JDW

The recent posts made me read through this poor multi-year old thread today from start to finish. I must say I don't know whether to laugh or shed tears at Serif's continued cold shoulder toward us who purchased Affinity apps and had some meager expectation of "ongoing software development." Perhaps if we asked for the world it would be unreasonable to expect Serif to accommodate, but we are talking about a Text Anti-aliasing popup menu. Serif, hire a programmer for a week to implement this popup menu so we can end this thread and your users can rejoice worldwide. Consider this post the much needed kick in your fanny to get that ball rolling. Thanks.

And that, my friends is the crux of the issue. Consider well this thread wasn’t “archived“ back when I first posted in 2015. But due to lack of action by Serif to implement this much wanted and needed feature (especially in regards to Japanese text), this thread became archived and covered in cob webs. I suspect the same will happen to any new thread on this topic, at least until the day Serif finally implements a proper vertical text feature. But I can’t help but be skeptical. Almost all my feature suggestions presented to date have fallen on deaf ears at Serif. And it’s a shame too since Affinity apps are otherwise great and the only real alternative to Adobe’s death grip.

Three full years have expired since I first posted about the need for that important feature. Nothing has happened. Some speculate that nothing has happened because I failed to post my request in this "Feedback for Affinity Photo" forum saying: "developers do not habitually follow that forum." So now that a link to my original post is firmly planted in this "correct" forum that the developers habitually read (apparently), based on my experience posting other feature requests and having no success, I simply cannot answer your question. What I do feel strongly about is this. The more Serif makes Affinity apps like Adobe apps in terms of key features, the more people will switch to Affinity apps. Yes, I really do think it's not too hard to convince people to break from an endless wallet-draining subscription. Even people who have never used Adobe apps can appreciate the goodness some of us are struggling to bring to Affinity apps. All it takes is for Serif to recognize that fact, order engineers to implement more of our important feature suggestions by a certain date, and then the world can rejoice. It's really as simple as that. Fingers crossed.

Done!

I posted the following thread 3 years ago but not a single person until today advised me to post that topic in this thread, claiming that no one from Serif diligently reads this forum such that my post was sure to have been overlooked these 3 years. Seems odd to me, but fine. Here it is: I would advise Serif to just move that thread into this thread. I would prefer that since I don't want to lose all the supportive posts in that thread. For truly, it is more than just me who wants that dropper tool added to Affinity Photo. Thanks.

I read your reply but my eyes glazed over when I read your "more patience needed" quip in light of the 3 years it's been since I opened this thread. Sorry, but three years is long enough (even for Serif staff to discover this thread). But more than that, Affinity Photo really is "PS on the cheap" insofar as it contains many similar features and is cheaper. That truth really isn't debatable. It's factual reality. There are more similarities with PS than not. It's just that some of us prefer AP to become even more similar. The eye dropper is a part of that. So rather than just defend the status quo (which has remained unchanged these last 3 years), please join us and jump on the bandwagon of feature requests that would help others even when you yourself are not helped by them. In that case, please use the string-pulling power of your 3,095 reputation to get this thread MOVED to the appropriate place in the Feature Requests forum, rather than tell me to make a new post 3 years later, which as you full well know would eliminate all the important posts in this thread. Moving the thread is better than starting a new one from scratch. Moving threads has been possible in other forums for years, so I must assume it's possible in this forum too. Thank you in advance for your kind assistance in doing that.

I started this thread 3 years ago. It has been supported by numerous people as you can easily see. And yet, not a single thing has been done by Serif to add the dropper icon akin to what's in Photoshop. I've made numerous other suggestions in this forum through the years -- nearly all of which have fallen on deaf ears. I want to know why. (And please don't give me "no time due to work on Affinity Publisher" as an excuse.) At the end of the day, it's not the fiddly workarounds people flock to but rather the familiar. Serif, please add the dropper tool to Affinity Photo today. Adding more helps like that to Photoshop users is the fast track to getting more of them to switch to Affinity Photo. Three years is already much too long to wait. Do it to humor me. Do it to show you actually care about customer feedback. Do it for your own reasons. Just do it. Do it today.

Absolutely! It would be proof Serif actually cares enough to listen to their customers needs!

Let me get this straight... There is a button in Affinity Designer 1.7 now for LINKING external graphics? If so, please post a screenshot with it circled in red. Thanks.

Agreed. Honestly, if Serif added even half the great ideas presented to them in this forum, Affinity apps would have kicked Adobe out the door long ago.

I agree 100% with razorpig in that it is totally unacceptable after all this time that nothing has improved. If Affinity apps will ever become an Adobe substitute (and I've long hoped for that), they must continuously be improved. That's not happening now, nor has it in the last two years since my previous post in this thread. It's unacceptable and a crying shame.

