[Scribus] Legal debate on Groklaw on spot colours

[Ranjan Ghosh]

Hi everybody!

Thanks, too for an interesting read.
There is a lot of confusion about this issue.
If there is anything at all that can be copyrighted
by PANTONE then this is the relation between
the code and a color. 
Scribus does not need to implement this at all to support
spot colors (including PANTONE).
What needs to be done in Scribus is that the user is able to
create colors on custom-named plates. The physical color
this plate is finally printed with is arbitary and can be
agreed upon beforehand say by telephone with the print shop.
Of course, if the user enters "PANTONE 486 CU" as a color name,
there is no need to phone the print shop, because it will know
which color has to be used. This name is not stored anywhere in the
Scribus application but entered by the user so there is no infringement.
If you look at that color on the screen or print on your home printer
which does not know about plates but only prints CMYK, the computer does not 
know the equivalent RGB/CMYK color, so for custom plates a 
proxy color must be defined. Most commercial apps make it a bit easier for the
user by automatically setting this equivalent color. If you select PANTONE 
486, the proxy color is CMYK red. Implementing this last thing - and only 
this - is what might get Scribus in trouble here because at this point the
connection between the color name and a certain color out of the gamut is
made. If Scribus lacks this feature, this is not really a problem, because
in the end (i.e. in final production) the equivalent proxy color is not  used 
and can be set to anything which closely resembles the inteneded color.
Hope this clears it up a bit.

Bye
Ranjan


Am Mittwoch, 17. August 2005 09:43 schrieb Tobias Hilbricht:
> Am Mittwoch, 17. August 2005 03:54 schrieb Christoph Sch?fer:
> > Hi all,
> >
> > for those of you who are interested in the legal aspects of spot
> > colours, there is an interesting (?) discussion going on in a Groklaw
> > thread:
> > http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20050816092029989#c350672
> > (search for Pantone)
>
> Thank you for that interesting pointer. What is the Scribus roadmap in
> terms of spot colours anyway?
>
> Yours sincerely
>
> Tobias Hilbricht
> _______________________________________________
> Scribus mailing list
> Scribus at nashi.altmuehlnet.de
> http://nashi.altmuehlnet.de/mailman/listinfo/scribus 
  
--  
FUP AG 
Ranjan Ghosh 
Leiter Software-Entwicklung 
E-Mail: ghosh at fup.de 
R?ttenscheider Str. 110, D-45130 Essen 
Telefon: +49 201 72004-0 
Telefax: +49 201 72004-18 
Website: www.fup.de