Editing Research/Web-to-print/WeasyPrint

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==Print in hybrid publishing workflows==
'''Print products = bottleneck in hybrid publishing workflows'''

Screens in pages represent different paradigms
* Instead of reflowable text, continuous space, variable screen size
* Page: a fixed space

The translation of layouts for screen to page layouts, within  is '''not trivial'''.

==HTML-to-print Tools==
* LaTex
* Browser built-in PDF rendering 
* Desktop publishing software
* Weasy Print.

==LaTex==
A type-setting/document preparation language, focused on producing typographicaly correct PDFs. 

===positive aspects===
* LaTex is a markup language;
* Pandoc converts seamlessly to LaTex.
* Supports page numbers, hyphenation, bibliography, references, hyperlinks, etc, etc...
* Can produce more experimental and generative outputs. <ref name="lakfon">See works by [http://research.lafkon.net/ Lafkon studio] for an idea of the possibilities</ref>.

===negative aspects===
* Outputs are by default look academic, although this can be changed
* Use is outmoded 
* Styling is defined by packages imported into the document, which is very different and '''incompatible with CSS'''. 
* A difficult tool to work with, let alone to teach. 


==Browser built-in pdf rendering==
Current browsers have built-in pdf rendering engines. 
By using the browser function «Print to file» and CSS rules for print, print layouts can be created from HTML files.
===positive aspects===
* relies on the same set of technologies - HTML, CSS and JS - as other hybrid publishing formats: webpages, ePubs, apps
* it is simple, easily to teach
* CSS includes page specific options: <code>@media page</code> rule, and the pseudo-classes <code>:first :left :right @bottom-left</code>
 
===negative aspects===
* works poorly and inconsistently
* requires a lot of trial-and-error to achieve the desired output, with results differing widely across browsers and versions

===OSP===
[http://osp.kitchen/ OSP] is making a lot of efforts in this area.

html2print tool (recently developed)
http://lurk.org/groups/80c/messages/topic/4CIuW3jpiAFLwllZN3itFV/

==Desktop publishing software==
Software such as Scribus and inDesign can be incorporated into an HP workflow.

Scribus can import HTML files and inDesign ICML(XML)files. Both formats keep their structure when imported and can remain '''updatable'''.

===positive aspects===
* allows direct feedback between operations and their effects
* graphic designers are familiar their workflows
* can produce complex PDFs with impositions, hyphenation, page numbers. etc
* can intervene in almost all aspects of the document
 
===negative aspects===
* to keep the content updatable operations (in inDesign) interventions on content are not possible
* complex structures, like large tables, are difficult to handle, while keeping content updatable (in inDesign)




==Weasy Print==
[[Weasy_Print]] (WP)<ref name="weasyprint1">“WeasyPrint Documentation” http://weasyprint.org/docs/.</ref> is a visual rendering engine for HTML to PDF, that uses CSS. 

Its CSS layout engine is written in Python, but employs several libraries to render the PDF.

===positive aspects===
* Uses HTML and CSS to layout the PDF
* Supports features like page size, page numbering, hyphenation in several languages<ref name="hyp">With the [http://pyphen.org/ pyphen library]</ref>
* Resulting PDFs can achieve high level of complexity, with simple instructions
* Simple and easy to use
* Can be used as a Python library or as a standalone program
* Free software (BSD license)
* Cleal documentation

===negative aspects===
* Can be difficult to install, due to its dependencies
* It does not support CSS custom fonts - uses [http://www.pango.org/ Pango library] to manage fonts
* No support for folded formats, such as booklets: no mechanism for imposition


[[Category:Research]]