[scribus] editing table

[John Jason Jordan]

On Sun, 26 Jul 2009 01:34:15 +0100
John Beardmore <John at T4sLtd.co.uk> dijo:

> John Jason Jordan wrote:
> 
> > ...If I need borders
> > then I typically create the table in OpenOffice.org Writer, being
> > careful to mimic the text styles that I am using the Scribus document.
> > Then I print to file from Writer. In Scribus I use File > Import > Get
> > Vector File, which imports the file as grouped vector objects. It's not
> > editable in Scribus because printing to file converts all the text to
> > outlines. 
 
> What sort of file do you print to from OO ?

First, I should have stated at the beginning that I use only 1.3.5,
currently RC3. I have no idea if any of this stuff works in 1.3.3.x.

In the OOo print dialog box I just check the box to print to file. I
also check the box for "Selection," since I want the file to contain
only the table, not the rest of the document. When I click OK to start
the print process it pops up a little window asking for the filename.
The filename ends up with .ps appended.

Unfortunately, OOo doesn't do exactly as told. It does print the
selected matter to file, but it includes the page number and header as
well, if they exist on the page. And even if there are no other objects
on the page the .ps file will have a border around it the size of the
entire page. When Scribus imports the .ps file all the objects (e.g.,
lines for the table borders, text as paths, etc.) will be grouped. So
after importing the table I ungroup it (which sometimes requires several
repeated ungroupings), delete the unwanted artifacts, then regroup.

It is important to create the page in OOo with the same margins as your
Scribus page so the table will be the right size when you import it
into Scribus. Also, if your table is going to span more than one page,
be sure to create them as individual tables in OOo. In such a case I
start with one OOo table that spans as many pages as it needs, enable
"repeat header row" so the header appears at the top of the table on
each page, and then use "split table" to turn my long table into
individual tables on each page.

As an alternative to printing to .ps file you can export as PDF or
print to CUPS-PDF, observing the same caveats as above to be sure you
get individual tables. Scribus cannot import PDF files as vectors, but
Inkscape can. Once you open it in Inkscape you can ungroup, delete
unwanted objects, regroup, then save as SVG. Scribus will be delighted
to import the SVG as a vector image file. It's faster just to print
to .ps file in the first place, but Scribus has some bugs in its .ps
import functions, so sometimes there will be objects that are messed
up. In that case I might try the PDF routes to see if they improve
matters.

> > A lot of people have been asking for real tables for a long time, but
> > it is not going to happen for quite a while yet. I can only assume that
> > the developers have decided it is too complex to tackle right now.
> 
> Which is a serious PITA for those of us doing any kind of technical
> work !

Indeed!