[Scribus] Scribus + TeX combo.

[Gregory Pittman]

Gregory Novak wrote:

>A note while people are on the subject: I recently wanted to print
>address labels, which involves placing ~80 of the same thing on a
>sheet.
>
>I originally used TeX for this, since it's trivially easy to write a
>script that reproduces the address 80 times.  Getting the labels
>exactly placed on the page eventually made this approach too
>frustrating.  I'm sure a TeX expert could get it to work, but not me.
>
>I then did it in Scribus by making an EPS file with the address and
>making ~80 pictures pointing to the same EPS file.  This worked fine
>in this case, but I can't help thinking that some power is lost by not
>having a full fledged scripting mechanism available. 
>
>For example, I have a bunch of digital photos and it'd be nice to use
>Scribus to lay it out a photo album for them.  However, I don't know
>how to effectivley script together the text, photos, etc.  I do,
>however, know how to do this for TeX, so that's what I'm using now.
>
>  
>
Like many things in Linux, this has already been done.  I made a script 
to do just this, actually two scripts, one for US Letter, one for A4 paper.

How they work is this:
When you fire up the script, you get a requester to indicate a directory 
and also which image format types to include. The script then makes 
pages from your images -- one version simply makes 6 pictures on a page, 
the other puts only four in a staggered format, so that you have room 
for comment text frames beside images as needed/desired.  It also 
automatically labels the page as to the directory and each image.  As 
far as I know, there is no upper limit to the number of images in a 
directory, it will just crank along until it's done.  Because of the way 
it works, you need to designate and load a directory with everything you 
want in your album.
I need to find these scripts, so I can attach them to a subsequent email.

Now, here is a peculiarity I am just noticing: my current 1.3.2cvs from 
24 November does not have a menu selection for Scripts (?!).  I /think/ 
I have python on this computer (at the office), but maybe not.

Greg