What it is
EsTexte is a tool for writing web content. EsTexte enables you to write text in a text format but with enough innate structure to allow the tool to mark it up for web documents. The structure itself is as intuitive as can be: equal (=) , dash (-) and dot (.) signs under lines to mark up header, asterisks (*) to identify unordered lists, number signs (#) for numbered lists, and the like.
The name
The name EsTexte evolved from S-text for "structured text" into EsTexte because it sounds like esthete when pronouced with a lisp. If you find lisps charming, you'll like the name. If you don't, or have suffered a lifetime of ostracism due to a speech impediment and take offense to jocular blatter about lisps, than this name is not for you and if you should wish to find a derogatory term for this software, you'll will have the moral high ground in so doing.
The reason
EsTexte owes much to other projects that do similar things. Notably, the Markdown project gave me some excellent ideas on how to structure text, not least of which is the idea for a link callout mechanism that separates link references to actual link data. Estexte is also inspired by projects such as WikiPad that rehabilitate the plain text format as a full citizen of the electronic documentation world.
If you're shopping around for text-to-html tools in general, also check out Grutatxt and all the other tools that are listed in the XML Alternatives page.
Given all this, I could have used something else, but I wanted a tool with an extensible syntax that would be eventually be usable in different scenarios: technical writing, blogging, script penning, letter writing.
How do I use it?
You can use it from the command line as well as from other java programs. You will find all usage instructions in the usage section.
What does EsTexte text look like?
Your EsTexte text will look like this:
Estexte
=======
The reason
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EsTexte owes much to other projects that do similar things.
If you want to see a full example, see the text source of this page.
There's much more information on the underlying format in the user guide.
Benefits
EsTexte will help you create and manage a website. You'll write documents in a texty format and then, when you need to go online with it, you'll execute a tranformation process that will generate a set of HTML pages that you can then port to your website using the appropriate protocol (FTP, SCP, HTTP post, etc.).
You can use only a part of EsTexte if you want to. The Api is self-documented and will let you use only the parser if you want, or the whole shebang if you need, even integrate it into a publication framework or a web application.
The technology
EsTexte is written in Java. The reason for this is that Java is a four-letter word and I like four-letter words. Other, secondary reasons also support this decision, namely: the need for a cross-platform tool, access to a large library base, speed and extensibility.
But mostly, I like four-letter words.
Note: the large library base is not at all used as of yet, no additional libraries beeing shipped with EsTexte.
Requirements
You need Java to run this piece of software. Maybe one day I'll provide a version compiled with GCJ for various platforms, but it really seems easier for me to require users to install the java software.
René Ghosh. last update: 03/07/2006