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Hi

I have a simple form that I'm creating consisting of vertical and horizontal lines and some text. I locked some of the background lines so I could work on the ones that are in the foreground but can't seem to unlock them. 

 

I have no idea what I have done. I'm a pretty new user of Affinity Designer so my I'll apologise in advance if this is something stupidly simple.

 

The document has been included as an attachment.

 

Cheers

 

Peter

Time management.afdesign

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  • Staff

Hi Peter,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

To unlock them you can either click on the padlock icon on each layer in the Layers panel to unlock one at a time or select the first locked layer and then the last one pressing ⇧ (shift) (like in Finder) to select them all, then press the padlock icon on the top of the Layers panel.

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  • 2 months later...

Hey MEB, what if I have something locked but I can't find it in the layers panel to unlock it because it's locked and I can't right click on it? Should users always have to go to the layers panel to unlock something. There is an unlock key short but it only works if I have the element selected in the layers panel... if I am going to go to the layers panel to select the element I will just unlock it there

 

There currently is an "ungroup all" ability, why no "unlock all" ability? I really miss this. Or am I not seeing something?

 

Edit: it appears that ungroup all actually only ungroups all groups within a group, not all instances of all groups. Hmm.

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  • 3 months later...

Thanks MEB! Sorry, I'm just seeing your response now, any progress?

 

I am working on a large complex designer piece right now and a right click menu structure to hide, unhide all, hide everything but the selected element/object, and /or lock, unlock all, lock everything but the selected element/object is really going to the top of my wish list of "gotta haves"...  :-)

 

I like to work as "ui free" as possible, going to the layers panel to do these things is taking me out of the flow. I'm probably not the only one, I'm guessing...

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  • 8 months later...

Hey MEB, I just came across this thread and was wondering if there was any end of year updates that you could give us with regards to this issue. I totally agree with retrograde with regards to the inability to unlock on the fly etc, it's really killing my productivity. Having to trundle about the layers panel searching for specific artwork to unlock is a bit of a nightmare. It's one of the ONLY thing that makes me yearn for Illustrator, and nobody wants that!

 

Thanks.

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  • 3 years later...
17 minutes ago, ridgeclimber@hotmail.com said:

I have read all the above and tried the remedies without success; I cannot unlock / uncouple layers -- -- Suggestions? 

Hi, first of all I wouldn't use my Email address as an user name here, you should change that if you don't want to be full spammed by the whole internet.

A layer has to be selected in the layers panel in order to lock/unlock it.

☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan
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v_Kyr
Yes I am aware that a layer must be selected, but selected layers, which are locked (as indicated by the padlock icon) in the layer box do not in fact lock, because I move them with the move tool.  And this is interesting: I just opened the graphics for Chapter 3 (Mam_tor.tiff.) which is described as having a locked background pixel layer and in fact has the padlock icon within and I moved it as well.

I think the locking feature will be an important feature in the heat of battle as my study continues, and I would really like to find a way to make it work. It seems to me this must be a software glitch; is there a patch or perhaps a more current version of Affinity Photo? I am running version 1.8.3.641; is there a newer version?

Thank You and Regards -- -- Tom Hagood  

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@tombo,

Are you sure you're able to move a locked layer using the Move tool, and not just moving the entire canvas with the hand tool? The latter can be done.

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10 hours ago, tombo said:

Yes I am aware that a layer must be selected, but selected layers, which are locked (as indicated by the padlock icon) in the layer box do not in fact lock, because I move them with the move tool.  And this is interesting: I just opened the graphics for Chapter 3 (Mam_tor.tiff.) which is described as having a locked background pixel layer and in fact has the padlock icon within and I moved it as well.

That's right, you can still move a locked layer inside the layers panel, you also can delete one from there. The following is quite a little bit misleading ...

Quote

Locking

Locking is useful when you need to prevent a layer from being moved or transformed unintentionally.

Lock/Unlock To lock a layer:

  1. On the Layers panel, select the layer to be locked.
  2. Do one of the following:
    • Select Lock/Unlock.
    • From the Layer menu, select Lock.

Select Lock/Unlock again, or use the Layer menu's Unlock item, to allow the layer to be editable.

Layers which are locked show in the Layers panel with a lock symbol next to them. Selected locked layers appear with crosses around the bounding box.

Opened images, or images developed from Develop Persona, appear as a locked background layer by default.