It's now March 2019 and I am using Affinity Designer 1.6.1, and although I see Text > Vertical Alignment, all the options are grayed out when I am typing text on the page. All options are grayed even if I select all the text inside a text box or even if I select multiple text boxes. It makes no logical sense at all. But I suspect that feature really isn't vertical text as in Japanese 縦書き (vertical writing), which is what I've been calling for since my last post in this thread in freaking 2015!!! Wherefore art thou, Affinity Designer updates?

Or Affinity Publisher could just import IDML files, which is how Adobe handles InDesign files across older versions. Maybe that would lower than impossibility chance to only 55.125%.

Actually, when you work the numbers, it only comes out to be a 64.875% chance that it will be never. At the end of the day, one thing holds true... WHERE THERE'S A WILL, THERE'S ALWAYS A WAY!

Serif, for the love of Pete!, the previous posters are in tears! Please implement graphic LINKING without further delay in Affinity Designer. It's a crying shame we even have to ask for this important KEY FEATURE. Thank you.

The previous post seems to show that relying on a "printer driver" is not always a solution to print booklets in Affinity Publisher. And for those of you searching desperately in vain for the link, there was none provided. So I shall remedy that by providing it here: https://www.thekeptpromise.com/CreateBooklet/ Disclaimer: I've never used the software myself. I'm just posting the link.

It took me a while to figure out how to show details about my linked files since there is no Links palette in Publisher like there is in Adobe apps. It seems that Linked file access in Affinity Publisher is restricted to Document > Resource Manager. Fine and well, but how do I perform a Reveal in Finder command like we can easily do in Adobe apps? (In Adobe apps you can right-click on the graphic to get the Reveal in Finder command, or do the same through the Links palette.) Thanks.

Yes, and in addition to a right-click on the page's thumb, you can click on File and choose "Spread Setup" and then click on the "Margins" tab. I was merely thinking that it might have been more intuitive if Margins could have been found in the Documents menu. Even placing a command like "Spread and Margins" in the Documents menu might be easier to find for some. I am just looking at this from the perspective of those who may be familiar with InDesign. A lot of people are moving to Serif apps so as to ditch the Adobe subscription ball-and-chain, so it might be an easier transition for them if some things are similar. But so long as most people can figure it out, that's what matters most.

I've already explained everything in depth, but to refresh memories... We need a consistent Print Booklet solution within Affinity Publisher that works for everyone, including Mac users, that does NOT rely on printer drivers. :-) But perhaps you misunderstand what I meant by that sentence, so I shall explain. Currently, in order to print on a Booklet in Affinity Publisher on a modern Mac user MacOS High Sierra, you must do the following: File > Print... Click on the popup which says "Range and Scale" and choose "Document Layout" Click on the Model popup which says "Single" and choose "Booklet" (And of course set your paper size and duplex printing settings as required within the same print dialog.) Seems easy enough, right? Well, yes... sort of. The above steps are consistent and work for the Mac under High Sierra, but I expect those settings may change with the print dialog. One cannot follow precisely the same steps on Windows either. I suppose I could just join hand-in-hand with others and cry, "well, the current method works well for ME on MY computer right now, so I won't worry about other platforms or the future or a consistent UI for booklet printing that is cross platform and will never change with the OS version." But I was trying to be a bit more open-minded on the topic and therefore suggested a dedicated Print Booklet UI that would be the same for everyone and would also be familiar to those who have used InDesign. As you have noticed, there is also the issue of other binding options which InDesign offers and which are not necessarily offered in the Print Dialog's "Model" popup. But hey, it doesn't affect me so "why should I care?" right? As to PDF printing, I myself have never had the need to create a PDF in booklet form because printing firms I've used typically will take the InDesign file as is. So when I do need a PDF, I need a normal PDF that would be viewable on a website, in which case you wouldn't want it in booklet form. But my own use-case aside, Affinity Publisher does offer the ability to create a PDF in booklet form which is a boon to those who need it, and therefore Affinity Publisher is to be praised for offering that feature. And that's the thrust of what I've been writing. Even if I myself don't need a particular feature, I am pleased it exists for the benefit of others and for my own self too should I require such in the future. To end my thoughts on the matter, so long as most Publisher users can enjoy using the current printing features cross-platform, that's all that matters.

I am well aware that I can set Margins when I created a new document and then change Margins after the fact by digging down into the Master page "Spread Properties." But is there a good reason why there is no conveniently accessible "Margins" command in the Document menu? That menu would be the most logical and intuitive place to find it. InDesign has "Margins and Columns..." in their Layout men, so anyone can easily find it without brainstorming or reading a manual, and I would argue a menu command is faster to access than (1) finding the Master, (2) right-clicking on the Master, (3) and then Choosing "Spread Properties." Thanks.

