Live Docs files not updating correctly with false positives.

[Oli Putland]

Hi there.

I use all the Affinity suite on iPad & MacOS.

The interchangeability between apps on macOS is flawless, I can open a file in macOS, change it and then save it and open it in another Affinity product and all is well.

The same cannot be said of iPad, as when I try to do this, the app opens old versions of a document when a document is saved in another Affinity App.

What’s worse is that the option: ‘Show In Files’ correctly shows the file in its most recent form, but when you open it, an older version is opened.

I created a video clarifying this issue.

 

Thanks

[Oli Putland]

Just a quick added note- this also happens when you save to ‘On My iPad’ and bypass the iCloud setup entirely.

[walt.farrell]

Just to be sure: Are you aware that Live Docs is a sandbox, isolated to the single application that is showing it? Its contents do not reflect what is in the file system unless you Save (from Live Docs on that application) or Close (X icon) without Saving and Open again.

Thus, if you have a document Open in multiple Affinity apps, and are using Live Docs in each, their contents are not connected in any way.

[Oli Putland]

Hello Walt.

Clearly Live Docs as it currently stands does not show ‘Live documents’. As you say- it is a sandbox environment, but this is not clear and there are too many signposts suggesting that one document is the same document anywhere you use it from.

 

Even Affinity’s official video recently released states that this is the best way to share documents between desktop and iPad OS, and at no point is it mentioned that you must close a document in order to ‘update’ it. I believe a better method would be an ‘update’ button in order to refresh the sandboxed documents to their current universally accepted states, particularly since the ‘Show in Files’ option suggests a totally different outcome.

[Lee D]

@Oli Putland As this isn't a bug but more of a workflow suggestion. I'd recommend posting in the Feedback and Suggestions section for our developers to consider improving the process in future versions.

I'll also pass on the feedback to our team on the File Management video.

[Paul Mudditt]

On 6/29/2023 at 11:49 AM, Oli Putland said:

Hi there.

I use all the Affinity suite on iPad & MacOS.

The interchangeability between apps on macOS is flawless, I can open a file in macOS, change it and then save it and open it in another Affinity product and all is well.

The same cannot be said of iPad, as when I try to do this, the app opens old versions of a document when a document is saved in another Affinity App.

What’s worse is that the option: ‘Show In Files’ correctly shows the file in its most recent form, but when you open it, an older version is opened.

I created a video clarifying this issue.

 

Thanks

Serif cannot fix this.

You did not close the open file/tab on the home screen. You MUST always SAVE then CLOSE any file before opening in any other app on any platform. A file system link exists between the home screen and the saved location, which is why once saved you do not need to browse to the location again on subsequent saves. Hence you MUST disconnect this link between the apps home screen and the storage system by closing the file which ensures all data is written to the filing system and not held in page swap memory or similar by iPadOS multitasking.

If you were on a Mac or a PC, you are effectively holding the file open in a tab and then trying to open the file again in another app. The fault is IOS/iPadOS. On macOS or Windows you would be warned that the file is already open in another app.

The iPad apps home screen must be treat as open tabs on a desktop app. ALWAYS save and CLOSE them if moving to another app or system.
 

[Paul Mudditt]

On 6/29/2023 at 11:51 AM, Oli Putland said:

Just a quick added note- this also happens when you save to ‘On My iPad’ and bypass the iCloud setup entirely.

Nothing to do with iCloud, everything to do with not closing the open file on the apps home page.

[Paul Mudditt]

The only solution would be the drastic solution of removing the home screen entirely and replacing it with the recent files folder option exactly the same as the desktop versions. Long term this is the only solution.

[walt.farrell]

52 minutes ago, Paul Mudditt said:

The only solution would be the drastic solution of removing the home screen entirely and replacing it with the recent files folder option exactly the same as the desktop versions. Long term this is the only solution.

Well, it might help if Live Docs were renamed Application Sandbox or something like that.

[Oli Putland]

I very much agree that the term ‘Live Docs’ is very misleading as the files being edited are not, for intents and purposes ‘live’ at all.

I also think that the ‘Show in Files’ option adds to the confusion as it truly does give a false positive piece of information, which compounds an already confusing logistical system.

I realise that Serif and indeed other third party companies have limitations placed on them via Apple, so they have to create their own working methods which I’m sure they have thoroughly researched, however I use several apps ‘Photomator’ & ‘Vectornator’ being two of them, that are able to effortlessly switch between iPad and Mac, updating and saving between them on iCloud Drive without the need of any kind of sandboxing area at all.

In other words- the apps behave as if both setups were Macs.

[Paul Mudditt]

9 hours ago, Oli Putland said:

however I use several apps ‘Photomator’ & ‘Vectornator’ being two of them, that are able to effortlessly switch between iPad and Mac, updating and saving between them on iCloud Drive without the need of any kind of sandboxing area at all.

In other words- the apps behave as if both setups were Macs.

Agreed, Vectornator uses the recent files/document method which works well.

However the Serif Dev's I am sure would say we are not comparing like with like.

History is the main reason that the sandbox is used so that no matter how many times you edit on the iPad, you can backtrack your document back to when you started it.

Of course on the Desktop you can also do this but only by selecting 'save history' with the associated larger file sizes of storing that history in each document.

Since there is little difference in the CPU power of iPad's vs Mac's or PC's I see no reason for Serif to continue using the internal sandbox storage for files anymore and change to Recent Files/Documents method with an option to save history exactly as the desktop apps and other apps like Vectornator.