To unlock all layers:

  • From the Layer menu, select Unlock All.

If any locked layer(s) is selected before Unlock All is applied, only that layer will be unlocked, instead of all layers.

... since it only affects things on the drawing canvas but not the layers on the layers panel too.

 

10 hours ago, tombo said:

I think the locking feature will be an important feature in the heat of battle as my study continues, and I would really like to find a way to make it work. It seems to me this must be a software glitch; is there a patch or perhaps a more current version of Affinity Photo? I am running version 1.8.3.641; is there a newer version?

No you already have the newest version and as said above, layer locking doesn't effect the modification of layers inside the layers panel so far.

 

☛ Affinity Designer 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Photo 1.10.8 ◆ Affinity Publisher 1.10.8 ◆ OSX El Capitan
☛ Affinity V2.3 apps ◆ MacOS Sonoma 14.2 ◆ iPad OS 17.2

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  • 1 year later...
52 minutes ago, davidtch said:

Hello,

Since time there has been an improvement to select & unlock objects (from canvas) on the fly ? 

Cheers

You can do this only by using the layers panel. Select a layer(s) and then click on the lock icon up in top right of the panel, that will lock the layer(s) you have selected. To unlock do the same or click on the lock icon in a layer to unlock.

Mac Pro (Late 2013) Mac OS 12.7.4 
Affinity Designer 2.4.0 | Affinity Photo 2.4.0 | Affinity Publisher 2.4.0 | Beta versions as they appear.

I have never mastered color management, period, so I cannot help with that.

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Thanks Old Bruce, 

Yes I know how to do it from layers panel. But not from the object itself.

I have a complex design and I want to select a locked object from the artboard in order to unlock it.

It's very difficult to find the onject from the layer panel beacause there is to much layers to scroll.

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If you switch the view mode to Outline you can select the (Vector) object on the canvas

To save time I am currently using an automated AI to reply to some posts on this forum. If any of "my" posts are wrong or appear to be total b*ll*cks they are the ones generated by the AI. If correct they were probably mine. I apologise for any mistakes made by my AI - I'm sure it will improve with time.

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3 hours ago, davidtch said:

I have a complex design and I want to select a locked object from the artboard in order to unlock it.

Try what @carl123 just suggested, At least for me, it works for both vector & pixel layers, although inside a locked artboard, I have to drag out a selection rectangle to select a pixel layer -- I can't just click on an edge of it like I can for a vector object.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.0 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
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7 hours ago, davidtch said:

It's very difficult to find the onject from the layer panel beacause there is to much layers to scroll.

Select object, and Ctrl+K, or mouse right click and last popup menu item. 

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1 minute ago, Pšenda said:

Select object, and Ctrl+K, or mouse right click and last popup menu item. 

How do you select a locked object, other than in the Layers panel, or from the outline view in AD?

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50 minutes ago, R C-R said:

How do you select a locked object, other than in the Layers panel, or from the outline view in AD?

??? Is your question related to what I wrote?
My response was to a user's comment about complex design and search in the layers panel, therefore, a completely unrelated problem with your query.

Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301
Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
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On 5/17/2020 at 1:50 PM, v_kyr said:

That's right, you can still move a locked layer inside the layers panel, you also can delete one from there.

All you have to do is have the locked layers encapsulated in a group, and they can be selected*) (and then moved and deleted) from the desktop/canvas as well.
*) Move tool, draw rectangle about locked objects - group is selected with locked objects. Alternatively, it is enough to have an unlocked object in the group, and all the locked objects will be selected through it.

Another example of how the concept of Affinity "locking" is completely wrong.

Edited by Pšenda

Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.4.0.2301
Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 23H2, Build 22631.3155.
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10 minutes ago, Pšenda said:

??? Is your question related to what I wrote?
My response was to a user's comment about complex design and search in the layers panel, therefore, a completely unrelated problem with your query.

I was asking how it relates to this recent post by @davidtch, specifically his comment about wanting to select a locked object from the artboard in order to unlock it, not from the Layers panel. If the object is already locked & I try the right-click method on my Mac to bring up the popup context menu, the last item ("Find in Layers Panel") is greyed out because I cannot actually select the locked item by clicking on it on the artboard. (Actually, almost all the items are greyed out, just as they are if I right-click on an empty spot on the artboard.)

The only thing that works for me is the workaround @carl123 mentioned using the AD outline view mode.

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