captain_slocum

I fully appreciate the need for Serif to raise revenue - they can't go on doing updates for ever for no more revenue. But while there are some interesting things in Designer and Photo, which I have happily paid for, the upgrade to 2 for Publisher is disappointingly poor. I don't know how the Publisher team go about setting up focus groups to find out what people want, but I don't feel they can be going about it in the right way. As a professional designer, I spend a lot of time finding out exactly what my customers want, but I'm not sure Serif have done this. Even just hiring someone on to their staff who was a seasoned print designer with a wide range of experience would have made a huge difference, but I can't imagine this is something they have done. I'm echoing the post from Bryn Reiger here, though less optimistic than him that they will listen this time - they haven't done so yet! Perhaps their system of toting up the number of requests for each feature is at fault. If ten friends told me I had a cold and one doctor told me it was a serious disease, I think I would go with the doctor. Quality, not quantity.
But I am wondering - is it me? When the Affinity suite came along, I thought - aha, this is going to give Adobe a run for their money! But perhaps I have been deluded by my own expectations. Maybe all they wanted for Publisher was to make it a decent flyer/small booklet app - which it is. In fact the only one really, for the Mac anyway, as Word and Pages are just WP and InDesign too complicated and expensive for the average village hall or small company publicist.
Well it is what it is, and I'm not sure I can carry on carrying a torch for the Publisher part of the Affinity suite much longer, though I will continue to recommend Photo and Designer.
 

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

I agree with rparmar, Publisher seems to be the poor relation. I use Designer in preference to Illustrator, although I have the Adobe suite, because it has nearly all the functions (apart from trace) but is easier to use. Photo ditto, though I find myself still using PS for some things out of laziness because I have been using it for decades - but I'm sure I could do without it. So I am overall happy with Affinity suite 2.0, though not overwhelmed, but I know three people apart from myself that would ditch InDesign if Publisher were better. 

I agree with rparmar, Publisher seems to be the poor relation. I use Designer in preference to Illustrator, although I have the Adobe suite, because it has nearly all the functions (apart from trace) but is easier to use. Photo ditto, though I find myself still using PS for some things out of laziness because I have been using it for decades - but I'm sure I could do without it. So I am overall happy with Affinity suite 2.0, though not overwhelmed, but I know three people apart from myself that would ditch InDesign if Publisher were better. 

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

I agree with rparmar, Publisher seems to be the poor relation. I use Designer in preference to Illustrator, although I have the Adobe suite, because it has nearly all the functions (apart from trace) but is easier to use. Photo ditto, though I find myself still using PS for some things out of laziness because I have been using it for decades - but I'm sure I could do without it. So I am overall happy with Affinity suite 2.0, though not overwhelmed, but I know three people apart from myself that would ditch InDesign if Publisher were better. 

I fully appreciate the need for Serif to raise revenue - they can't go on doing updates for ever for no more revenue. But while there are some interesting things in Designer and Photo, which I have happily paid for, the upgrade to 2 for Publisher is disappointingly poor. I don't know how the Publisher team go about setting up focus groups to find out what people want, but I don't feel they can be going about it in the right way. As a professional designer, I spend a lot of time finding out exactly what my customers want, but I'm not sure Serif have done this. Even just hiring someone on to their staff who was a seasoned print designer with a wide range of experience would have made a huge difference, but I can't imagine this is something they have done. I'm echoing the post from Bryn Reiger here, though less optimistic than him that they will listen this time - they haven't done so yet! Perhaps their system of toting up the number of requests for each feature is at fault. If ten friends told me I had a cold and one doctor told me it was a serious disease, I think I would go with the doctor. Quality, not quantity.
But I am wondering - is it me? When the Affinity suite came along, I thought - aha, this is going to give Adobe a run for their money! But perhaps I have been deluded by my own expectations. Maybe all they wanted for Publisher was to make it a decent flyer/small booklet app - which it is. In fact the only one really, for the Mac anyway, as Word and Pages are just WP and InDesign too complicated and expensive for the average village hall or small company publicist.
Well it is what it is, and I'm not sure I can carry on carrying a torch for the Publisher part of the Affinity suite much longer, though I will continue to recommend Photo and Designer.
 

