In the next article we are going to take a look at BlueGriffon. When we need create simple web pages in a comfortable way and without paying for a license, this is an interesting alternative. It's about a editor WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get). It works in a similar way to a word processor, but it allows us to obtain, as a result, a document in HTML or EPUB format.
BlueGriffon is partly open source. It will allow us to install some proprietary components that add extra functionality. One of its greatest advantages is that its operation is based on the Gecko rendering engine used by the Firefox browser. It supports HTML 5 (including audio, video, and forms) and CSS3 (including 2D and 3D transformations, transitions, shadows, columns, font-related features, etc.). At the same time it will give us the possibility to handle CSS variables, images in SVG format and many other features.
It's a multiplatform program that we can use in Spanish, even though the translation is only partial. In Ubuntu, as BlueGriffon is not included in the official repositories, we will have to resort to the GetDeb repository for installation.
For who does not know, GetDeb is an unofficial project which aims to offer the latest versions of open source and freeware applications for the different versions of Ubuntu. In GetDeb we can find more modern packages than those contained in the official repositories or programs that are not included in them. In this repository the packages are included as they are offered by their authors after a trial period.
Installing BlueGriffon on Ubuntu 17.10
Add the GetDeb repository
To add the repository the first step is to get your public key. We will achieve this by downloading it with the wget command and sending it to the apt-key add command. We will achieve both things by writing the following command in the terminal (Ctrl + Alt + T):
wget -q -O - http://archive.getdeb.net/getdeb-archive.key | sudo apt-key add -
Once the public key of the repository is added, we can add said repository. We will do this by executing the following command in the same terminal:
sudo sh -c 'echo "deb http://archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu trusty-getdeb apps" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/getdeb.list'
After this, it only remains to update the package database stored by the system. We will do this by executing the following command:
sudo apt update
With these simple steps, we have our Ubuntu ready to enjoy the complete collection of packages stored within the GetDeb repository.
Install BlueGriffon
Install from Getdeb
Once the repository is installed, we could use the Ubuntu software option to install BlueGriffon. However, continuing with the same terminal, we will only have to write the following installation command in it:
sudo apt install bluegriffon
We don't have to worry about having dependencies previously installed. During the installation all that are necessary will be installed. Through this process we may not install the latest version of the program. When we start it for the first time, the program will check the project page if there is a new version and it will tell us that we can download it.
Install the latest version of Bluegriffon
If you want to install the latest version, you can download it using the download option that the program will show us. We can also choose to get hold of the .deb file from the web page and choose to open a terminal (Ctrl + Alt + T) and write in it:
sudo wget http://bluegriffon.org/freshmeat/3.0.1/bluegriffon-3.0.1.Ubuntu16.04-x86_64.deb
The file that exists for Ubuntu today is for version 16.04, but I am installing it on Ubuntu 17.10 without any problem. When we have the file saved we can proceed to the installation by typing in the same terminal:
sudo dpkg -i bluegriffon-3.0.1.Ubuntu16.04-x86_64.deb
After the installation is complete, we can start enjoying the cool features of BlueGriffon.
Uninstall Bluegriffon
To eliminate this program from our operating system we will only have to open a terminal (Ctrl + Alt + T) and write in it:
sudo apt remove bluegriffon && sudo apt autoremove
We can also use the Ubuntu software option to remove the program.