Designer, Export Persona: How to use "User Variables"?

[flobnoit]

Hi all, 

Within Designer (Windows) can someone explain how to use the User Variables in the Export Persona? It intuitively seems like creating a User variable would make it available to the Path Components of all slices; and so that updating the Value of a variable would update it for all Slices (within the same file) calling that variable.

At present (2.1.1) this is not the case for me.

 

Example case, behaviour and expectations:

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I am making mockups. I have a 2 slices for each of 2 different product blanks. I have a symbol over each blank where I can place the logo variations the clients want to see, and I have 4 color variations of each blank.

I build a path as in the attached image: "Text [Slice Name] - [UserVar]" on Slice 1. I switch on my layer of blue variations, set [Color] to "blue" on Slice 1. 

At this point, I would expect that I could open Slice 2, and build the path the same way by using the [Color] variable I created in Slice 1. However, the variable created on Slice 1 does not appear in the User variables box of Slice 2. I can create it again in Slice 2 (using identical spelling/case) but this also does not connect the value of the variable across Slices.

If I "Copy export setup to clipboard" from Slice 1, and Paste it in Slice 2 (so that presumably the variables are identical), and then update the value of [Color] on Slice two, the new value does not become applied to Slice 1. I would expect that a variable being created would allow me to update the value in one place and allow for all instances of that variable to be updated as well. 

--

I did not find any explanation of this panel in the help documentation, and the only forum post referring to it seems to be from the pre-2.0 forum. And the behaviour now appears to be similar to what was reported then.

 

If this is expected behaviour, any guidance on the logic would be appreciated (so I can adapt and integrate).

If this behaviour is not expected, I would like to request that User Variables be available file-wide so that updating the value of Variable A updates it in all places that call Variable A. 

Additionally I would like ask if it's feasible to make a small window (even just in the Export Persona) that allows for the User variables and their values to be kept open in the Studio, so they may be updated more easily. This would help streamline the accurate naming of exports during repetitious tasks.

 

Thanks,

flobnoit

 

[v_kyr]

See related older discussions about "Export Persona" and "User Variables" there, they possibly never really fixed those things so far ...

• export persona user variables site:forum.affinity.serif.com

... and so on !

[flobnoit]

Thanks @v_kyr - it looks like the problems of 2020 persist still. I'll wait a couple more days to see if anyone else has thoughts, then formally move this over to bugs/requests forum.

[flobnoit]

To other forum-goers who happen across this topic- If this is a topic of interest to you, I have also made this a formal post in the Feedback forum where you can show your support:

 

[NM_]

I agree with you, the current implementation of user variables appears incomplete. Currently, the only way to use it would be by copying the export format to the clipboard, and if the export format contains multiple variables, you can paste it into a new slice and edit only one of the variables. Still, as it stands, it is cumbersome to use and not as functional as one would have expected.