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

After banging on about tables for years in this forum, I had hoped that Publisher version 2 would have addressed the glaring issues. Alas no text to table, no table to text, no flowing tables. And no span columns. These are essential tools.
It's hard to see what is that different. I am beyond disappointed. This is a dot update, not a version upgrade.
I said recently I would wait for a major upgrade before passing further judgement, and have wanted to support Affinity by giving them the benefit of my 35 years experience in DTP. Sorry folks, this is not yet a serious publishing tool, it is still just a flyer app. Hey Ho, can't ditch Adobe yet I'm afraid.

Can I add my request for this as well. I spend a lot of time deleting the unwanted text styles imported every time I paste from a Word doc - about 20 -30 time a day!
How about a simple preference option to import or not import text styles when pasting? Should not be difficult.

I agree that the implementation of tables is good, but one of the three reasons I can't leave InDesign yet is that the tables don't flow. I have written about this many times elsewhere for many months but never get an acknowledgement that it is even being considered. If the editor of one of my monthly magazines sends in an amendment needing me to add a row near the front of a table (usually a calendar or a list of contacts, sometimes a long list of parts), then I would have to completely redo all the table boxes on subsequent pages. Apart from the obvious time factor, it is going to lead to mistakes.
(BTW, if you were wondering, the other 2 reasons I can't leave InDesign yet is the lack of custom presets for Find and Replace, and the lack of the ability to span a para across two or more columns. In ID those features save me countless hours every month.)
I am really surprised at what seems to be a lack of faith by the Affinity people in their own product. At the moment APub is only fit for professionals to use if you only produce leaflets and short documents (which it does very well). But add flowing tables and custom FandR presets, and suddenly it can be used for documents and books and specialist catalogues and technical manuals of any length and complexity.
Please take this criticism in the kindly way it is meant, from a professional who very badly wants to see you succeed with APub. It is a fine product and I salute you,  but it's not quite there yet.

I have been asking Affinity to take tables more seriously for a very long time, but don't waste your time - they are not listening. I personally know of several sales they have lost because of the woeful implementation of tables. I am still using InDesign for much of my magazine production because of this. You cannot call yourself a serious DTP programme if you can't flow tables across pages. I really wanted AP to succeed in the beginning, which is why I spent so much time advising them of what professionals need, and there are some excellent aspects of the software, but they seem to have stagnated. Without saved presets for things like find and replace and without table flow, it will never be a productive tool for magazine and catalogue designers. I'm afraid they have a closed mind set and refuse to listen to the experts who use DTP for more than a fancy village fete flyer.

I am not suggesting that because a professional user is missing a useful feature they expect Serif to jump to attention and add it in. All software has limitations and areas that need work arounds, including InDesign, Word (especially Word!), etc, and software developers have to prioritise their responses to requests.
But where I do think Serif have shot themselves in the foot, is in not using real world professional users to help them create a better product. If I was producing a new app, I would give my eye teeth to have a large band of professionals falling over themselves to help me go in the right direction in the way that we, who give up our time to help this be a better product, do. (I am a professional - I make money from creating books, magazines, newsletters, brochures, marketing material, etc. I mostly have to use InDesign because of the vital missing features in Affinity Publisher).
I suspect that part of the problem might be that the people who check and report back on what is posted on the forums do not have the in-depth DTP experience to read and fully understand the arguments being put forward. This results in them treating the posts numerically, that is to say just looking at the numbers who want a particular feature, rather than the quality of each request and the experience and status of the person posting.
Like many others, I have been hoping that Affinity Publisher could be an Adobe replacement, in the same way that ADesigner and APhoto are. And it could be, if only Serif would show a little humility and admit that they do not know everything and that they could learn something from older and wiser heads.
Excellent though it is, Affinity Publisher cannot possibly be an InDesign replacement until it has flowing tables, F&R and GREP customisable presets, spanning over columns, and - of course - word count. These are fundamental, everyday features of our lives. It is as if a car designer was asking for feedback about a new model and ignored people who pointed out that they had forgotten the steering wheel. There are a dozen other items I could think of they could implement, but they are the ones that my colleagues and trainees consistently point out as holding them back from using Affinity Publisher for anything other than a quick 4 page brochure. As part of my ongoing IT consultancy work I constantly monitor products such as these, and I have been suggesting these features right from the very first beta, in many, many posts, but I have never, not once, had an acknowledgement or reply suggesting anyone is listening or cares. I say this in sadness, not in anger, because I can see how much better Affinity Publisher could be.
Having been rather rudely rebuffed by a moderator for my last post, I resolved to give up on Affinity and not waste any more of my (unbillable!) time, but I couldn't resist just one more post. But that's it now. Good luck Affinity, I wish you well.

