ScripterNG? vs. Scripting

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jlpoole

1)  What does ScripterNG stands for?  Scripter "Next Generation"?

2)  What is the history of ScripterNG vis-a-vis the scripting engine for Scribus?  It looks like ScripterNG was a Google Summer of Code (GSOC) project headed up by someone with a username of Henning.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zpm98BXr2R4  I'm not clear on where it stands vis-a-vis the current HEAD of the SVN repository.

I've downloaded Scribus' current high watermark (17,549), "HEAD", from Subversion (svn://scribus.net/trunk/Scribus)and successfully compiled it on Gentoo Linux using Gentoo's package manager.  The out-of-the-Subversion version did not have a menu item Extras-ScripterNG.  So I followed the instruction to include ScripterNG as follows (with slight modification):

   ScriptingNG notes

   pulled SVN head (svn://scribus.net/trunk/Scribus) into /usr/local/src/scribus

   Following directions at http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/ScripterNG
    (installed within my Gentoo system: "emerge dev-vcs/bzr")
   in /usr/local/src:
      bzr branch http://henning.cco-ev.de/scribus/scripterng scripterng
      
   per scipterng/README

    install python-dev, python-qt4-dev, perhaps python-sip4-dev, sip4 if you haven't already
    None of the above pacakges appear within Gentoo's portage system:
      themis scribus # eix python-dev
      No matches found.
      themis scribus # eix python-qt4
      No matches found.
      themis scribus # eix python-sip4
      No matches found.
      themis scribus # eix sip4
      No matches found.
      themis scribus #


   in /usr/local/src:
      mkdir scribus/scribus/plugins/scripterng
      cp scripterng/*  scribus/scribus/plugins/scripterng
      nano scribus/scribus/plugins/CMakeLists.txt
         #
         # 6/10/12 jlpoole
         #
         ADD_SUBDIRECTORY(scripterng)
         
   in /usr/local/src/scribus:
      cmake .
      make
      make install

   
Based on the above, my version of Scribus has the "Extras-ScripterNG" which opens a window to launch the plugin which, in turn, creates a modal (blocking) window exposing two tabs: Python and Javascript.

It's taking a long time to compile, e.g. 20 minutes plus on quadcore laptop that has been pretty snappy with compile times.  Compiling is on the order of compiling Firefox or Google's Chrome.

I've also staged an SVN pull at /usr/local/src/scribus where I'm following the instructions in the "obsolete" [url src="http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/ScripterNG"] ScripterNG [/url] page which appears to install a version of ScripterNG apart from the regular scripting feature.  It's taking a long time to compile, e.g. 20 minutes plus on quadcore laptop that has been pretty snappy with compile times.


ScripterNG supports both python and QTScript, a variant of JavaScript or Ecmascript.  The building instructions suggest that ScripterNG co-exists with the regular python scripting and ScripterNG is accessed

http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/Category:Scripts
has
Note: The new script engine "ScripterNG" is currently being integrated into Scribus. The next steps will be:

    get the script engine to work (should already be ok)
   
   
http://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/ScripterNG
has the warning
This information is obsolete.  Yet, there are instructions for building with ScripterNG which works.


So what is the state of ScripterNG?  Is it something that will be brought into Scribus, or is it an experiment or investigation?

I'm very interested in helping get scripting in Scribus well documented and to have an editor for Python script that has autocomplete.  I'm very familiar with XML and XSL transformations -- it's part of my regular day-time job.  I do like JavaScript as I work with it in my job, Python is not something I'm readily familiar with, but it's various packages, e.g. database connectivity, make it highly desirable.
John L. Poole

work: Principal Software Engineer, Oracle Corporation
play: Editions Poole - publisher of classical ensemble piano music (using InDesign & scripts thereunder)

a.l.e

hi john,

lot of questions!

scribusNG has been renamed as scripter2 and will be called scripter in the future :-)

as far as i can tell, it will just replace the older scripter in the future release 1.6
(it will probably be possible for some time to add again the old scripter at compile time... so, yes: all the scripts will have to be ported to the new scripter!)

the page you are linking to is rather old. currently, the new scripter is in the trunk and can be switched in by adding -DWANT_SCRIPTER2=1 to the cmake command.
(as of today, there is a small error in one of the files and you will have to do a small correction to get it compiled... i don't have the patch at hand).

there has been a second GSOC aimed at completing the scripter API and get the code to work correctly with 1.5svn.

jain should be committing his work in the next few days and it will then be available for download!
(and this should also fix the small error mentioned above)

you will be able to test it, soon and i will be happy to hear your comments and critics!

finally, about the editor: personally, i'd prefer scribus to support well the external editing of scripts (reloading and launching them...) rather than seeing an internal editor that has too many features.
there are enough editors around that have perfect support for python!

and, for now, i think that only support for python is implemented, but having also read henning words, i think that once the first implementation is well integrated into scribus, it should not be hard to add support for javascript!

if you want to help with the documentation or the js support, you're welcome!

have a nice start to the week
a.l.e