• What this book is about
• The very beginnings
• Some basic elements of a Scribus script
• A real script: bcaption.py (and a variant)
• centervert.py
• en+emdash.py
• Autoquote.py
• replacetext.py
• ExtractText.py
• scribalbum.py
• shiftobjects.py
• swapimage.py
• invisibleimages.py
• Bar codes
• setguides2object.py
• resizeobject.py
• paste2all.py
• piechart.py
• colorchart_generic.py
• temp_graphing.py
• Creating Text Styles
• Python and strings
• Troubleshooting

swapimage.py

Here's a fun little script, that I can't say anyone including me has ever used in a purposeful way. The idea is that maybe you want to play with some layout containing images, and just want to see the difference in impact by interchanging a couple of images.

#!/usr/bin/env python
# -*- coding: utf-8  -*-

"""
swapimage.py

USAGE

Select 2 image frames, no more, no less, both must be image frames. Can be on different 
pages.

Run the script, the images are swapped.

"""

try:
    import scribus
except ImportError:
    print "Unable to import the 'scribus' module. This script will only run within"
    print "the Python interpreter embedded in Scribus. Try Script->Execute Script."
    sys.exit(1)


if scribus.selectionCount() != 2:
    scribus.messageBox('Selection Count', "You must have 2 image frames selected",
                       scribus.ICON_WARNING, scribus.BUTTON_OK)
    sys.exit(2)

frame1 = scribus.getSelectedObject(0)
frame2 = scribus.getSelectedObject(1)

ftype1 = scribus.getObjectType(frame1)
ftype2 = scribus.getObjectType(frame2)
if ((ftype1 != "ImageFrame") or (ftype2 != "ImageFrame")):
    scribus.messageBox('Object Type', "Both selected objects must be image frames",
                       scribus.ICON_WARNING, scribus.BUTTON_OK)
    sys.exit(2)

scribus.setRedraw(False)

filename1 = scribus.getImageFile(frame1)
filename2 = scribus.getImageFile(frame2)

scribus.loadImage(filename2, frame1)
scribus.loadImage(filename1, frame2)

scribus.setRedraw(True)

The usage information suggests right off the bat that most of what is here is error-checking. Aside from checking about running this in Scribus, we make sure that two and only two objects are selected, AND that they're both image frames. Notice here I have a different style of checking frame type. The command getObjectType() will return the string 'ImageFrame' if that's what it is, and note also there is no space, that's not a typo.

Once we clear the error hurdles, in four lines our work is done. If the user decides he doesn't like the switch, he just runs the script again.

Something I noticed on playing with this script is that it doesn't work so well in a situation where one or both pictures have an X-offset or Y-offset. A few more lines would be needed to get this information, and then transfer it.