Hawk: The absence of inline graphics and tables makes InDesign unfit as a professional tool. So would not having the other features you mention of course. But you are creating a false dichotomy - it is not a case of choosing between essential features. If it really would take another 2 - 5 years to create a professional DTP app (where did you get that figure from?) then either they should hire an extra software engineer or throw in the towel.
The important point that I and others have made is that Affinity did not ask us professionals what was essential in a DTP app. They cite their 25 year experience in DTP (with the dreadful Serif!) but ignore the collective experience of many real world users such a myself who have been using DTP to make a living since its dawn.
Nobody expects the first iteration of new software to be perfect. (When InDesign first came out it did not have tables.) And I know I speak for others when I say we have nothing but goodwill towards the Affinity team's efforts, and that we do not wish to nit-pick. But there are certain elements that have to be in place if an app is to be seen as a viable replacement for an existing go-to app. Without inline graphics and tables (something a developer colleague assures me is quite easy to implement - even the humble Notes on the Mac has it) APublisher just becomes another village fete poster app.
Our motives for these posts is not to have a pop at Affinity, but to help them in their endeavours, which we applaud. We understand that this is a beta and that 1.0 will look different, but we are dismayed that a moderator has said this is not on the immediate feature list.
As for having the beta to play with being a privilege, I think the boot is on the other foot -  Affinity should feel privileged that there are seasoned designers out there freely giving their time to make the app viable.
I suspect that privately there are red faces over this, and (assuming they read these posts!) hope that wiser counsels prevail and that this issue is given the priority it deserves.

I am not suggesting that because a professional user is missing a useful feature they expect Serif to jump to attention and add it in. All software has limitations and areas that need work arounds, including InDesign, Word (especially Word!), etc, and software developers have to prioritise their responses to requests.
But where I do think Serif have shot themselves in the foot, is in not using real world professional users to help them create a better product. If I was producing a new app, I would give my eye teeth to have a large band of professionals falling over themselves to help me go in the right direction in the way that we, who give up our time to help this be a better product, do. (I am a professional - I make money from creating books, magazines, newsletters, brochures, marketing material, etc. I mostly have to use InDesign because of the vital missing features in Affinity Publisher).
I suspect that part of the problem might be that the people who check and report back on what is posted on the forums do not have the in-depth DTP experience to read and fully understand the arguments being put forward. This results in them treating the posts numerically, that is to say just looking at the numbers who want a particular feature, rather than the quality of each request and the experience and status of the person posting.
Like many others, I have been hoping that Affinity Publisher could be an Adobe replacement, in the same way that ADesigner and APhoto are. And it could be, if only Serif would show a little humility and admit that they do not know everything and that they could learn something from older and wiser heads.
Excellent though it is, Affinity Publisher cannot possibly be an InDesign replacement until it has flowing tables, F&R and GREP customisable presets, spanning over columns, and - of course - word count. These are fundamental, everyday features of our lives. It is as if a car designer was asking for feedback about a new model and ignored people who pointed out that they had forgotten the steering wheel. There are a dozen other items I could think of they could implement, but they are the ones that my colleagues and trainees consistently point out as holding them back from using Affinity Publisher for anything other than a quick 4 page brochure. As part of my ongoing IT consultancy work I constantly monitor products such as these, and I have been suggesting these features right from the very first beta, in many, many posts, but I have never, not once, had an acknowledgement or reply suggesting anyone is listening or cares. I say this in sadness, not in anger, because I can see how much better Affinity Publisher could be.
Having been rather rudely rebuffed by a moderator for my last post, I resolved to give up on Affinity and not waste any more of my (unbillable!) time, but I couldn't resist just one more post. But that's it now. Good luck Affinity, I wish you well.

