Scribus Forums

Scribus => Beginner Talk => Topic started by: JimMorr on February 11, 2021, 01:29:08 PM

Title: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: JimMorr on February 11, 2021, 01:29:08 PM
I have just upgraded from an older  version of Scribus in which I did use a collection of text boxes and picture boxes. Should I rewrite old boxes as tables now? It seems they are missing a few features I have used:
- I can't find a way to make a partially transparent background for rows
- The cells are text only, I cannot find a way to anchor a picture box in a cell
Am I missing something or those features are not there? (Are not there yet)?
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: JimMorr on February 25, 2021, 10:29:08 AM
OK, lets try something more basic. I cannot edit shape of the frame for a table (to set margins). (Edit button is gray) Is it intended for current state of development?
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: dragonfly on February 25, 2021, 05:33:09 PM
In an effort to learn more about how tables are created I found this ..

https://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/Building_Tables

So cell box margins can be placed behind the text cells.

It seems rather messy to me as a workflow.  Why not just create tables externally (they can be mixed text and image cells) and then import tables an images into imageframes? 

In principle they could be imported through Scripter.  Or even from Google Sheets which has a python API. Or from markdown/mermaid which exports tables as images. I have Atom editor which can generate mermaid tables.

But all this is hypothesis since I have not prepared Scribus tables.
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: JimMorr on February 26, 2021, 09:39:33 AM
IMO Scribus needs native advanced tables. Tables which allow styles managing, updating, resizing. Tables which allow to select content for a cell: paragraph / graphic box. At least this is my impression when trying to design a game rulebook.
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: dragonfly on February 26, 2021, 11:29:28 AM
My approach differs from yours.
Where a feature is not available in any software (in this case native tables) then do not wait for the development team to meet your requirements. Use your own initiative. For this reason, I am an advocate for toolchains and using microservices where in this case Scribus is just one link in a chain. The external resource to import is a generated table. The table cells can also be dynamically changed (I refer to this in another thread using ScribusGenerator.py).   You might want to generate different versions of your game rulebook in different languages.
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: dragonfly on February 26, 2021, 01:14:40 PM
Postscript:

Now that I had read a bit more about writing game rulebooks .. https://www.boardgamedesignlab.com/rules/ (https://www.boardgamedesignlab.com/rules/) ..
it seems even more important to preprocess this content to import into frames.
It is not a simple table grid as in Excel.
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: JimMorr on February 28, 2021, 11:29:49 AM
I also work on what I have. My questions came as in previous version there was nothing I could use and I created such tables with separate text boxes:

(https://i.postimg.cc/vTPw6gxX/sample-Table.png)

This was real pain in the back as when length of text in a cell changed I had to rework the whole table. If table stopped fitting into a page... well, whole layout could be affected.
In latest version however tables have been added. It is a great feature I am just not sure if it is experimental and subject to change or should I rework my old layout into it...
Title: Re: Tables [1.5.6.1] transparent background and cells with graphics
Post by: dragonfly on February 28, 2021, 12:45:11 PM
If you follow the logic I explain in adjacent thread here https://forums.scribus.net/index.php/topic,3976.0.html (https://forums.scribus.net/index.php/topic,3976.0.html) about using ScribusGenerator.py I envisage that you could dynamically change rule book grid cell dimensions by creating a template which has grid cells attributes specified as
%VAR_x1%, %VAR_y1%, %VAR_w1%, %VAR_h1%
%VAR_x2%, %VAR_y2%, %VAR_w2%, %VAR_h2%
etc. and any other attributes you wish to change such as importing images from a repository or directory.

Then all you require to amend are the variables in your master csv before final preview and print.

Another approach would be to create the rulebook cells externally to import.  Boxy SVG is a nice utility for this and you can export from Boxy SVG to be imported into Scribus document.