Arrange single symbol instance (move to front / move to back) applies to all symbol instances

[gafvert]

I've run into some very strange behavior in Affinity Designer 1.7.3 on macOS that I finally figured out was caused by how symbol instances handle rearranging (moving back/forth), which might be by design I guess, but have such strange and unpredictable consequences I'm considering them a bug:

It seems that when using symbols and selecting once instance of the symbol and pressing the "Move to front" or "Move to back" rearrange buttons this somehow applies to all instances of the same symbol. I'm guessing that this is more or less never what the user intends when trying to move a single selected object back/forward and it's very unexpected. This is further complicated by the fact that the canvas isn't redrawn properly for the other instances of the same symbol when this happens, so you only see that they've been moved back/forward if you scroll or otherwise cause them to be redrawn. And as the final problem, the arrange can't be undone. The problems seem to be especially bad when the other layers being rearranged are also symbol instances.

So, together this more or less means you currently can't use the arrange feature on symbols and instead you have to manually drag the layers in the layers panel to re-arrange them if you want different instances of the same symbol on different levels.

[Sean P]

Hi gafvert,

Thanks for letting us know, this is something that is already with development. I will get your comments passed on to development and get the issue bumped.

 

[Move Along People]

-

[gafvert]

Ah, thanks @haakoo, grouping seems to work as a work-around at the moment to avoid the bug, I'll try to remember that. But since you can't undo the consequences of other symbol instances being moved I'm now a little scared to use the arrange commands at all on symbol instances. And good to hear this is being worked on.

Seems like a long time since 1.7.3 was released, so maybe we'll get an update soon? I'd personally appreciate more frequent smaller updates with fixes and improvements than having to wait for big feature updates.

[Move Along People]

-

[Fun Art Sam]

I'm experiencing the same problem with symbols on Windows PC, but this never happened before. 

[timmolderez]

I've bumped into the same issue on Windows (using Affinity Designer 1.9.2.1035), but did find a workaround.

What does seem to work is:
- Turn off Sync (the button in the top right of the Symbols studio)
- Arrange your symbol instances however you'd like (because sync is turned off, you'll only affect your currently selected symbol instance)
- Turn Sync back on; the symbol instances still behave as they should

[Imonobor]

On 5/2/2021 at 5:32 PM, timmolderez said:

I've bumped into the same issue on Windows (using Affinity Designer 1.9.2.1035), but did find a workaround.

What does seem to work is:
- Turn off Sync (the button in the top right of the Symbols studio)
- Arrange your symbol instances however you'd like (because sync is turned off, you'll only affect your currently selected symbol instance)
- Turn Sync back on; the symbol instances still behave as they should

Thanks, that worked out for me. It's a bit annoying that you have to do it every time you arrange a symbol, AND you can't undo if you mess up.

It's a real shame that this problem IS STILL PRESENT 2 years later, c'mon devs, you've been "working on it" all that time?