1 Introduction

deplate is a ruby-based tool that converts wiki-like markup to LaTeX, HTML, DocBook, or really plain text. It currently supports the following input formats:

• “native” viki/deplate markup with variations: full, restricted, template, play, headings (≈outline)
• ruby’s rdoc

It currently supports the following output formats:

• HTML: single page, chunked (small website, HTML-based slideshow)
• PHP = HTML + extras
• LaTeX: standard document classes, koma, dramatist
• DocBook: article, book, man/ref
• Really plain text

The “native” viki/deplate markup supports page templates, embedded LaTeX code, footnotes, citations, bibliographies, semi-automatic index generation, table of contents etc. It is suitable for writing articles, books, plays (for screen or stage), or for creating small websites. By means of LaTeX or DocBook, it is possible to create PDF or RTF documents. From a user perspective, viki/deplate is an intermediary format that can replace LaTeX. deplate’s LaTeX output is intended to be readable and well formatted. Because of the tight integration with LaTeX, you still get most of its features but with fewer quirks and support for more output formats. At least, that’s the idea.

deplate aims to be modular and easily extensible. It is the accompanying converter for the Vim viki plugin.

A note on code quality: This is a personal pet project and the result of a series of early morning pre-coffee plumbing. It originally served two purposes: learn ruby, convert emacs-wiki pages without emacs. It has improved since then but not always in the most advantageous manner. It works for me though and has proven quite useful.

In case deplate doesn’t meet your needs, there are plenty of similar tools you might want to give a try.

For converting mostly plain text to HTML, LaTeX etc.:

• aft
• PlainDoc (pd2tex)
• reStructuredText
• sisu
• txt2tags
• yodl

With respect to website generation, you might also be interested in these tools:

• webgen
• rote

The authors of zoem (Stijn van Dongen and Joost van Baal) compiled a comprehensive list of similar efforts.

1.1 Goals

1. Use it as a personal wiki (via the Vim viki plugin)
2. Be able to publish to many other formats – but do it in a way so that the output looks nice and can be edited and shared with other people
3. Use a syntax that is convenient to use with all sorts of non-specialized text editors (the most basic markup should be wiki-style; more complex things should be done using a more structured approach or by embedding ruby code)
4. Support all the tags needed to write not-too-technical documents (i.e., headings, footnotes, citations, indices, page headers/footers, tables, figures, verbatim text, basic text styles etc.)
5. Conditionally allow the dynamic/on-the-fly generation of content (e.g., statistical analyses via R, concept maps via dot …)
6. Use other programs for tasks they perform well
7. Make it customizable