.. _a_started: *************** Getting Started *************** .. _main website: https://novelwriter.io .. _GitHub: https://github.com/vkbo/novelWriter/releases .. _PyPi: https://pypi.org/project/novelWriter/ This section contains brief guides to how you can get novelWriter running on your computer. These are the methods currently supported by the developer. Packages may also be available in other package managers, but those are not managed by the developer. No installers are provided at this time, but it is fairly straightforward to set up novelWriter with the provided install scripts. As novelWriter matures, more options for how to install it and get it running will be added. For non-Windows users the install process is at the present time best suited for people used to working with the command line. But even if you're not, the install process is fairly straightforward. The next pages have specific install instructions for the various operating systems novelWriter can run on. The instructions below are supplementary information, instructions for alterbative methods, and additional build options. .. note:: The text below assumes the command ``python`` corresponds to a Python 3 executable. Python 2 is now deprecated, but many systems still have both Python 2 and 3. For such systems, the command ``python3`` may be needed instead. On Linux, the scripts can also be made executable and run without the ``python`` command. Likewise, ``pip`` may need to be replaced with ``pip3``. .. _a_started_depend: Dependencies ============ novelWriter has been designed to rely on as few dependencies as possible. Aside from the packages needed to communicate with the Qt GUI libraries, only one package is required for handling the XML format of the main project file. Everything else is handled with standard Python libraries. The following Python packages are needed to run novelWriter: * ``pyqt5`` – needed for connecting with the Qt5 libraries. * ``lxml`` – needed for full XML support. * ``pyenchant`` – needed for efficient spell checking (optional). PyQt/Qt should be at least 5.3, but ideally 5.10 or higher for nearly all features to work. For instance, searching using regular expressions with full Unicode support requires 5.13. There is no known minimum version requirement for package ``lxml``, but the code was originally written with 4.2, which is therefore set as the minimum. It may work on lower versions. You have to test it. Optionally, a package can be installed to interface with the Enchant spell checking libaries, but this isn't strictly required. If no external spell checking library is available, novelWriter falls back to using the internal ``difflib`` of Python to check spelling. This is a slower and less sophisticated spell checker than the full spell checking libaries. The spell check library must be at least 3.0 to work with Windows. On Linux, 2.0 also works fine. If you do use the internal spell checker, you also have to provide a text file with a list of all words correctly spelled. One word on each line. Dictionary files for English is included with novelWriter. For other languages, you will need to add more files yourself. If you install from PyPi, these dependencies should be installed automatically. If you install from source, dependencies can still be installed from PyPi with: .. code-block:: console pip install -r requirements.txt .. _a_started_install: Installing from Source or PyPi ============================== You can download the latest version of novelWriter from the source repository on GitHub_. You can also install novelWriter from PyPi_. If you're running novelWriter from source, the main setup script has a number of options that may be useful to you. You can list them by running: .. code-block:: console python setup.py --help To install from PyPi you must first have the ``python`` and ``pip`` commands available on your system. If you don't, see specific instructions for your operating system in this documentation. To install novelWriter from PyPi, use the following command: .. code-block:: console pip install novelwriter To upgrade an existing installation, use: .. code-block:: console pip install --upgrade novelwriter When installing via pip, novelWriter can be launched from command line with: .. code-block:: console novelWriter Make sure the install location for pip is in your PATH variable. This is not always the case by default. .. _a_started_i18n: Building the Translation Files ============================== If you installed novelWriter from a package, the translation files should be pre-built and included. If you're running novelWriter from the source code, you will need to generate the files yourself. The files you need will be written to the ``nw/assets/i18n`` folder, and will have the ``.qm`` file extension. You can build the ``.qm`` files with: .. code-block:: console python3 setup.py qtlrelease This requires that the Qt Linguist tool is installed on your system. On Ubuntu and Debian, the needed package is called `qttools5-dev-tools`. .. note:: If you want to improve novelWriter with translation files for another language, or update an existing translation, instructions for how to contribute can be found in the README.md file in the ``i18n`` folder of the source code. .. _a_started_docs: Building the Documentation ========================== If you installed novelWriter from a package, the documentation should be pre-built and included. If you're running novelWriter from the source code, a local copy of this documentation can be generated. It requires the following Python packages on Debian and Ubuntu. * ``python3-sphinx`` * ``python3-sphinx-rtd-theme`` * ``python3-sphinxcontrib.qthelp`` Or from PyPi: .. code-block:: console pip install sphinx sphinx-rtd-theme sphinxcontrib-qthelp The documentation can then be built from the ``docs`` folder in the source code by running: .. code-block:: console make html If successful, the documentation should be available in the ``docs/build/html`` folder and you can open the ``index.html`` file in your browser. The documentation can also be built for the Qt Assistant. To build the help packages from the documentation source, run the following from the root source folder: .. code-block:: console python setup.py qthelp The setup script will copy the generated files into the ``nw/assets/help`` folder, and novelWriter will detect the presence of the files and redirect the menu help entry to open help locally instead of sending the user to the website. Pressing the :kbd:`F1` key will in any case try to open help locally first, then send you to the website as a fallback. .. note:: In order for the local version of help to work, the Qt Assistant must be installed on the local computer. If it isn't available, or novelWriter cannot find it, the help feature will fall back to redirecting you to the documentation website.