Auto-Correct ellipsis change doesn't work

[VJS]

Affinity Publisher 1.10.5 will NOT accept the ellipsis change I make in Auto-Correct. All other auto-correct line items work.

 

Also, I can find no way to add a new correction, like substituting a Dollar symbol for a Pound or Euro symbol.

[Old Bruce]

44 minutes ago, VJS said:

Affinity Publisher 1.10.5 will NOT accept the ellipsis change I make in Auto-Correct. All other auto-correct line items work.

Not all fonts have an ellipsis character/glyph.

[walt.farrell]

1 hour ago, VJS said:

Affinity Publisher 1.10.5 will NOT accept the ellipsis change I make in Auto-Correct. All other auto-correct line items work.

From your screenshot it "accepted" the change, as it is shown down in the list of saved changes.

Are you saying that when you type "..." (3 dots) it is not replaced by ". . ."? It works for me, but note that you must type the characters in order for auto-correct to work. It will not work for pasted or Placed text.

 

28 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

Not all fonts have an ellipsis character/glyph.

From testing on my system, VJS is trying to replace either (I can't tell for sure):

• ... (3 dots) with ". . ." (3 spaced dots)
  or
• An ellipsis character ("…") with ". . ." (3 spaced dots)

They do not seem to be using an ellipsis character as the replacement. That would look like the second entry in this screenshot:

(For testing, I added these entries. The first is 3 dots, replaced by spaced dots. The second is 4 dots, replaced by an ellipsis character. The screenshot that VJS provided shows spaced dots, as far as I can see, as the replacement.

 

[kenmcd]

Looks like @VJS is trying to replace the Auto-Correct entry
from 3-dots to ellipsis
with 3-dots to three spaced dots.
This does work while typing, but will not replace existing text.
Need to use Find and Replace for that.

[VJS]

I appreciate all the responses. My 15-year-old Word allows me to do this—font immaterial for three spaced dots—yet Affinity Publisher (AP) can't? I tried it over and over and it wouldn't convert as I typed. I tried to set this up because I want it to work regardless of whether the type face I happen to be using (or am told to use by an author) has an ellipsis or not. Yes, the screenshot does show that it was accepted, but it doesn't work as I type. I quit AP, relaunched, tried a new document, changed font—no spacing periods. Could I do it with Find and Replace, I would hope so, but I'm trying to do what the program should allow me to do but doesn't. Several of you have said it worked for you. What incantation did you say? BTW, It also works with InDesign CS6, which I'm trying to get away from, but it's glitches like this that won't allow me to.

[carl123]

1 hour ago, VJS said:

Several of you have said it worked for you.

Works for me also (Windows)

Just ensure the language you have set in the Auto-Correct screen matches the language you have set for your text, which can be checked in the Character panel (with the text highlighted). E.g. "English (United States)" is not the same as "English (United Kingdom)"

 

PS Just notice in your first post that you have Auto-Correct set to plain "English".

I don't have that so it may be a Mac / Windows difference but check what other "English" options you have in that drop-down box

[walt.farrell]

6 hours ago, carl123 said:

Just ensure the language you have set in the Auto-Correct screen matches the language you have set for your text, which can be checked in the Character panel (with the text highlighted). E.g. "English (United States)" is not the same as "English (United Kingdom)"

Good thought. The auto-correct function is tied in to the same Language settings that Spelling, Hyphenation, etc. use.

[Pšenda]

12 hours ago, VJS said:

What incantation did you say?

For me work fine - press "dot dot dot" -> automatic change to "dot space dot space dot".
No incantation, I just typed it into Auto-Correct.

P.S. it is interesting, that then you only need to enter two dots, which apparently add up to the previous one, and it changes to a space dot space dot again.

[VJS]

Thank you Carl & Walt. One problem solved but another, major issue has surfaced. I had changed the Preferences Auto-Correct to English (not identified as American), as is the document and that allowed the three dots to fill in with spaces.

That problem solved, thank you both. Although I remembered resetting it when I initially found the feature.

However, quitting out of AP and going back in, the Auto-Correct function reset to English (United Kingdom). I tried resetting AP without a document, but closing and relaunching shows it again reset itself to United Kingdom. I really don't feel like resetting it every time I use AP, so any other suggestions?

[Old Bruce]

6 minutes ago, VJS said:

However, quitting out of AP and going back in, the Auto-Correct function reset to English (United Kingdom). I tried resetting AP without a document, but closing and relaunching shows it again reset itself to United Kingdom. I really don't feel like resetting it every time I use AP, so any other suggestions?

I got bit by this. These are the settings for all the different languages. Not a default setting of English(United Kingdom) for the whole application. On my Mac I use Canadian English. I have nothing set in the auto correct for that language. If I wanted to use the three dots to an ellipsis or three dots to a dot space dot space dot then I would have to enter whichever into the Canadian English section. Otherwise it will auto fill nothing. The way I like it.

So you could have English UK set to an ellipsis and English US set to dot space dot space dot then see the behaviour change according to the language you choose for the text that you type. You shouldn't worry about the reseting back to UK English. That is not actually happening.

[walt.farrell]

50 minutes ago, VJS said:

However, quitting out of AP and going back in, the Auto-Correct function reset to English (United Kingdom). I tried resetting AP without a document, but closing and relaunching shows it again reset itself to United Kingdom. I really don't feel like resetting it every time I use AP, so any other suggestions?

As @Old Bruce mentions, it's not an application setting. It is not saying: Use auto-corrections for English (or whatever language).

It is saying: If the user happens to be typing text in English, then use these auto-corrections.

Think of it this way: you could have text for 2, or 5, or 10, or (pick a number) different languages in your document. One set of auto-corrections can't work for all of them, so you provide auto-corrections for each different language you might use, and then when you're using a particular language (as shown in the Character panel, Languages, Spelling) that set of auto-corrections is applied as you type.

[VJS]

Thank you, Bruce. I'll try it tomorrow on my desktop. When one response told to make sure that both AP and the document had the same setting., I assumed that meant the setting would "stick." It just seems a bit strange that it doesn't.

This is a good forum with some nice and very helpful people.