I am not suggesting that because a professional user is missing a useful feature they expect Serif to jump to attention and add it in. All software has limitations and areas that need work arounds, including InDesign, Word (especially Word!), etc, and software developers have to prioritise their responses to requests.
But where I do think Serif have shot themselves in the foot, is in not using real world professional users to help them create a better product. If I was producing a new app, I would give my eye teeth to have a large band of professionals falling over themselves to help me go in the right direction in the way that we, who give up our time to help this be a better product, do. (I am a professional - I make money from creating books, magazines, newsletters, brochures, marketing material, etc. I mostly have to use InDesign because of the vital missing features in Affinity Publisher).
I suspect that part of the problem might be that the people who check and report back on what is posted on the forums do not have the in-depth DTP experience to read and fully understand the arguments being put forward. This results in them treating the posts numerically, that is to say just looking at the numbers who want a particular feature, rather than the quality of each request and the experience and status of the person posting.
Like many others, I have been hoping that Affinity Publisher could be an Adobe replacement, in the same way that ADesigner and APhoto are. And it could be, if only Serif would show a little humility and admit that they do not know everything and that they could learn something from older and wiser heads.
Excellent though it is, Affinity Publisher cannot possibly be an InDesign replacement until it has flowing tables, F&R and GREP customisable presets, spanning over columns, and - of course - word count. These are fundamental, everyday features of our lives. It is as if a car designer was asking for feedback about a new model and ignored people who pointed out that they had forgotten the steering wheel. There are a dozen other items I could think of they could implement, but they are the ones that my colleagues and trainees consistently point out as holding them back from using Affinity Publisher for anything other than a quick 4 page brochure. As part of my ongoing IT consultancy work I constantly monitor products such as these, and I have been suggesting these features right from the very first beta, in many, many posts, but I have never, not once, had an acknowledgement or reply suggesting anyone is listening or cares. I say this in sadness, not in anger, because I can see how much better Affinity Publisher could be.
Having been rather rudely rebuffed by a moderator for my last post, I resolved to give up on Affinity and not waste any more of my (unbillable!) time, but I couldn't resist just one more post. But that's it now. Good luck Affinity, I wish you well.

I frequently produce A5 booklets of 40 to 48 pages that are printed on A4 paper using InDesign and I find that even that mature programme is not capable of producing booklets properly. The only solution I have found is to use a programme called Create Booklet. This takes a PDF and paginates it correctly so it will print as a booklet. A brilliantly simple but powerful little gem (I am in no way connected to the company).
I tried it out yesterday with Affinity Publisher and it works very well. When exporting from AP, make sure in the export dialogue you select PDF - PDF/X-4 - All Pages. And of course, set up your page size as a custom size of 148.5mm x 210mm (A5 is NOT half of A4 remember). I hope that will help anyone trying to create A5 booklets printed on A4 paper.

Thanks Guys. In InDesign I had set up dozens of presets for these sort of things years ago and sort of forgot how it all worked. With no presets in APublisher I have to do it all from scratch again. I must RTFM!

Thanks Guys. In InDesign I had set up dozens of presets for these sort of things years ago and sort of forgot how it all worked. With no presets in APublisher I have to do it all from scratch again. I must RTFM!