[Scribus] PageMaker 4.0

[Peter Linnell]

On Friday 09 April 2004 07:00 pm, Greg Ennis wrote:

Please see my comments in-line:

> Louis,
>
> Thanks for helping!!!!

There is lots good and friendly help on this list.;)
>
> I will need to edit, revise, print etc.
>
> I have an a software manual in PM4 format and would like to port it over
> to something that can be used in Linux.  I suppose HTML would be the
> easiest, but would prefer something more robust and that is why I was
> looking at scribus.

The HTML exporter from PM was horrible. Avoid at all costs.

> I have the hard copy of the manuals.  The text could be typed in again,
> and the graphics were screen shots of the software so those could be
> duplicated too.  I am just trying to find a way to do it with less
> effort.
>
> If you can offer suggestions I would appreciate your help.
>
> Thanks,
>
<snip>

Here is how I would go about it:

First, hopefully the images are linked and not embedded.

Get the PM 4 docs open in Pagemaker 4, 5 or 6 
PM 6.5 and 7 with an add-on can open them. The add-on converter is available 
on the adobe site.

Export the linked graphics and text into some managable directories and 
rebuild the doc in Scribus natively.

With DTP applications, converting between different applications is not 
trivial and even the commercial converters are not perfect. DTP files and 
Pagemaker, in particular, are very complex internally. There is only on 
application which I know does it well and that is InDesign 2+.

This sounds cumbersome, but will produce the best results in the end. Post 
back if you have more questions.

There is no doubt in my mind Scribus is up to the tasj of a software manual. 
The Scribus 1.2 manual will be in PDF - from Scribus - of course. :)

Cheers,

Peter