# sile-typesetter/sile

The SILE Typesetter — Simon’s Improved Layout Engine

Repository: https://github.com/sile-typesetter/sile
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/sile
Homepage: https://sile-typesetter.org
Language: Lua
License: MIT
License Family: permissive
Topics: sile, typesetting, typesetting-system, publishing, pdf-generation, tex, pdf, lua
Last push: 2026-07-18T09:44:06+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 76/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 93, release rhythm 40, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4657, "days_push": 46, "days_rel": 459, "gap_med": 20, "n_releases_24m": 8}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1783, forks 106 (observed 2026-08-28T04:05:35.596766+00:00)

## What it is
SILE is a typesetting system that produces beautiful printed documents as PDF output, conceptually similar to TeX but written from scratch in Lua with modern technologies. It supports complex frame-based layouts, XML input, grid typesetting, and extensibility via Lua packages.

## Use cases
- typeset a book or journal to PDF
- convert XML documents to PDF without XSL stylesheets
- produce complex page layouts with frames
- typeset text on a grid
- extend a typesetting engine with Lua scripts
- find a modern alternative to TeX/LaTeX
- automate PDF generation in a CI pipeline

## When to choose
- you need programmatic, extensible typesetting with Lua instead of TeX macros
- you want to render XML directly to PDF
- you need frame-based complex layouts or grid typesetting
- you want to run typesetting as a CI job or in Docker

## When to avoid
- you need the vast package ecosystem and community of LaTeX
- you want a WYSIWYG word processor or desktop publishing GUI
- you only need simple Markdown-to-PDF conversion
- your team already has deep TeX expertise and tooling

## Facets
- artifact type: application
- maturity: active
- function: pdf, templating, documentation, parser
- domain: documentation, pdf, text-editors
- platform: windows, bsd, cli
- tags: typesetting, tex-alternative, lua, pdf-generation, layout-engine, book-publishing, xml-to-pdf, publishing, linux, macos, docker

## Member repositories
- sile-typesetter/sile (main) score 76

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:35.596766+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T03:24:19.328528+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/sile-typesetter/sile (fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:35.596766+00:00, sha 15ed86b8e28f)
  - homepage: https://sile-typesetter.org (fetched 2026-08-29T11:02:51.375892+00:00, sha 7da1ebcc0074)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.