[scribus] some observations on 1.5.x to 1.4.x transfers

[John Culleton]

On Thu, 4 Feb 2016 19:34:47 -0500
Gregory Pittman <gpittman at iglou.com> wrote:

> First, I will admit that I messed up. I
> inadvertently marked the App directory in
> ScribusPortable as hidden. The catastrophe that
> ensued related to the fact that, although the
> system at work allows me to mark a directory as
> hidden, I have no way to unhide the directory
> after that (without getting IS involved).
> 
> So yipes! I needed to use Scribus, I needed to
> use it right away! I quickly found out
> ScribusPortable is more nonfunctional than
> functional if the App directory is hidden. So I
> made use of ScribusPortableTest (1.5.0) that I
> had available, altered some files, saved them,
> understanding that I couldn't load a 1.5.x file
> into 1.4.x subsequently. No problem, the first
> option seemed to be to stick with 1.5.x. Why
> not?
> 
> The why not was that, for some reason, any
> lines on the page would not print on the
> network computer. I had some lines to create
> writing spaces, but also other lines for
> barcodes. None printed. I could find no setting
> of color or transparency or whatever to explain
> this. Unacceptable.
> 
> So I went to the bother to (re)load up
> ScribusPortable 1.4.6 onto my network space.
> Ok, the plan was to recreate the document
> structure, copy text from 1.5.0 to the frame in
> 1.4.6. A major obstacle was that you can't run
> 1.4.6 and 1.5.0 simultaneously (this is Windows
> 7) - it told me I already had Scribus running.
> Next plan: send the frames to Scrapbook, then
> pull them into 1.4.6. The next obstacle was
> that I couldn't load them directly by adding
> the Scrapbook directory from 1.5.0. Nothing
> showed up. So I copied the files manually
> outside of Scribus from ScribusPortableTest to
> ScribusPortable.
> 
> Now I had access to these text frames, but
> found that on pasting them into a document, all
> formatting and linebreaks were lost. More
> editing. The other curious thing, which I only
> found by trying to print, was that each frame
> was set not to print. Also fixable.
> 
> In the end, even though I figured out how to do
> this, there were a number of unexpected
> stumbling blocks along the way.
> 
> Greg
> 
> ___

> 


In Linux I have multiple sign ons
and multiple virtual screens. So I could sign on
as user xxx on one screen and then go to another
screen and sign on as user yyy. Each user would
have his/her own support files. I could use copy
from one instance of Scribus and paste on another
instance using the other identity all on the same
computer. Of course in a work environment you
often don't have a choice of OS.

I don't have the limitations of working on an
office network controlled by someone else.  I do
have a router to which the other boxes are
connected,

My own recent horror story does not involve
Scribus as such but may be of value as an
example of what not to do. I have an off-brand
desktop the has worked for several years as my 
workhorse. On disk 1 and the first partition I
generally keep Windows. But I spend my work
time on the third partition of the second
disk. using Slackware Linux. Recently I needed
to use an application that depends on a
recent version of MS Windows. So I went on
line to Ebay and bought a Win 7 dvd complete
with valid identity number. Unfortunately it
would not work through my router, also several
years old. The new app works by contacting a
data base out on the internet. I contacted
everyone I could think of to get a driver that
would work, including the manufacturer of the
router (my model was too old) the manufacturer of
the computer (just was bought by another firm and
they had no specs on the older model) and several
internet groups, all to no avail. The tech guy at
the new computer company suggested that I
take the cover off the computer, identify the chip
set on the CPU and then contact Microsoft. At my
age and with my shaky hands I did not attempt this
pathway.

Finally I filched my wife's laptop which praise
be had been upgraded to Windows 7 in the first
partition and would talk to my router through a
wireless connection. I hate using a laptop but at
least I got my app running. Sooner or later my
wife will want the laptop back. 

There is nothing wrong with my router except that
it is old. There is nothing wrong with my Desktop
except that I can't get a Windows 7 driver for
it. 

I would tear may hair out except Mother Nature
has already done that.  

-- 
John Culleton
Wexford Press
Book layout, typesetting and Indexing
Free list of books for self-publishers:
http://wexfordpress.net/shortlist.html