Pressbooks vs Vivliostyle
Pressbooks
pressbooks.orgVivliostyle
vivliostyle.orgSide by side
| Figure | Pressbooks | Vivliostyle |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $12/mo | Free |
| Free plan | — | Yes |
| Free trial | Yes | — |
| Open source | Yes | Yes |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 5 | 1 |
| Spec score · eBook Creation Software | 8.6 (#7) | 8.2 (#11) |
| Founded | Pressbooks says Hugh McGuire founded it in 2011. | 2018 |
| Self-hosting | Organizations can run their own Pressbooks network, but must install dependencies and handle ongoing software and security updates. | The Viewer is downloadable and can run from a user-controlled web server, while CLI runs locally or in server-side workflows. |
| Support | Enterprise customers receive onboarding, email support, typically one-to-two-business-day responses, training and guidance on publishing and integrations. | The project directs users to documentation, GitHub contribution channels and a Slack development community. |
| Themes | Self-Publisher plans include more than 20 themes for changing book appearance. | Official and community themes are distributed as npm packages and can be selected through CLI options or configuration. |
| What it does | Pressbooks is a book content-management system for publishing webbooks and exporting EPUB, PDF and XML formats. | Vivliostyle is an open-source CSS typesetting ecosystem for producing paginated digital and print publications with web technologies. |
Plans
Pressbooks
- Free TrialFree
- Single Author$12 a month
- Collaboration$40 a month
- Institutional Network$5,999 a year
- Shared Network$15,999 a year
In their own words
Pressbooks
Pressbooks has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.
Vivliostyle
Vivliostyle is an open-source typesetting project for digital and web publishing based on web standards. Vivliostyle Viewer presents HTML with CSS typesetting in a browser and can display EPUB files and web publications. The command-line tool typesets HTML and CSS and exports PDFs, including PDFs generated from EPUB files. For print production, its PRESS-READY option supports PDF/X-1a output and requires Ghostscript and Xpdf.
Vivliostyle Pub is a web application for editing text, Markdown, or HTML and previewing typesetting; its new version is in alpha. Themes are distributed as npm packages and applied through vivliostyle.config.js. Viewer can display HTML hosted on GitHub or Gist, or be copied into a public web-server directory. The CLI requires Node.js, and the installation tutorial lists macOS, Windows, and Linux. Vivliostyle uses AGPLv3, which allows modification and commercial use subject to reciprocal license terms. Its FAQ says publications made with the software need not publish their HTML or CSS source data. The project is maintained by Vivliostyle Foundation.