Mike Perry

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Yes, I did get all three apps directly from Affinity. I do that whenever I can to ensure that developers get all the money they deserve. And all had to do was rename those folders for Designer, Photo and Publisher as you suggested, and all is well. I'm now back in the Affinity family. Yeah!
You might change your online name to Gandalf the Wizard, because that's what you are. I would have never discovered this. Many, many thanks.
 
 

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

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
 
 
 
 

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
 
 
 
 

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
 
 
 
 

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Ah yes, it's easy to spot heavy users of InDesign like myself. We absolutely love ID's GREP abilities, keeping in mind that doesn't just mean sophisticated text replacements. It also includes the ability deal with paragraph and text styles as well as an app's other formatting features, searching and replacing those too. The book drafts I work with run to hundreds of pages and, being scientific in nature, make heavy use of italics. I need the ability to import Word documents, retaining all the italic formatting that doesn't use the italic text style. I then need to be able to change those hundreds of italic fonts into an italic text style. With ID's GREP that's easy. I search for italic fonts and replace them with an italic style. Only then can I begin to do the layout in earnest. 
GREP has other marvelous time-saving advantages. Science texts often come to me with hyphens for page ranges that need to become N-dashes. Looking for every hyphen in a book would be a pain. GREP allows me to search only for hyphens that are bordered on both sides by numbers.

Add me to those voting for footnotes and endnotes, but with a strong stress on the later. Visit any university library and you'll find that endnotes replaced footnotes long ago, perhaps in the 1950s. In the era before computers, endnotes were far easier to typeset. In todays world, their appearance at the bottom of a page is seen as clutter by most readers. And being able to have both in the same document would be handy. Footnotes could be used at the bottom of a page to clarify ideas. Endnotes far away could be used to give references that most people don't read.
I would, however, agree with those who'd like to see footnotes handled in a more powerful way. Untangling Tolkien, my day-by-day chronology of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings was done in Framemaker, which allowed me create the equivalent of footnotes for references to the source in LOTR in a sidebar alongside the text to which it applies. That worked far better than bottom of the page footnotes or endnotes. I can't do that in ID.

Ah yes, it's easy to spot heavy users of InDesign like myself. We absolutely love ID's GREP abilities, keeping in mind that doesn't just mean sophisticated text replacements. It also includes the ability deal with paragraph and text styles as well as an app's other formatting features, searching and replacing those too. The book drafts I work with run to hundreds of pages and, being scientific in nature, make heavy use of italics. I need the ability to import Word documents, retaining all the italic formatting that doesn't use the italic text style. I then need to be able to change those hundreds of italic fonts into an italic text style. With ID's GREP that's easy. I search for italic fonts and replace them with an italic style. Only then can I begin to do the layout in earnest. 
GREP has other marvelous time-saving advantages. Science texts often come to me with hyphens for page ranges that need to become N-dashes. Looking for every hyphen in a book would be a pain. GREP allows me to search only for hyphens that are bordered on both sides by numbers.

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
 
 
 
 

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
 
 
 
 

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
 
 
 
 

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
 
 
 
 

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
 
 
 
 

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