For many writers, the act of writing (or placing one word after another) is synonymous with the tool that they use to do it. There’s a reason why writers feel so strongly about their moleskin notebooks, fountain pens, and computer software. I’m no different than any other writer. I have my preferred tools, and I love them dearly. They...
One of the most difficult (and, subsequently, rewarding) publications to create is that of a photographic or fine arts book. Unlike a novel, or a book with a sane number of images, fine arts books have a lot of variables. These include a written narrative, photographs and the artwork, and the typography. Additional page decoration add to the...
Over the past week, I’ve been helping a non-profit put together a yearly thank-you calendar. I’ve been using Scribus, and so far, it’s been going very smoothly.
Scribus includes a nifty “Calendar Wizard” that lets you generate date grids for any month or year. But though the Calendar Wizard works well, I found that it didn’t...
For most things, I really like Scribus. It’s a marvelous program that is easy to use and extremely powerful. With that said, there is one design decision that drives me absolutely nuts: the use of top-level windows for tool palettes.
I could go on (at length) about why this bothers me. (If I were to do so, I might talk about how the...
Sometimes it’s important to be extremely fussy about otherwise inconsequential things. There’s a reason why people fight over the proper pronunciation of már ‘habitation in Quenya (the m takes on an mb sound), pirates versus ninjas, and the proper placement of footnotes. It’s not that any of these particularly matter, but when pronounced, understood, or typeset correctly, such miscellanea greatly enrich the world. And it...
Read MoreLibreGraphics Magazine – Issue 1.3
LibreGraphics magazine is one of those bold things that the open source world needs more of. It’s designed as a catalyst for discussion and, more importantly, a showcase of what can be accomplished with open source software. In the graphic arts world, a sizable number of graphic design users have this idea that the only software worth using is a suite of proprietary (and extremely expensive) tools. For that reason, one of the stated goals...
Read MoreVisual Thinking, Explained
In the Open Source Writing book, I’ve got a section of Visual Thinking. While I’m hardly an expert, the way we perceive and understand the world is a serious interest of mine an I read everything I can find on the subject. This morning, while I was fact checking a few things for the book, I came across this video by Tom Wujek. In it, he talks about the neuroscience of understanding and how the brain understands the world of ideas....
Read MoreLibreGraphics Magazine and Conference
You know that obsession I’ve got with awesome stuff and the compulsion to share it? Well, it seems to have taken hold this morning. There are two things in the RSS feed today that simply must be shared. For these, everything – looming deadlines, familiar responsibilities, and miscellaneous addictions – can wait. The first item is a link to LibreGraphics magazine. The second is a call for proposals from a conference of the same...
Read MoreCamp KDE and Writing Tools
Next Monday, I’m going to be giving a talk entitled “Writing and Publishing With Open Source Tools” at Camp KDE, the annual KDE conference for North America. For those interested in attending, the talk happens at 12:15 pm at the Hotel Kabuki, in San Francisco. I’m really excited about the talk and I think it’s going to be excellent. (I know, having high expectations for your own performance is the route to obscurity,...
Read MoreTouching the Face of God
Today was the 25th anniversary of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Considering that it is a major anniversary of a catastrophic event, I’ve been somewhat surprised at the response. Or, I guess I should clarify, the lack of one. A quick search on Google News shows that it is being covered, but the world seems far more focused on the happenings in Egypt and the upcoming launch of Verizon’s iPhone. While the norm for most sites was...
Read MoreMiscellaneous Stuff: Layouts, Spam, Poster PDFs, etc.
Note: Still working on the book. Hope to be done soon. More information will be posted when I actually finish. To the many kind people who have asked, I am still alive. Yes, I am still working on the book. Large projects have minds of their own, and I am having a very hard time convincing this one that she should be “finished.” Every time I think I’m nearing the gate, I discover something else that needs to be done. Writing...
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