OK, here we go...
As some of you may already know, I have been working on an ePub editor for quite some time now. And after about six months of development time, I come to you with the current, initial version of
Sigil. It’s still rough around the edges (to say the least), so consider it
an alpha build at best (version 0.1.0). It can crash, it can bug out on you
. It has nowhere near the features I want it to have, but it will get there. I consider this to be a multi-year project for me, so this is just the start.
Now what does it have to offer…
- Free and open source software under GPLv3
- Multi-platform: runs on Windows, Linux and Mac
- Full Unicode support: everything you see in Sigil is in UTF-16
- Full EPUB spec support
- WYSIWYG editing
- Multiple Views: Book View, Code View and Split View
- Metadata editor with full support for all possible metadata entries (more than 200) with full descriptions for each
- Table Of Contents editor
- Multi-level TOC support
- Book View fully supports the display any XHTML document possible under the OPS spec
- SVG support
- Basic XPGT support
- Advanced automatic conversion of all imported documents to Unicode
- Currently imports TXT, HTML and EPUB files; more will be added with time
- Currently exports EPUB and SGF (Sigil native format); more will be added with time
- Embedded HTML Tidy; all imported documents are thoroughly cleaned; changing views cleans the document so no matter how much you screw up your code, it will fix it (usually :))
- An actually usable user interface
- Native C++ application
- Bugs :)
- And a lot more...
It can be downloaded here:
http://code.google.com/p/sigil/. There is currently no documentation, so don’t waste your time looking for some (it will be added with time, don’t worry).
Currently the Windows and Linux people get a zipped folder with all the required files. Mac people get a DMG. I’ll be providing installers for Windows and Mac versions when the code stabilizes a bit. The Linux people will get DEBs.
Notes for Windows users: you
have to run the file “vcredist_x86.exe”
before running Sigil for the first time. This is a Microsoft provided setup file that installs some files Sigil depends on.
Tested on XP, Vista x64, Windows 7 x64.
Notes for Linux users: Sigil requires Qt 4.5.0. I’m assuming you know how to install this.
Tested on Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope).
Notes for Mac users: This has only been tested on Mac OS X 10.5. Previous versions
might work. Also, Sigil isn't a universal binary, so Intel Macs are a must. I'll provide universal binaries after I sort out certain architectural issues that are blocking this.
Report any bugs here and on the issue tracker on Sigil’s website (search the thread and tracker first, please). Be sure to include any and all relevant information. The more info you give me, the better and sooner will I be able to help you. Feel free to give any suggestions on how Sigil can be improved. My TODO list of features and improvements fills up a book (literally), but I’m certainly more than willing to hear what other people think.
This is open source software, and it will hopefully be open source development. I want the community to say what should be changed, updated, improved and in what way. MobileRead is by far the most awesome community I’ve ever been a part of and I know we’ll be able to come up with some great ideas.
