> >Do you the programmers/users of scribus think it is usable to lay out a >40 to 48 page A3 sized newspaper?
I think it is. However, I would choose Scribus only if your layout is fairly standard from issue to issue - i.e. not "magazine style". I've done a lot of newspaper lay-out with QuarkXpress, and have recently begun to look at Scribus. Good things about Scribus (for newspaper production, compared to QuarkXpress): - The Python scripting plugin can take care of a lot of boring, repetative work. - PDF export - customize keyboard shortcuts. - XML-based file format if safer (some Quark files will sometimes lock up forever). - Good, free support from mailing list. Bad things (at least I haven't found a way to do this): - poor handling of columns: this should (at least optionally) be a property of a single text box. - lacks some typhographic controls, like kerning and line spacing - lacks "canvas dragging" (eg. like in Quark, where pressing the Alt key allows you to move the canvas - Python plugin lacks text links Note, however, that Scribus is developing at a rather astonishing rate, and hopefully these things will be taken care of quickly. In addition I have had some problems with stability and font rendering (this can probably be solved, however, with a careful installation. I just compiled on a Redhat 7.3, and have not tried fixing things.) >I find it hard to use, and cant find a comprehensive guide in the >documentation. Where can I find out how to use it? DTP is not just about learning a program, it's also about learning DTP. So even if it is difficult to learn how to lay out a newspaper page in Scribus, it would probably be just as difficult with Quark og Indesign. >If we are going to use it we'll translate it to Afrikaans my mother >tongue and also need to add Afrikaans hyphenations (we have an >algorithm[we'll actually we have a neural net]). Is this adding >translations/features and hyphenations hard? We want to hire a >programmer to help with the features, how long will it take him to start >programming (start being productive)? I don't know about that, but here is a piece of advice: Get a programmer that knows Python, and put him/her to work on scripts for converting text in some semantic format (like docbook xml or Quark-style tags) to various pages. This will save you a lot of work in laying out your newspaper. I'd be happy to help you out with this; I'm an extremely incompetent Python coder, but I have some experience with text formats and making page templates. Regards, Lars Nygaard ________________________________________________ lars.nygaard at ilf.uio.no 22 85 82 18 (jobb) http://folk.uio.no/larsnyg 90 63 23 19 (mobil)
