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Passthrough PDF still can't handle ligatures


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As mentioned in other topics, when viewed in Publisher, the PDF is still interpreted. The Passthrough attribute applies only when Exporting the Publisher document to a new PDF.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

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4 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

As mentioned in other topics, when viewed in Publisher, the PDF is still interpreted

WYETGINWYS or WYSINWYE? What a pity. :(

------
Windows 10 | i5-8500 CPU | Intel UHD 630 Graphics | 32 GB RAM | Latest Retail and Beta versions of complete Affinity range installed

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4 hours ago, benwiggy said:

Does the company have a blog where they might explain why, when they came to design the Affinity suite of apps, they elected to choose such an absurd and largely unhelpful model for the handling of PDFs? 

It's just the very first beta with the feature, and it is not fully developed. If we participate in beta testing, we should expect a certain degree of rough experience, and that is our opportunity to leave feedback for the good of the finished product.

Here is some commentary on the why and the thoughts about its future:

 

 

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"the PDF specification will always have features we won't support."

"We are still working on aspects of our PDF importer that converts PDF to native Affinity"

The design intent seems to be to provide an 'interpreted' PDF on the screen, regardless of the state of the beta development.

Affinity is hell-bent on 'converting PDF to native Affinity', rather than just accurately rendering a PDF as a graphic object. This would be fine if it were guaranteed 100% accurate, but it isn't.

Affinity should just treat PDF the same way it currently does EPS -- place as an image; open and outline the embedded fonts for editing or bitmapping -- with this 'interpretation' thing as an optional extra.  They could save themselves a ton of work and satisfy most of their users.

As it is, the current design fails to make Affinity a viable product for my workflow.

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That's exactly what it does with EPS.

1. I'm not sure I want ads/logos 'converted to image file' - I want them passed through. But Affinity should convert to bitmap in Photo persona. It does not do this reliably.

2. Outline text for editing in Design persona.

3. Place as pass-through image object in Publisher persona.

Is that not what you want?

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3 hours ago, haakoo said:

all elements are editable to the extend of what's possible

By definition that would not be "pass-through" any longer.

 

4 hours ago, benwiggy said:

The design intent seems to be to provide an 'interpreted' PDF on the screen

PDF looks like gibberish unless it is interpreted.  Here is an example of a portion of an uninterpreted PDF file:

 

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Whether it is interpreted by code from Serif, Apple, Micro$oft, Adobe, or whoever, at some level it must be interpreted to be meaningful to a human observer.  So yes, it is quite obviously by design that the PDF is "interpreted" when displayed on the screen - that should not be in question.

The question is one of the interpretation of the PDF being sufficiently incomplete that not all elements (such as embedded fonts) being handled in the manner prescribed by the format.  Because the Affinity software only interprets a subset of the PDF standard and that subset does not cover the features being used by the file, other things get left out and the resulting image does not reflect the expectations of users.  It is in effect an approximation of what the PDF is intended to look like... but then, so are all other on-screen renderings of a PDF file as they are all raster by the time they are displayed and raster representations of vector objects are approximations by nature; it is really a matter of some approximations being better than others.

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4 hours ago, benwiggy said:

Affinity should just treat PDF the same way it currently does EPS -- place as an image

That is not possible without interpreting the PDF file, and also supporting embedded fonts.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

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1 hour ago, walt.farrell said:

That is not possible without interpreting the PDF file, and also supporting embedded fonts.

Affinity can interpret PostScript in EPS files with embedded fonts perfectly. Putting a PDF on a page is not a radically difficult new concept. It's been done since the 20th century.

1 hour ago, fde101 said:

PDF looks like gibberish unless it is interpreted.  

Yes, I know a little about PDF. 😉 

There is "interpreting" and then there is "interpreting" - and for some reason Affinity's 'interpreting' is entirely different from just rendering as any other application would do it. It wouldn't matter so much, but for the fact that, as you point out, Affinity's interpretation is incomplete. 

We are in agreement that "some approximations are better than others". Every other approximation works sufficiently well, and Affinity's approximation does not.

I am deeply disappointed that I cannot use Affinity reliably for the kind of work with PDFs that I need to do.  If there is a paid upgrade to v.2.0, then I will certainly think twice before committing if the PDF workflow is not improved.

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4 hours ago, benwiggy said:

I am deeply disappointed that I cannot use Affinity reliably for the kind of work with PDFs that I need to do.  If there is a paid upgrade to v.2.0, then I will certainly think twice before committing if the PDF workflow is not improved.

In the first place, you should bear in mind that we haven't seen the final implemntation yet. Even if they keep the current approximation (which I doubt, knowing their obsession with quality), I think the application offers MORE than enough power for EUR 50, with new features being added all the time. Feel free to pay EUR 50 per month to ye olde Adobe if you need more. (Or try QX, the new versions are rather good).

All the best!

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On 9/23/2020 at 7:14 PM, anon2 said:

Are you kidding? So many bugs and usability impediments are being allowed to persist for years.

Publisher hasn't been around for that long ;-) If you mean AD (I cannot judge Photo as I use it for very basic things only), yes, some bugs have been with us for ages and are pretty annoying (expand stroke is a notorious example). 

What I had in mind, however, was the desire to come up with a lean, fast and intuitive UX/UI.  

In terms of bug squishing and feature additions, yes, we all miss something that we need. But it's not fair to compare the Affinity suite with software that has been here for 10+ years and costs 10 times as much. Serif deserve a little bit more time, considering what the first releases of Indesign and QX looked like... My two cents, feel free to disagree of course. 

All the best. 

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21 minutes ago, Goner__ said:

Publisher hasn't been around for that long ;-) If you mean AD (I cannot judge Photo as I use it for very basic things only), yes, some bugs have been with us for ages and are pretty annoying (expand stroke is a notorious example). 

I was considering the whole Affinity suite. The three apps are fundamentally one app but with different features made unavailable in each.

By the way, Expand Stroke is something that was greatly improved recently, so that's an odd example for you to give as a "notorious example".

 

21 minutes ago, Goner__ said:

But it's not fair to compare the Affinity suite with software that has been here for 10+ years and costs 10 times as much.

I never for one moment compared Affinity suite with other software, so I don't know why you put that in your response.

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