Then I do change them accordingly,
and when it seems to work, I leave the change in. But just because it
*seems* to work doesn't mean it really *does* work (in the sense that it
doesn't break something else).
An example: I wanted to use optical margins, which did not seem to work
at all. I checked the code, and somewhere I found something that seemed
weird (in my interpretation of things), so I changed this small thing
(one single character, actually), and suddenly I had working optical
margins. But this "weird" thing was probably there for a reason, and by
changing it, I might well have messed up something else that I just
haven't discovered yet -- after all, this is a development version. When
I'm done with my mentioned project, I will have more time to look into
the code and to discuss this with some devs. But until then I don't know
if this even is a bug, and that's why I don't want to make this patch
public.

>  
>> 3. You have to know your other tools to use as well as know a few things
>> about the PDF standard itself. Scribus (in any version) is not -- nor ever
>> will (or should!) -- be a one-for-all tool. One great improvement that
>> entered the svn version a few months ago was the ability to embed
>> exisiting PDF files into the newly created PDF. Having lots of
>> advertisements, most of which I receive as PDF files, this possibility is
>> invaluable. However, while Scribus-created PDFs can usually be trusted, I
>> cannot trust every single PDF I receive in terms of standards conformance
>> et cetera. Since Scribus "only" embeds these PDFs as XObjects, anything
>> that is wrong with the one small PDF is now wrong with the whole document.
>> Hence I use a combination of Adobe Reader (not free, I know -- except as
>> in beer --, but still a very important tool), ghostscript, podofo, and
>> possibly others, to end up with a flawless PDF.
> 
> Would you please describe it in more detail? Most resources about checking
> PDFs are about Acrobat, PitStop, PDF-Analyzer, etc. - closed source tools
> for Windows.

I was not referring to preflight checking, but to producing. This has a
lot to do with trust: When I have a PDF that is messed-up in one way or
the other, and I give it to the Adobe Reader (which is quite relaxed
when it comes to standards conformance), have the AR convert the PDF to
a PostScript file, I trust that I have a "good" PS. When I then use
ghostscript to do a PS->PDF conversion, I trust that I have a "good" PDF
(and, for that matter, I also have a transparency-flattened PDF, which
might or might not not prevent some problems with your print service).
Since I do trust AR and GS to do the right things (when given the right
parameters), this is enough preflighting for me. I have yet to be
disappointed :-)

Greetings,

Ben