Go to previously viewed spread

[Ash]

Apps: Publisher
Platforms: All

There is now a new option to go to your previously viewed spread in Affinity Publisher. So, for example, if you are on page 30 and then go to page 400 to edit something, clicking on previously viewed spread will jump you back to page 30 (and hitting again will jump back to page 400 – so you can switch between the two pages quickly).

You can find this option in the Document menu (Previously Viewed Page) for which you could optionally set a keyboard shortcut for as well as using the new button with the rest of the page navigation options in the bottom left of the UI as highlighted with arrow below:

 

On the iPad version you can find this option at the bottom of the view menu:

 

[OliverJ]

Yes... this is going to be super helpful

[MikeTO]

Thanks! I'm really looking forward to this but I can't get it to work yet.

1. Open document - opens to spread 282-283
2. Scroll to page 212-213, place cursor, and type a word
3. Choose Previously Viewed Page - the History panel shows "Set current page" but the page displayed doesn't actually change

I've tried this several different ways and it always records an event but doesn't do anything for me.

Thanks

[Jon P]

This has been already raised internally Mike, and is currently by design.

The key thing here being that you were on spread 282-283, and then scrolled to 212,213. So when you switch to that spread and click on it so it is active, then click "Previously viewed page", it is taking you to the previous view you had, which includes the scrolling that you did when on that spread.

If you open on 282, then use the pages panel and jump to another page, it should then switch you between the spreads.

I'll add your observations to the issue we raised internally. Out of curiosity, in this scenario, would you expect it to ignore the scrolling you did, and display spread 282 regardless of where your view was before hand?

[MikeTO]

35 minutes ago, Jon P said:

This has been already raised internally Mike, and is currently by design.

The key thing here being that you were on spread 282-283, and then scrolled to 212,213. So when you switch to that spread and click on it so it is active, then click "Previously viewed page", it is taking you to the previous view you had, which includes the scrolling that you did when on that spread.

If you open on 282, then use the pages panel and jump to another page, it should then switch you between the spreads.

I'll add your observations to the issue we raised internally. Out of curiosity, in this scenario, would you expect it to ignore the scrolling you did, and display spread 282 regardless of where your view was before hand?

Yes, I'd expect it to show me 282, the last page I edited.

I was thinking about this today when testing this. I wouldn't normally scroll with Pages, I did that because I was testing it with Find & Replace and noticed that it jumps to the first search result and wondered if that was going to mess this up. If I'm editing page 282, find "Smith", Publisher will set the view to the next instance of Smith, say on page 300. But I want the one on page 146 so I click that result and edit it. Then I choose Previously Viewed Spread and I'd want it to take me to 282 which was the last one I edited, not page 146 which was displayed automatically. I know F&R logs the view change to the first result as Ensure Text Selection Visible so hopefully that won't interfere with Previously Viewed.

[walt.farrell]

7 minutes ago, MikeTO said:

Then I choose Previously Viewed Spread and I'd want it to take me to 282 which was the last one I edited, not page 146 which was displayed automatically.

 

7 minutes ago, MikeTO said:

But I want the one on page 146 so I click that result and edit it.

But as you said, you did edit 146.

And in any case, where did "editing" come into play? The function is "go to previously viewed spread".

[Rudolphus]

Really helpful, thank you!

I am aware this is not a place for a feature requests, but this one is a kind similar: could you, please, implement even 'Zoom to Previous Zoom' in all apps?

[Seneca]

18 minutes ago, Rudolphus said:

I am aware this is not a place for a feature requests, but this one is a kind similar: could you, please, implement even 'Zoom to Previous Zoom' in all apps?

Try Navigator and create your own zoom presets there.

[Rudolphus]

Well, I know, but believe me, its not as easy and flexible to use as a simple Previous zoom. First of all, Navigator creates View points, not Zoom presets, that means they are fixed in position. When I work on details of a design moving here and there and just need to fast check overall impact and return back where I was, the View points present no real/easy/fast solution. 

[jmwellborn]

When I first tried this in light mode, the tiny icon at the bottom of the Pages Panel was inactive and so faint that I had real trouble finding it at all.  I knew where it was supposed to be, based on the screenshot at the start of this topic.  I also fiddled with all of my User Interface sliders, but could never make it show up, even though the tiny Toggle Master View and Page count icons were visible from the start.  Once I actually clicked on a page and then another page, it suddenly appeared in vivid black and works like a charm — with one addition.  You can toggle back and forth between the two pages you have chosen as many times as you like, but if you wish to toggle from one of the pages to a different page, or between a new pair of pages, you must double click on the new page or pair of pages.  

Great addition!  I could have used this with pure joy recently while creating some lengthy legal documents, each of which refers back and forth to numbered Articles, Sections, Subsections, etc.  Being sure that every cross reference was correct as additions or deletions were made (thus moving material back and forth from one page to another to accommodate the changes), was a very lengthy process.  

[Pšenda]

12 hours ago, jmwellborn said:

I could have used this with pure joy recently while creating some lengthy legal documents, each of which refers back and forth to numbered Articles, Sections, Subsections, etc.  Being sure that every cross reference was correct as additions or deletions were made (thus moving material back and forth from one page to another to accommodate the changes), was a very lengthy process.

The ability to vertically/horizontally divide the document into two/more parts would be useful for exactly these situations, so that you can view and edit the document in two places at the same time. Unfortunately, the existing way via the new View is very cumbersome and therefore probably not even used.

[MikeTO]

There's a bug in this feature that I haven't quite figured out but here's a test document and screen recording.

I open this document and it shows me pages 8-9. I type onto page 8 and then scroll with the scrollbar to an earlier page. Type something there and then choose Previously Viewed Page. Nothing happens. The History panel isn't visible in this recording but Set Current Page is being executed, it must just think the current page is the previous page.

test.afpub

 

 

[Affinity Info Bot]

An issue raised in this thread ("Go to Previously Viewed Page doesn't work consistently") has now been reported to the developers by the testing team (Ref: AFB-8239). Thank you very much for reporting this issue to us.