Split-flow in Publisher

[philipt18]

Please add the ability to split the flow between two text frames in Publisher. For example, when you have text flowing from Text Frame 1 to Text Frame 2, and each frame shows a paragraph. Right now deleting the flow line between the two frames would leave the second frame empty, and the first frame overflowing. What I'm asking for is the ability to delete the flow line, leaving everything in place. In this case both frames would show exactly the same text they showed before, they just wouldn't be connected (and nothing would be overflowing).

[Catshill]

What you are asking for is the ability to split the contents of the frame (ie the text) rather than the frame itself.

[fde101]

This has been requested before, but can be a bit more complicated than it sounds.

For example, if hyphenation is being used, there is a possibility for the split to occur in the middle of a word, in which case you suddenly have a half-word at the end of one frame and another at the start of the next frame, which can lead to spelling errors while at the same time removing the hyphen (since it is no longer one connected word from the perspective of the text engine).

Similarly if your text is displayed justified and the split occurs in the middle of a paragraph, then the last line of one may no longer stretch across the width of the frame since it is now the last line of the surviving portion of the paragraph and the first line of the other may not longer stretch across the width since it is now the first line of its surviving portion.

Other text flow rules may similarly be impacted by splitting the text in the middle, and there may not always be good solutions to match these things up.  Serif would either need to accept that splitting the frames will impact formatting in this manner, or would need to arrange for "phantom" paragraph content on either side to help maintain the exiting status of the flow (and then work out what to do when the user edits the content from there).

None of it is 100% insurmountable, but I suspect they have bigger fish to fry at the moment.

[Petar Petrenko]

On 6/18/2023 at 2:14 PM, fde101 said:

if hyphenation is being used, there is a possibility for the split to occur in the middle of a word, in which case you suddenly have a half-word at the end of one frame and another at the start of the next frame

That's why InDesign has "Hyphenate Across Column" feature.