loukash

Oh, that does help, but it's not overly intuitive as there's no indication in the appearance panel that the stroke has a width profile associated with it. Perhaps adding another attribute such as 'Profile' (see mockup below) could help to indicate that the stroke has additional width/profile data associated with it?

Addendum: I added a few more thoughts on the overall stroke width 'Profile' UX in another post.

I love this! Works great! 
Only thing that's related to this tool that I hope gets improved is this panel:

It's too small. Being able to resize it and making the Profile feature more global so other features could reuse them, i.e. brush settings, would make it even better. It also needs an option to invert the curves.

Yeah, I miss that effect a lot, but I'd prefer it to be more of a non-destructive vector effect (sort of a mix between the contour tool and layer FX) so that you could always go back and edit the effect as and when needed. Also see 'pucker, bloat, splatter, block shadow, offset, etc'. Roughen also isn't an effect that should be limited to the pencil tool, as using it with paths/curves/shapes drawn with the pen tool, shapes and fonts would also be desirable.

This please!

The new smoothing algorithm is fantastic! It's such a pleasure to use now, and with almost (I'm just being very fussy) no clean up required. The new implementation of the auto-close settings is really intuitive. Well done. I'll report back any issues I find with it, but just wanted to acknowledge what an improvement this is.
Addendum: Okay, now I know this is going to sound whiny, but is there anyway to reduce or turn off the smoothing? It's now very difficult to draw a rough, hand-drawn line. I do LOVE the new smoothing algorithm, but there are times where I want my lines to look a little rougher.

Fair enough. I really liked all the "happy accident 'bugs'" in v1 where you can use the Links panel in APu and ADe or the Text Frame panel in ADe and APh if you know the dirty little secret how to obtain them.  

Seriously?
Serious users are here. Non serious users leave when it doesn't suit their needs. Other non serious users never come here because they use it instead of discussing it. Non users don't come here.

The real question is though;
Why are there so many people posting nonessential topics and keep on discussing these topics to fill their days.
And by doing so, making it for the (new) user,seeking answers, so difficult.

And boy are there some bone scrapers here. But yes a general chat forum that could be ignored/blocked from the streams by the members, could be the solution.
 

It's a MacOS security feature.
Not a "bug".

In addition to these excellent points, I would also point out that if anyone is working in an area with poor or no internet connectivity, there is no reason to rob them of access to online help simply to add rich video content that is probably not as important as having a quick reference to some less familiar feature they are trying to use.
Some users may also work in an environment where they need to be disconnected from the internet for security reasons and losing access to online help would similarly mean losing access to any kind of help.
I agree that a change to online-only help is a TERRIBLE idea.  PLEASE reconsider.

I like the place panel but I would like it to be persistent. If I drag 20 images and start placing them one by one (not autoflow), I cannot stop the process or switch to another tool to make a small adjustment, otherwise the place panel disappears and I loose track of what images have already been placed.
Making it persistent like any other panel would be very helpful when working with imported assets

Thank you so much for your help! That was exactly the problem. 

Just found a good article explaining this in epic detail, including how to reliably choose the actual app version (e.g. beta or retail, V1 or V2):
 
https://eclecticlight.co/2024/04/10/how-macos-opens-a-file-in-the-correct-app/

Now I understand what you want to do. This is a bug that has come up before but I don't think it has been logged by Serif because we've just talked about it in the support forum rather than posting it into the bugs forum. I'll do that now but here's another thread on the issue.
The workaround is simple - ungroup the group and regroup it. The bug is that scaling a group with text frames with independent baseline grids will not work. (EDIT: The thread below states that it's with groups that have been previously scaled but that's not exactly right.)
Cheers
 

I posted this into the bugs forum today because it came up again and I don't think it was logged by Serif.
 

This bug has been found by two different users in the threads below but I don't believe it has been logged. The Independent Baseline Grid feature does not work inside a scaled group.
Create a document and set Use baseline grid and Show baseline grid. Draw two text frames and select Text Frame > Baseline Grid > Use Independent Baseline Grid. Set a grid spacing that is obviously different than the document's baseline grid. Group the frames and then slowly scale the group to see the independent baselines be ignored. Ungroup and regroup the frames to work around the issue with a scaled group.
Screen Recording 2024-04-13 at 10.15.49 AM.mov    

While i fully understand the (probably) good intentions, i have seen to many apps from other vendors going to total disarray because older versions lost attention and help get totally out of sync. It really helps nobody if online help works reliably only for the bleeding edge release of the app, and provides misleading or completely wrong results for slightly non-current releases.
The help documentation is an dedicate deliverable accompanying the app releases. It s no „optional“ or „if we find time“ low priority thing. As Affinity updates UI and features in every minor update, we need a perfect fitting documentation for every minor release. The offline help can include links to additional online-only resources like videos. This is never a reason to go fully only only.

select all curves you want to change Brushes panel > Pens > option/alt-click on the topmost "Solid Pen with Pressure" adjust average stroke width as needed, the original stroke width and the pressure will be retained Layer > Expand Stroke voilà It's not a "problem". It's how the tool works. Sometimes you may actually want exactly this kind of tool.
The actual problem is that apart from the aforementioned "Solid Pen with Pressure", there are no other true vector brushes. In other words, it's a missing feature, not a "bug" or something.

select all curves you want to change Brushes panel > Pens > option/alt-click on the topmost "Solid Pen with Pressure" adjust average stroke width as needed, the original stroke width and the pressure will be retained Layer > Expand Stroke voilà It's not a "problem". It's how the tool works. Sometimes you may actually want exactly this kind of tool.
The actual problem is that apart from the aforementioned "Solid Pen with Pressure", there are no other true vector brushes. In other words, it's a missing feature, not a "bug" or something.

The Ignore button is your friend.  

All Affinity apps support both aliases and symlinks as expected.
So either the alias or the PNG itself are broken.
Also note that "alias" ≠ "symlink". 
If you're actually using symlinks (I do in certain scenarios), then you must not ever move the original file because a symlink is essentially just a POSIX file path/URL. Much like web URLs, if you change only one character in the original file's path, the symlink will break. Whereas an alias can "track down" the original file even if you move it to a different location on the same disk because it keeps track of its filesystem ID instead.

All Affinity apps support both aliases and symlinks as expected.
So either the alias or the PNG itself are broken.
Also note that "alias" ≠ "symlink". 
If you're actually using symlinks (I do in certain scenarios), then you must not ever move the original file because a symlink is essentially just a POSIX file path/URL. Much like web URLs, if you change only one character in the original file's path, the symlink will break. Whereas an alias can "track down" the original file even if you move it to a different location on the same disk because it keeps track of its filesystem ID instead.

What did it say in the dialog after you've selected the image to place?
Also, if no image is selected, the "Open" button should actually be grayed out.

But I don't understand why Publisher is requesting a folder for the location of the Linked image and the Image Policy message appears a second time since a file was already selected before the initial Image Policy message...

At first I thought this is an April 1st joke that accidentally fired off too early.

Designer → Appearance panel → stack as many gradient fills as you like.