Publisher - linked affinity designer files change on save

[Maxdanger]

Hi all,

I'm having an issue with linked affinity designer files in publisher. The steps I am following are outlined below:

1. I save a designer file with different artboards which will be used as pages.
2. I open publisher and use place autoflow to place all artboards as pages in publisher. The reason for this is I am still able to modify the designer file and have the changes automatically feed through to the publisher document. Opening the designer file in publisher and converting artboards to pages will break the link between the original designer file so this isn't an option for me.
3. So long as I leave publisher running, changes I make in designer are instantly reflected in publisher. However, if I close publisher, make changes, then reopen the document, the placed artboards reset to only show the first artboard in the designer file.
4. I then have to manually change which artboard to display which soon becomes tedious when placing multiple designer files with a couple hundred pages in total.

I am using the latest beta version of the apps (1971).

Side note - a variant of this bug does seem to be present in the release builds, however I am posting this in the beta build forum because the behaviour is changed in 2.2. In 2.1 release build, all placed artboards are reset to "Document", whereas in 2.2 all artboards are reset to the first artboard of the designer file. Because of the different behaviour, I am assuming that Serif has made some changes to this in 2.2, but the bug still remains.

Video of the steps I take in 2.2 and 2.1 below (I've sped up the steps in 2.1 to avoid being unnecessarily long and repetitive)

 

Thanks very much in advance!

[Hangman]

Hi @Maxdanger,

I can replicate this in the current Beta, so can confirm it is a bug, hopefully, we will see a fix prior to the release version.

[Maxdanger]

Hi @Hangman,

I hope so. I saw that it was mentioned that the next build would be a potential release candidate so hopefully Serif can implement this fix in time for the 2.2 release

[Hangman]

Hi @Maxdanger,

I certainly hope so as this is quite a big issue when working with linked Designer files...

[Affinity Info Bot]

An issue raised in this thread ("Publisher Files are Incorrectly Updated when Linked Affinity Designer Files are Placed in Publisher 2.2.0 (1971)") has now been reported to the developers by the testing team (Ref: AF-28). Thank you very much for reporting this issue to us.

[Vaclav Slovacek]

Hello, I have the same issue. It is getting really frustrating that such a great feature gets hammered by so many bugs that kill productivity and waste a lot of time. Is there any workaround or recommendation how to behave to avoid it?

Having Publisher constantly open with the files that depend on the linked files? This sounds extremely error prone and risky.

[mhgd]

I'm experiencing this in Publisher 2.2.1 too. (Windows 11 Home 22H2 22621.2506)

Had the same thing happen in Designer previously and that was down to having alt-dragged a copy out from the placed document but that doesn't seem to be the issue here as I manually placed the linked Designer files. As soon as I changed something in the Designer file, all 29 instances of the linked file then display the first artboard rather than the artboards I had selected previously. The scale is also reset when going through and re-selecting the correct page for each instance. 

[Affinity Info Bot]

The issue "Editing a linked document with multiple artboards, incorrectly auto-updates artboard selection to artboard 1" (REF: AF-28) has been fixed by the developers in internal build "2.3.0.2150".
This fix should soon be available as a customer beta and is planned for inclusion in the next customer release.
Customer beta builds are announced here and you can participate by following these instructions.
If you still experience this problem once you are using that build version (or later) please reply to this thread including @Serif Info Bot to notify us.