----- 
permalink: glyph
filters_pre: 
- erb
- redcloth
title: "Project: Glyph"
type: project
github: glyph
links:
- "Repository": http://www.github.com/h3rald/glyph/
- "Bug Tracking": http://www.github.com/h3rald/glyph/issues
- "Development Wiki": http://wiki.github.com/h3rald/glyph
- "Download": http://www.rubygems.org/gems/glyph
- "Book (PDF)": http://github.com/h3rald/glyph/blob/master/book/output/pdf/glyph.pdf
- "Docs": http://yardoc.org/docs/h3rald-glyph/
- "User Group": http://groups.google.com/group/glyph-framework
status: Active
version: 0.3.0
-----

<%= render 'project_data', :tag => 'glyph' %>

Glyph is a _Rapid Document Authoring Framework_. 

With Glyph, you can manage your documents tidily in _projects_ and generate deliverables in different formats such as HTML or PDF (through <a href="http://www.princexml.com/">Prince</a>).

<br style="clear:both" />

<div class="section">
<h3 id="h_1">Main Features</h3>
Glyph comes with its very own macro system to perform a wide variety of advanced tasks:
* Generate block-level HTML tags not commonly managed by lightweight markups, like @head@, @body@, @div@ and @table@.
* Create and validate internal and external links.
* Include and validate images and figures.
* Automatically determine header levels based on the document structure.
* Automatically generate a Table of Contents based on the document structure.
* Store common snippets of text in a single YAML file and use them anywhere in your document, as many times as you need.
* Store configuration settings in a YAML file and use them anywhere in your document, as many times as you need.
* Evaluate Ruby code within your document.
* Include content only if certain conditions are satisfied.
* Define macros, snippets and configuration settings directly within your document.
* Highlight source code.
* Call macros from other macros (including snippets), avoiding mutual calls.
* Include text files within other text files.
* Include the value of any configuration setting (like author, title) in the document.
* Filter input explicitly or implicitly (based on file extensions). 
* Manage draft comments and todo items.
* Provide a simple, less-verbose syntax to write XML code.

</div>

<div class="section">
<h3 id="h_2">Installation</h3>
@gem install glyph@ -- simple, as always.

</div>

<div class="section">
<h3 id="h_3">Essential Glyph commands</h3>
Glyph is 100% command line. Its interface resambles <a href="http://git-scm.com/">Git's</a> for its simplicity and power (thanks to the <a href="http://github.com/davetron5000/gli">gli</a> gem). Here are some example commands: 

* @glyph init@ -- to initialize a new Glyph project in the current (empty) directory.
* @glyph add introduction.textile@ -- to create a new file called _introduction.textile_.
* @glyph compile@ -- to compile the current document into a single HTML file.
* @glyph compile --auto@ -- to keep recompiling the current document every time a file is changed.
* @glyph compile -f pdf@ -- to compile the current document into HTML and then transform it into PDF using <a href="http://www.princexml.com/">Prince</a>.
* @glyph compile readme.glyph@ -- to compile a _readme.glyph_ located in the current directory into a single HTML file.
* @glyph outline -l 2@ -- Display the document outline, up to second-level headers.

</div>

<div class="section">
<h3 id="macros_nutshell">Glyph macros in a nutshell</h3>
Format your documents using Textile or Markdown, and use Glyph Macros to do everything else:

**Glyph Source:**

<div class="code">
<pre>
<code>
section[
  @title[Something about Glyph]
  txt[
You can use Glyph macros in conjunction 
with _Textile_ or _Markdown_ to
produce HTML files effortlessly.
  ]
  p[
Alternatively, you can just use em[Glyph itself]
to generate HTML tags.
  ]
  section[
    @title[What about PDFs?]
    @id[pdf]
Once you have a single, well-formatted HTML 
file, converting it to PDF is
extremely easy with a 3rd-party 
renderer like =>[http://www.princexml.com|Prince].
  ]   
]
</code>
</pre>
</div>

**HTML Output:**

<div class="code">
<pre>
<code>
<div class="section">
  <h2 id="h_10">Something about Glyph</h2>
  <p>
    You can use Glyph macros in conjunction with 
    <em>Textile</em> or <em>Markdown</em> to
    produce HTML files effortlessly.
  </p>
  <div class="section">
   <h3 id="pdf">What about PDFs?</h3>
   <p>
     Once you have a single, well-formatted HTML 
     file, converting it to PDF is
     extremely easy with a 3rd-party renderer 
     like <a href="http://www.princexml.com">Prince</a>.
   </p>
   <p>
     Alternatively, you can just use <em>Glyph itself</em>
     to generate HTML tags.
   </p>
  </div>
</div>
</code>
</pre>
</div>

</div>

<%= render 'project_updates', :tag => 'glyph' %>