Cross-platform applications: September 2009 Archives

While I've known about the free, open-source desktop publishing application Scribus, until I happened across this article today I didn't know that Scribus is a cross-platform program that runs not just in Linux/Unix but also on computers using the Macintosh OS X and Microsoft Windows operating systems.

That raises my opinion of Scribus immediately. I strive to use as many cross-platform applications as possible because of the flexibility they afford me across the many operating systems I run. Other apps that fall under this category (and there are more than you'd think) include the Firefox Web browser, Opera Web browser, Thunderbird mail client, GIMP image editor, Inkscape drawing app, Blender 3D-animation creator, Audacity audio editor, OpenOffice productivity suite, Filezilla FTP client, Abiword word processor, Pidgin instant-messaging client.

(Tangential discussion on cross-platform concepts continues ...)

And with the ability to run "true" Unix-like applications on Mac OS X via the Fink Project (and to some extent in Windows with Cygwin), there are many more Unix/Linux applications that have the potential to work across platforms than you'd think.

Add to that the WINE project that allows Linux users to run many Windows apps, and then look at the rapidly evolving world of virtual machines and you can see that we seem to be converging on a point where if not any then at least many applications not coded for different operating systems will be able to run on them in some form or fashion.

But for now, for the unwashed masses that includes me (I've never been all that successful with WINE or virtual machines though moderately successful with Fink), when I see a cross-platform application I immediately want to start using it on every kind of computer to which I have access.

One of the main reasons I'm using Thunderbird to manage my e-mail is the ability to take those files from one system to another and not have to re-learn a different application every time.

So on to Scribus ...

I'm about to get involved with a project where the publishing platform of choice is Microsoft Publisher. I've never used MS Publisher, so I'll reserve any judgments about the application at this time, but it runs on Windows only. Not even the Mac.

And it costs money. It's either part of an MS Office suite (think big bucks) or available on its own for $169.95.

And while I do have a Windows XP box at work, this isn't a work project. At home we have laptops that currently run Mac OS X and the Ubuntu and Debian distributions of Linux.

I don't know if the other people involved in the project I'm slated to be working on are using "legit" copies of MS Publisher, or are stealing it like just about every Mac and Windows user I know does with the apps on their "personal" personal computers.

As I've written many times (the link eludes me at present, or I'd link up to something suitably sanctimonious), I'm both uncomfortable and unwilling to steal software. That's why I pretty much quit using Windows on my "personal" personal computers. Besides all the things that Microsoft does that are more than a little distasteful, I love the performance gains I got by using the Unix-based OS X and Linux/BSD operating systems. And at least with true Linux/Unix, I love having thousands of free, mostly open-source applications just sitting there in easily accessed repositories and available to install with a few mouse clicks (or, heaven forbid, a few words typed into a text-based terminal).

So the bottom line is that I hope Scribus does as well as some are claiming, because having a free, open-source application for creating high-quality printed documents, and having that application run on just about every computer out there is just what I'm looking for.

Never mind that I haven't been concerned with actual printed on paper output in more than a couple of years (I leave that to the software that somehow manages to get the Daily News to press), but if I do have to re-enter that world on a smaller scale, I'll be much happier if I can help myself and others shed the confining shackles of expensive, proprietary and often stolen software for all that is free and (hopefully) good.

My first step will be to install Scribus on my Ubuntu 8.04 LTS laptop and try my hand at a few document layouts that I'll output to PDF (increasingly the standard for high-end printable document output; yep, even the Daily News uses it) and then present right here.