gajrey1042

All very well, but it is your softare that has the problem.
First version of Beta I have seen this problem so it must be fixable.
Surely you can fix it so we don't have to jump through all those hoops??

As someone who's done dozens of books in all formats, print and digital, using InDesign, I'll add my remarks to this book publishing discussion.
1. Writing as chapters versus the book in one file. With ID I write (or layout for other publishers) the entire book as one document but break the chapters into separate text-frame flows. Initially, as I do the layout, adding graphics, I have an excess of pages in each set of frames. That way, adding a graphic to chapter one has no impact on the pagination for chapter 21. It's also necessary to do that to get ID to do endnotes right. I will be blunt. I will flat-out not use or recommend an publishing app that forcing me to do editing, proofing, and layout in chapter-length segments. I don't thing that is going to be a problem with Affinity Publisher. But I know that if it becomes little more than a brochure-making app, it won't sell.
I can give an illustration why I feel so strongly. Suppose some word in an entire book needs changing. That is a very common problem. With that entire book handled by ID, I simply do a document-length search and replace (rather than a story-length one). I typically could do that in less than a minute. With each chapter in a separate document, I might need to do a dozen or more searches and take perhaps 15-20 minutes. I won't put up with that nor will I put up with some complicated process to create and merge contents, an index, or pages into a PDF. I want the book to be in and managed as one document. Again, I don't think that'll be an issue with AP.
2. Printed book v. ebook. ID lets me create multiple versions of a book from one master document. That means a print-ready PDF, along with reflowable and fixed-layout epubs. (I handle Kindle editions by sending Amazon a reflowable epub for conversion.) That seems to work well enough. Again, I will be blunt. The books I write and edit myself and those I do for other publishers are revised and updated up until the day they go off to be printed. I am not going to klutz with any workflow that means I have to do that editing in one app for the print version and another for the digital version. I am not anal retentive. I won't put myself through all the niggling, detail-mongering that maintaining two versions requires. And why should I? ID can manage to output multiple formats from one source. Any other app that I might adopt or recommend must do the same. 
3. PDF as input text. My response to any mention of that is, "are you insane?" PDF means "Page Description Format." That means it has already determined how a page is formatted, so why would I want to import it into a page layout program? I use page layout apps to take unformatted or poorly formatted text from Word and other sources, turning it into something that's appealing. I do not want any prior attempt at laying that text out to intrude. It only gets in the way. I already spent quite a bit of time trying to get rid of extraneous Word formatting. And yeah, I realize that in a lot of businesses, all they have is a PDF they want to tweak. They want to be able to import that, ignoring how ugly it may look, and make that tweak. That's fine for them. I just don't want to make that my work flow.
I hope I don't sound too negative. Given my work, I'll continue to use ID and may even continue to use it for all the books I layout. I am well past ID's initially steep learning curve. But as a writer, I would love to have a powerful page layout app that I could recommend to independent writers, one that doesn't have as steep a learning curve as ID or ID's inflated, $240-a-year subscription cost.
--Michael W. Perry, Inkling Books
 
 
 
 

I totally agree with this! It seems Affinity Publisher is building an app to be a great UI layout designer and brochure layout software. Nice and useful direction, but, print and digital publishers need more from a publishing app. Being able to control the number of pages in signature units goes a long way in the Print Book option. I think this is a basic request as well as eBook export. Those 2 basic features would position AP for a competitive option over other industry publishing apps.

Have to agree with some of the above who would expect complete book publishing export--including eBook--from Publisher as you can find with publishing software like Vellum (which approaches both print and eBook production). After all, this software is called Affinity Publisher. 
I find this software to be typical of Serif: well-designed, pretty, comprehensive...and intimidating to someone who can, but won't, take the time to learn the ropes,  let alone the fine threads, of this impressive software unless it has the payoff I require as a busy independent publisher with three books in the wings (one of them illustrated).  Serif missed the boat with previous publishing software, but hits the mark when it comes to titles like Drawplus and the Affinity group. If the only export were to .pdf files (with much higher resolution than the Aff. Pub. offers at present) and set up for Print and Ebook, I would put my money--and my time--on the table right now. But that also would have to include functional templates included for print and Ebook production--and not as an additional purchase.  Because this is early in the app history, let's hope this will be considered. Otherwise, I am not sure who the target consumer group is for this product. Mainstream or production teams? Depends upon how much money Serif wants to make and whether it will move the cross-hairs from elite in-crowd to ordinary folks.
That said, I tested the Beta software and found everything installed easily and ran smoothly. The sample brochure exported to .pdf quickly and completely. I didn't find that the table of contents were linked, however, surprisingly, to interior content. I opened the .pdf in Adobe Acrobat and enjoyed the full screen presentation. At full screen, the elegant type font was tiny. Increasing resolution will fuzz up the pictures because the .dpi settings in Aff. Pub. are too restrictive, the max being 400 dpi.  I did not print the results.
Hope my input helps. In summary:
the sample brochure converted nicely to .pdf but should have allowed for higher resolution so that pages can be magnified by the viewer. this Publisher program should publish more than fancy brochures and take on the print (fiction and textbooks) and eBook  pub market.  Aff Pub should decide who its market is and let us know, too.  

Sorry but I really need to say, that it´s a flaw that a program like Publisher doesn´t have book export features. I consider them standard for such a program. Please don´t try to sell this as a feature. I think this is a part where Serif needs to work on till the alpha.

I wasn't expecting to see designer with master pages.. no ebook export... a lot of self publishers out there could benefit from what page plus offered with this modern approach... just looks like a graphics package.  I can design my flyers, etc in Designer, so i don't need this product unless it allows a full blown publication.  PDF export gets slammed for ebooks, better to have the epub export format.   They shouldn't have retired PagePlus if they're not going build on that with a fresh modern approach.