So you still won't be able to print material you own because you cannot export it. Boy, that will make the print maniacs upset.
*Gets out a pair of binoculars and looks around.*
Oh, hey, there. Over there. Hey, Bid, I think I see were your barbs landed. Waaaaay over there. Wow, they really missed the mark.
No, not upset. Not even close. In fact, I'm quite pleased. Rob has said from the start that one of his concerns with printing was the protection of copyrighted material. This isn't news. This isn't a surprise. This was the expectation from day one of me asking about the ability to print.
And from day one, I've said I understood Rob's position on this point. I have some frustrations with the copyright holders, but not with Rob wanting to stay in business and wanting to stay legal. But still, all I wanted was the ability to print my own content, and I have that.
Not only do I have that, but since I was able to write my own script, I was able to tailor the output to my specific taste. And I've got a good set of command line options that allow me to make each conversion a little bit different. I can include inline images at different sizes, according to percentage. I can print stat blocks inline or just leave them as clickable links. I can choose to indent or not. And the output comes out looking really nice.
After I wrote the script, even though I wrote it primarily for myself, and tailored it to my own taste, I decided to share it with the community here. I have enjoyed the fruits of the labors of everyone here who have contributed to the community packs and to other data sets, so I give back when I can.
I'm no expert with data sets. I get frustrated with them rather easily sometimes. And they are very time consuming. But this script ... this I was able to do. So I shared it for your and for everyone else here.
And make no mistake, it's not JUST for printing. Once you export it to HTML, you can transfer it to a tablet if you wish. You can have access to view your realms anywhere you go, with or without internet access. You can be kicking back on the beach, or in an underground, concrete bunker with no cell or satellite signal. But so long as you transferred the file to your tablet, you're good to go.
You can print to a PDF file for whatever reason you might want to. Maybe you use a VTT that allows you to incorporate PDFs as handouts.
Maybe you want to format your document more professionally in a word processor or desktop publishing application. Well, now you can either import the HTML directly or copy and paste larger blocks of text instead of having to go snippet by snippet.
Other people may come along and do a better job than I've done, but for now at least, I can point at this thing and say, "I did this. I made this possible. Not just for myself, but for the whole community here."
So yes, I am a "print maniac", but in the best possible way. And far from upset, I'm quite giddy. :-D
