I am pleased to announce the availability of an application developed to aid fiction writers on Linux. It is called plotdb, the plot database. It is designed to help track all the components of a story, including characters, objects, concepts and locations, and to attach them to chapters and scenes in a way that facilitates the story-writing component of authoring. I wrote this application to scratch an itch I had for free (as in beer and as in freedom) novel writing software for Linux.

The pure python version of plotdb is v.0.3. This sounds extremely low, like pre-alpha, but the application began existence in the early fall of 2007 using a different database engine. Recently, I decided to move to sqlite as the database back end, which is supported as a native module in python 2.5.x. The first release of the version written in pure python was dated 4/30/2008.

I have used the original version of this software extensively since it's initial incarnation in August of 2007. I have used this pure python version since I ported it to sqlite. There is no real difference that I can see in the two versions, except the pure python version is easier to maintain, albeit slightly slower. I would consider this beta quality software, tested somewhat in real usage but not full production yet. I am currently writing a novel and use this software daily for that purpose.

I, David May, am the sole party of blame in the production of this application. It was conceived and written by me from scratch. You can get plotdb with my compliments at:

http://w3.cnm.edu/~dmay/plotdb.html

plotdb is released under GPL v.2. I am willing, as time permits, to incorporate changes made by users into the application. I am particularly interested in portability changes that allow plotdb to be used on Windows or Mac, since I use Linux almost exclusively. You can contact me at

dmay at cnm dot edu

If this is not the correct forum to announce this software, please accept my apologies in advance. And thanks in advance for any direction anyone can provide on where else this should be posted to capture the largest audience of interest. I do not lurk this list, so please respond to my email as well as (or in lieu of) posting to the list.

Kind regards,

David F. May
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