I think Publisher magage 3 personas with Studio Link because you will need the 3 apps for designing a catalog, for instance.
When you use PHOTO or DESIGNER as a stand alone app, I guess you want to edit a photo or create a logo, and then "edit with..." if you want to use it in a future catalog, magazine... In PUBLISHER.
The weird thing is that set up of DESIGNER or PHOTO is different depending if you use it as a stand alone app or as a persona in PUBLISHER, I mean they are not connected and the interfaces are different and you don't have the same tools as you want them to be shown; for example, if you install new brushes into DESIGNER as persona in PUBLISHER, you won't have them in DESIGNER stand alone app and the same the other way around...
So you have to choose your workflow before starting to work with Affinity apps.
I had PHOTO and have just bought DESIGNER and PUBLISHER, and I'm confused; I 'm not sure which is the best option in my workflow 😞