Preparations

Setting up novelibre

If novelibre were a commercial application, all the steps described below would be performed automatically by the setup program. On Windows, for instance, this would then be an .exe or .msi file that must be executed with special authorizations and may even require a costly certificate in order to be approved for download and installation.

There is also the problem that a separate setup program would have to be created and maintained for each operating system. For Linux, it would be necessary to provide installation packages or images, whereby there are a multitude of different standards.

Because I don’t run a software business, but am just a hobbyist and rather want to write novels, I’ve decided to go a different route: I provide an executable Python zip archive that works the same way on all operating systems if Python is installed correctly. No Internet connection is required to install and operate novelibre.

The very last setup steps, which vary depending on the operating system and may also require special authorizations, must be carried out by the intrepid users themselves. I do what I can to make these steps easier, and provide detailed instructions for Windows below. Enjoy!

Installing the application

Step 1

• Either launch the downloaded novelibre_vx.x.x.pyzw file by double-clicking (Windows/Linux desktop),

  

  Example (Windows Explorer)

• or execute

  `python novelibre_vx.x.x.pyzw` (Windows), resp.

  `python3 novelibre_vx.x.x.pyzw` (Linux) on the command line.

  

  Example (Windows command line)

“x.x.x” means the version number.

In both cases, a pop-up window should appear indicating that the installation was successful.

Example (Windows)

Important

Many web browsers recognize the download as an executable file and offer to open it immedately. This starts the installation.

Example (Chrome browser)

However, depending on your security settings, your browser may initially refuse to download the executable file. In this case, your confirmation or an additional action is required. If this is not possible, you have the option of downloading the zip file.

Making novelibre accessible on the Desktop

Note for Linux users

In the following chapters, the Windows procedure is described.

As a Linux user, you are expected to know how to set up a program launcher on your specific desktop. Roughly speaking, it is a matter of calling python3 with ~/.novx/run.pyw and an optionally specified file as parameters.

With the XFCE desktop, for example, my launcher command is:

python3 /home/peter/.novx/run.pyw %F

You might have to copy the novelibre icons to a dedicated image directory where your program launcher gets the icons from. You also may want to set novelibre as standard application for files with the .novx extension, and assign them the novelibre logo as file icon. With the XFCE desktop, none of this was too difficult for me. In doubt, refer to your desktop documentation.

It’s a good idea to register the novx extension in the mimetypes as text/xml, so it can be opened with your web browser for display, using the novx.css style sheet.

Step 2

Open the installation folder.

Step 3

Drag and drop run.pyw to the desktop while holding down the Alt key. This creates a shortcut to launch novelibre from the Windows desktop. Now you can also drag and drop .novx project files to this shortcut.

Step 4

Optionally, you can replace the “Python” icon with the novelibre logo you may find in the installation’s icons subdirectory.

To do this, right-click on the desktop shortcut and open the Properties dialog. Select the Shortcut Tab and click on the Change icon button (1). In the icon selection dialog, click on the Browse… button (2). This opens a file selection dialog. Move to <home>\.novx\icons and double-click on the “N” logo (3).

Step 5

To rename the shortcut to novelibre, right-click on the desktop shortcut and open the Properties dialog. In the first tab, replace “Shortcut to run.pyw” with “novelibre”.

Associating .novx files with novelibre

Step 6

Optionally, you can associate the .novx file extension with the novelibre application. Then the project files are displayed with the novelibre icon in the Explorer, and you can open them with novelibre by double-click. Further, you can display .novx files with a web browser, using the novx.css style sheet.

Double-click on the add_novelibre.reg script. Windows will display a warning and ask you for confirmation. If in doubt, you can inspect the add_novelibre.reg file with a text editor or ask an expert you trust.

Hint

You can undo this by executing the remove_novelibre.reg script. This removes all the novelibre-specific entries from the Windows registry while keeping the application.

To uninstall the application and all its tools, plugins, and configuration data, just delete the <home>\.novx folder after executing the remove_novelibre.reg script.

Important

Executing the program under Windows by double-clicking on the .novx file works under the hood by calling the currently installed version of the Python interpreter.

If you update Python at a later date, you must then re-install novelibre afterwards, and execute add_novelibre.reg again. Otherwise, Windows will not be able to find the new Python version and will fail when trying to open .novx files on double-clicking.

Please keep that in mind, even if it’s pretty unlikely that novelibre will need a Python update in the near future.

Updating the application or a plugin

Just execute the first step as described above. If there is any further action required, the setup script will give you a message.

---

Setting up Writer

I assume that novelibre users are already familiar with LibreOffice or OpenOffice Writer. Therefore, I will only give a few brief tips that relate specifically to the interaction with novelibre.

Making the sections visible in the manuscript

An essential part of the workflow is writing with the Writer word processor. For this, novelibre creates editable manuscript files in the Open Document Text format that are meant to be temporary. These documents contain structural information that enables novelibre to recognize and correctly sort the sections when reading them back.

For the whole thing to work, it is extremely important that you only write within the section boundaries. To do this, you might want to make the section boundaries visible in the Writer settings.

LibreOffice 7.6 screenshot: Make sure the Section boundaries box in the Tools > Options > Application Colors dialog is ticked. Writing outsides the visible section boundaries has no effect on your novelibre project.

Hint

With OpenOffice and older versions of LibreOffice the dialog may be called “Appearance” instead of “Application Colors”.

Docking the Navigator

To quickly find the chapters and sections of your novel in Writer, it is best to keep the Navigator in sight. I prefer to dock it to the left of the work area. To do this, first press F5 to open the Navigator. By default, it appears as a pop-up window that can be placed anywhere on the screen. To dock it, double-click in a free gray space while holding down the Ctrl key, as shown in the following image.

LibreOffice Writer screenshot: The red “X” indicates the position for double-clicking.

Tip

The Navigator displays a confusing wealth of information. It is best to reduce this to the headings first. To do this, select “Headings” at the top of the tree and then click on the “Content Navigation View” icon. This works if a document containing headings is loaded.

LibreOffice Writer screenshot: The red “O” indicates the icon to click on.

Customizing the look of your manuscript

The manuscript created by novelibre has a layout that is similar to the “standard manuscript format” which is widely used to provide an overview of the total number of pages of a work to be printed.

However, the set font “Courier New” is only available for Windows, and it is not particularly attractive (I, for my part, have installed the free Courier Prime font on Windows and Linux, which gives me a pleasant typewriter feel).

In addition, hyphenation is turned off, and the page size is set to A4, which is not the worldwide standard.

That’s not for you? No problem. This is what the document templates in Writer are for. So if you don’t like the look of the generated manuscript, simply apply a template that suits your needs and tastes. Perhaps you have to design your favorite template first, but your knowledge of this technique will pay off when it comes to designing print pages for self-publishing.

In order to minimize circumstances, I recommend my Style switcher extension, that allows you to customize your manuscript with a single mouse click.

Note

Loading a template or changing the default font and page size has no impact on re-importing the document with novelibre.

Tip

If you just want to change the font without applying templates, you can achieve this by having LibreOffice replace it automatically. For this, open the Options dialog and go to Fonts. Tick the Apply replacement table checkbox. Then enter the fonts of your choice.

novelibre uses “Courier New” for text documents, and “Calibri” for spreadsheets.

LibreOffice Options dialog screenshot.

Tip

If you prefer simple blank lines instead of the three-asterisks section separators in your final document, you can achieve this using “Find and replace”. This is particularly convenient with a macro that comes with the novelibre-tools extension.