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Can anyone offer advice on a program for compiling and publishing a book?

I have Scribus but am having a rough time with it. I was very good with Quark... I need something that has style sheets, page numbers, contents.

If Scribus is the best for those purposes, I guess I'll have to keep working with it but as of now I really hate it.

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It has a very steep learning curve, but I think that the best option for books is still LaTeX, unless your book is very images-oriented. The fact that is basically a language hinders the start, but then gives you a flexibility that is difficult to find in other programs.

It is very well supported in Ubuntu, and has even a very friendly and useful Stack Exchange site.

You can get started or explore the system here: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/155863/getting-started-with-tex-latex

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  • I'd also use LaTeX. If you find it difficult to start using it (it's rather complicated at first because of the packages and so on) I recommend you to use ShareLaTeX, an on-line editor, also you can find suiting templates for your purpose. Feb 2, 2014 at 22:34
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use Quark in Ubuntu

If you are good at Quark, you can use it in Ubuntu as well with help of wine. You need to download the .exe file from the Quark website and use it in wine. For how to's on wine, read

  1. Useful resources
  2. How to use wine
  3. How to run wine on ubuntu
  4. Install windows program on ubuntu
  5. Community help by ubuntu on Wine

Useful links

10 ways to e-publish with linux

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  • You might want to specify which specific Quark software will meet the asker's requirements as Quark provides many solutions and products.
    – nsane
    Jan 25, 2014 at 6:49
  • Asker has used quark before on windows,so asker better knows about this. I've only suggested him to use wine. Jan 25, 2014 at 6:53
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BookSmart is a bookmaking application developed by Blurb, Inc. It allows users to design and publish books.

Although Blurb do not offer or support a Linux version of BookSmart, it is a Java application which will run on Linux with a bit of fiddling.

Learn how to download and more information: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BookSmart

Please be sure to read the notes before installation.


LyX is a structured documentation system that uses LaTeX, a typesetting system, as its back-end. This means that you enter the content and the system works out the best layout. As the user does not have direct control over layout, LyX isn’t optimised for free-form documents such as posters, but it comes into its own in the creation of longer, more complex projects such as a book. The LyX interface doesn’t qualify as WYSIWYG, but it does reflect elements such as emphasised text, and it does allow you to see images (called figures in LaTeX-speak) and tables within the document. Although it is a front-end to a markup system, you can typically complete a complicated project without ever encountering any LaTeX code, but you can dabble with it to add customised effects.

More information and step by step tutotrial here:http://www.linuxuser.co.uk/tutorials/publish-a-book-with-lyx

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I don't know what your needs are exactly but you can try the Zim Desktop Wiki. It's a great tool for capturing and organizing you ideas, thoughts and writings, etc.

For typesetting, page layouts, etc the best option is, as Rmano mentioned, LaTex. The basic idea behind LaTex is to focus on writing and leave the "decoration" to the software. If you find LaTeX difficult to master, you can try Texmacs which is a WYSWYG alternative for Latex. (It doesn't use Latex internally but can import from and export to latex).

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