Scribus

Scribus is a page layout application aimed at print production. Documents are built from frames placed on pages: text frames that can be linked so a story flows from one into the next, image frames, tables and vector shapes. Master pages carry repeating elements such as running heads and page numbers, while guides and a snapping grid handle alignment.

Typography and colour are the areas it takes furthest. Paragraph and character styles apply across a document, with control over hyphenation, tracking, kerning and OpenType features. Colour can be defined in CMYK or as spot colours, ICC profiles drive soft proofing on screen, and PDF export offers press options including bleed, crop marks, colour separations and PDF/X output intents. A preflight check reports missing images, overflowing text frames and colour space problems before export.

Scribus is not a word processor. Long text is usually written elsewhere and imported; the built-in story editor is meant for corrections rather than drafting.