Why would Affinity Publisher need to deal with "many printer types" seeing that InDesign's Print Booklet feature does not? Seriously. Open InDesign and a document, then choose File > Print Booklet and have a look at the dialog that appears. To your left you see the following 3 choices: Setup Preview Summary Setup shows you your printer preset (if any), Page Range you want to print, Booklet Type (2-up Saddle Stitch is most common) and related choices like Creep and Bleed, Margins, and whether or not you want blank spreads printed. That's it. To setup duplex printing requires you to click the "Print Settings..." button on that same screen, which opens the standard MacOS Printer dialog box in which you tweak your settings. So really, Print Booklet just ensures that pages print in the right order so the end result is a booklet, but all the hard work is still done by the MacOS printer driver and related dialog. If there is anything "hard" about adding a Print Booklet feature to Affinity Publisher, it is for Serif to properly replicate 2-up Saddle Stitch, 2-up Perfect Bound, 2-up Consecutive, and other binding (print order) methods. But at first they could limit that to just the most popular -- 2-up Saddle Stitch and then add others over time. So again, I don't see the addition of this critically important feature as anything that would slow down development of Affinity Publisher. And seriously, without a convenient means to print booklets, why not just use Illustrator instead for designs of 10 pages or less? (Or in the context of this forum, Affinity Designer) Illustrator or Designer give you multiple artboards/pages. It may not be as elegant as a dedicated Publisher app, but it works. Indeed, I suspect that many Affinity Designer users have done just that while waiting for Publisher. So what I am saying is that if one argues for a long and troublesome method so as to avoid forcing Serif to add a Print Booklet feature to Publisher, I could easily arguing the slightly more troublesome yet usable alternative to Publisher -- using Affinity Designer. Print Booklet is to Affinity Publisher what a duplex unit is to a laser printer. Some people may not need it, but for those who do, you wouldn't want a non-Duplex printer to mass print your 2-sided masterpieces. All said... Serif, please just add a Print Booklet feature to Affinity Publisher. If it wasn't needed, InBooklet never would have come on the scene when InDesign came out, and Adobe certainly wouldn't have spent time to add that as a standard feature when Quark bought InBooklet so as to kill it. It shouldn't be that much trouble to add it, since all the hard work is done (at least it is on a Mac) in the print dialog box. Print Booklet is merely a more convenient way to establish the proper print order of the pages in your document. Thanks.

No change whatsoever with these settings either...

My "Performance" preferences are shown in this screenshot...

I guess we have few InDesign users here who know the merits of "Print Booklet." I will admit that even Adobe was brain-dead to the need some years back (InDesign CS2 and prior) when Print Booklet was a mere 3rd party plugin called InBooklet. But the InBooklet plugin for InDesign was so popular that Adobe's competitor Quark bought the company who made the plugin so as to kill it and give Adobe a firm kick in the fanny. (Quark makes Xpress, a competitor to InDesign, and Xpress was king back in the day when it came to DTP.) Knowing how much of a needed feature it was, Adobe added "Print Booklet" to the File menu starting in InDesign CS3 and has been a critically important part of InDesign ever since. Here's a basic overview: https://helpwiki.evergreen.edu/wiki/index.php/Printing_Booklets_(Mac)_-_InDesign Various "Booklet Types" are offered by InDesign's Print Booklet feature, but "2-up Saddle Stitch" is typically the best choice when making 2-sided booklets that will be stapled in the middle. Say you create a design no B5 paper in the landscape position, creating 2 pages of content side-by-side for a total of 4 pages when considering both sides of the said B5 paper. The "2-up Saddle Stitch" setting in InDesign will properly format the pagers for direct printing to your printer, with only minor printer driver setup required, and no PDF creation required. Print that way, then take the papers from your printer, staple them in the middle, fold, and you're done. No cutting or trimming required in my experience. It's really very easy and straightforward and consistent across all platforms and printer drivers. Again, you don't need any major fiddling in your printer's dialog box when using Print Booklet. You just need to make sure you have duplex printing and typically you will choose "Short-edge binding." Once that's setup, you then check the Preview in the Print Booklet dialog and ensure your cover page and back page are correct, and then it's typically safe to print. There are lots of guides and YouTube videos on InDesign's "Print Booklet" feature. Ten minutes or so of Googling, reading and watching will make the feature abundantly clear and hopefully clarify what the same sort of feature is greatly needed for Affinity Publisher to be taken seriously. Why does this matter? Because Serif needs to woo Adobe users away from Adobe. The easier you make the transition and the more complete the feature set, the more likely it is that Adobe users currently tied to the month subscription ball-and-chain will "see the light" and make the switch. But if the transition looks too difficult or if there are major features lacking, most Adobe users would probably justify the ball-and-chain price and stick with what works for them. So I strongly suggest that Serif add a Print Booklet feature to Affinity Publisher, post haste.

We need a consistent Print Booklet solution within Affinity Publisher that works for everyone, including Mac users, that does NOT rely on printer drivers. Adobe put “Print Booklet“ in InDesign for years for good reason. So should Affinity Publisher.