Development

Scribus Development Projects

Introduction

Following are an overview of the available Scribus development projects and links to the respective project areas in the wiki. Potential contributors who would like more information are encouraged to contact the Scribus Team in the #scribus IRC channel on FreeNode.net, scribus-dev mailing list, and this wiki.

Core coding

The development of Scribus has many aspects. The core software is written in C++ usint UI framework. In addition, it's drawing on a number of libraries such as lib2geom that are included with the Scribus source and many shared libraries including Cairo, Zlib, LittleCMS, libTIFF, Cups, libXml2, Python, Boost, aSpell, and PoDoFo.

Plugin and script writing

A number of C++ plugins and python scripts extend the Scribus feature list and enhance the user experience. There are many opportunities for interested developers to work on the existing plugins and scripts or write new ones.

Interface translation

Work on the translation of the Scribus user interface is a very important on-going project that could always use more effort in order to keep the many available or new translations up-to-date. This project is a good entry point for new contributors as it does not require skills beyond the ability to communicate in English and the translator's native language.

Documentation writing

Documentation writing is another area that requires constant attention and effort to keep the discrepancies between the Scribus functionality and the information available to the users to minimum. Lack of the appropriate documentation, out-of-date documents, and poor documentation structure lead to user confusion, misrepresentation of the capabilities of Scribus, and waste of efforts that go into the other parts of the project. Scribus Wiki is the central hub for the documentation efforts.

Scribus packaging

Packaging Scribus for the multitude of Linux distributions, Windows, MacOS X, and OS/2 Warp (eComStation) is a combined efforts of the packagers from downstream distributions, Scribus Team's members, and representatives from the Scribus Community. In addition, the Scribus Team provides archives and repositories with Suse and Fedora RPMs, Debian and Ubuntu packages, Windows installers, and MacOS X packages to make up-to-date versions of Scribus available to the users.

User support

The strength of the Scribus Community is apparent from the activity of the Scribus mailing list and the #scribus freenode IRC channel where many Scribus users, DTP professionals, and Scribus Team members provide advice and directions, help solve problems and find workarounds for Scribus limitations. Our channels of communication with the users could always be enriched by additional presence, goodwill, and sincere efforts of additional contributors.

Website and wiki

Web infrastructure of the Scribus project is in a constant flux. There always are opportunities to fix errors, expand coverage, improve structure, and streamline presentation of the materials that can help people around the world use Scribus effectively, develop and improve it, and support other users.