Publisher text flow questions

[DarkClown]

I'm struggeling a bit with the text flow behaviour. Mayby one of the experts can give me some ideas.

I'm layouting a book that is split into various longer text chapters. Within there chapters I'd like the text to float from one text frame to another. To be able to easily changes the layout later I generated double sided master pages with text frames that are connected. This way I can easily spread a chapter over many pages and easily chage the layout if required later. When adding a seconf chapter I run into the unwanted situation that all text frames of the masterpage are connected so automatically the new tex get added to the existing textfrom the previous chapter. To prevent that I duplicated my master page and disconnected the flow between the text frames on both pages. Evenb that works fine. So by adding the new master page I can disconnect the text frames. Problems now start, when the disconnectes textflow shifts to the next page. I can only disconnect the textflow between the two opposite pages but not the one from one double sided page to the next one. With the second master with disconnectes text frames I get a text overflow in the first frame. No more floating. I might need another master that has connected text frames for the double page but is disconnected to the next double sided text frame ... But the master doesn't show this type of "follow up" connection - so I can't disconnect it.

I hope that wasn't to confusing.
Any ideas how to solve that problem?
Thx, Timo

[MikeTO]

I don't fully understand but could you share your template here?

Most people don't have separate masters for each chapter, they just have one story (range of text) for all of the chapters combined and flow that from page to page, using breaks and styles to demarcate the start of a new chapter.

Other people have a separate story for each chapter but still don't have separate masters. They place the text for chapter one and create as many pages as required. They add a new page for chapter 2 and make it a separate story, not linked from the last page of chapter 1, place the text for it in that frame, and then shift click the overset indicator to add the required pages for chapter 2. And repeat.

Other people do create a separate master page for each chapter. I'm doing that for my current book because I want to insert the chapter name and a tab for it on each page. By doing this, I can add or remove pages for chapter 1 without having any impact at all on chapter 2. The downside is that instead of just worrying about excess or inadequate pages at the end of the book I could have over or underset text at the end of each chapter. But Preflight will tell me when I have overset text anywhere in the document, and underset would happen only when deleting a large amount of content and I can check for that.

The only situation I can think of that Affinity can't handle is when selected pages of a chapter have a different layout. Some books have two-column layouts but sometimes you'll have a page with a photo that spans both columns at the top of a page with single column text below it. That is handled via a Span Columns feature in other apps, not by using a separate master page. If you attempt to handle that via a separate master page in Publisher then when you add or remove text in the story before that page you'll find the text flows from that page to a page based on a different master. The best way to handle it in Publisher at this time is to manually place the photos or text that span columns (using a separate text frame), and manually repositioning them when you add or remove text in the chapter.

If the problem you're having is that when you start chapter two it's connected automatically to chapter one, simply break the link between the frames. If you somehow end up with chapter two text in the chapter one story, then copy everything from the end of chapter one in the story, cut it, and then paste it into the newly separate chapter two story.

[walt.farrell]

2 hours ago, DarkClown said:

Any ideas how to solve that problem?

a. Insert a Frame-Break character between the chapters.

Or 

b. Use a paragraph text style for the chapter header that includes starting on a new page.

 

[DarkClown]

29 minutes ago, MikeTO said:

If the problem you're having is that when you start chapter two it's connected automatically to chapter one, simply break the link between the frames. If you somehow end up with chapter two text in the chapter one story, then copy everything from the end of chapter one in the story, cut it, and then paste it into the newly separate chapter two story.

Thank you Mike for your detailed description.

From what I experienced I can't break the text link between text frames that were placed and linked on the master page - at least it does not work for me. Elsewise problem would be solved.

[Old Bruce]

32 minutes ago, DarkClown said:

From what I experienced I can't break the text link between text frames that were placed and linked on the master page - at least it does not work for me. Elsewise problem would be solved.

Just click on the inflowing (or outflowing) triangle, then click in the same text frame. This all happens on the Actual Pages with the text cursor caret in the text frame you need disconnected.

 

[DarkClown]

22 hours ago, Old Bruce said:

then click in the same text frame.

Ohh, seems to be my mistake .... I did noch click in the same frame again ... and for some reason the cursor for breaking the flow looks slightly different than in the help file ...
Thanks Old Bruce!