Paste format when pasting from another app.

[AvdA]

Hello helpful people - I didn't find this discussed elsewhere - please direct me to the topic if it has been.

Perhaps I will eventually manage to create a pencil or brush in Affinity Designer 2 that looks and feels as delicious as the one from Goodnotes 5. In the meantime I like to write in Goodnotes 5 and paste my text into my Affinity Designer 2 where I am managing the rest of the design. I'm using an iPad Air 3.

When pasting, a message pops up : Allow Paste, which I do.

Sometimes the clipboard content is pasted as an image of the text in my handwriting in original colour.

Sometimes it is pasted converted to black text. I do not want this.

Strokes would be ideal of course.

It is frustrating that sometimes the text is pasted beautifully (ie what I drew) and sometimes it is pasted as converted text (AND that I can't seem to control which it will be).

Is there a way of controlling the format that is pasted? Does it depend a previous activity in Designer for example?

Many thanks for thoughts and input.

Edited April 4, 2024 by AvdA

[Dan C]

Hi @AvdA,

Thanks for your post and our apologies for the delayed response here, we have been exceptionally busy following our Canva acquisition announcement which has temporarily increased our response time. We're working hard to stay on top of things, so we thank you for your patience and understanding here.

I'm not personally familiar with Goodnotes 5, however the format of the object pasted within Affinity will almost always be based on the contents of the clipboard itself, rather than your recent activities within the file.
One thing that may affect this is if a text object is already selected within the Affinity app, therefore I'd recommend making sure that no objects/layers are selected when pasting from Goodnotes.

The clipboards contents are controlled by Goodnotes 5 when copied, and when pasting into Affinity the format of the object(s) pasted will depend on what has been copied.
I don't believe there is a native clipboard inspector within iPadOS - however you may be able to download and install a third party inspector in order to confirm the exact contents before pasting.

Do you notice any difference in the text within Goodnotes before copying, or do you copy/paste with a different workflow when you find the objects are pasted as text/as an image in Affinity? Or does this seemingly occur randomly when following the same workflow between Goodnotes and Designer?

You may also wish to try the Paste Without Format option from the Edit menu (...), as you might find this provides different results than the default Paste option.

I hope this helps

[AvdA]

Thanks for taking the time Dan.

In Goodnotes there aren't any layers and it was such a lovely surprise when I first discovered I could paste my drawn text into Designer.

One thing I tried was to include some obvious image eg circle the text although even that doesn't seem to be working any more. It feels like someone somewhere must have 'improved' something 😞 although of course that might be my imagination.

Good idea to try the Paste Without Format although it gave the same results.

I've just done some more testing. Here is what I have learned ...

In Designer 2 (see attached screen shot).

Copy from Goodnotes 5 (entire image with starfish drawing and some text).

Create a new pixel layer. Paste the image - yes to allow paste from Goodnotes. Yay wow this time it just happened to work - transparent image pasted into the pixel layer AND layer name automatically changed to Image. Perfect!

Create layer 1 rectangle behind to check transparency so far so good.

To see what happens, create a new vector layer. Paste the image - yes to allow paste from Goodnotes. NOTE that here we are dealing with exactly the same clipboard content. Hmm this time Designer has attempted to convert to text - which I do not want - I wonder to myself it it is because I had the new vector layer highlighted.

Create a new pixel layer to test this theory. Highlight and paste the same image again. Oh dear this time it has created a new layer with the converted text 😞

So it tantalisingly works wonderfully sometimes. It seems unlikely that this is something to do with the Goodnotes side because I am getting ALL outcomes from the identical clipboard content.

I tried creating a new document to see if it might work only the first time. Nope 😞 

I just re-read your email and noticed the option to have no layers selected - have now tried this - it converted to text again 😞 

If it is any clue the behaviour seems to be the same (ie seemingly random) in Photo 2. For no reason that is apparent to me, it works sometimes.

If I have to create a pixel layer every time I can live with that - as long as the behaviour is consistent.

Your looking into this is very much appreciated. I hope these clues help !

Many thanks,

Anna

 

[AvdA]

PS I just updated to 2.4.2.2371 - seems the same as far as this problem goes

[AvdA]

Also in case this might provide a clue, it occurs to me that it was working absolutely consistently when I used this approach to make some lyric videos in January. And then I was just pasting drawn text without any image or other kinds of strokes (so it might have been tempted to convert to text). Probably around 50 times no problem. It feels to me as though the tendency to convert to text has begun more recently..

[AvdA]

Hi @Dan C - I'm hoping you might get a chance to come back to this eventually - please see above for various clues. I'm trying to find others.

One thing I have noticed is that when I do a fresh copy in Goodnotes and come back to Designer 2, Designer 2 will ask me if I want to allow the paste from Goodnotes. If I paste the same content several times it doesn't ask me each time (this is a good thing because that would be annoying). It doesn't seem to make any difference to the outcome - I only mention it for completeness.

So, focussing on the desired outcome rather than the exhibiting problem, I think the best place to control whether Designer 2 attempts to convert the clipboard content to text (or not) as part of the paste process, would be to have each behaviour specifically tied to one or other of those menu items you mentioned.

Ideally, Paste should consistently give one behaviour and Paste Without Format should give the other. The currently selected layer (if any) should be irrelevant.

That would be excellent 🙂

[Dan C]

Apologies for the delayed response here as I have been out of the office for the past few days.

I can see from the Goodnotes helpfile that there are specific options when copy / pasting in the app for Handwriting:

Quote

Select the Lasso Tool. Tap it again and make sure to enable the relevant options. For example, if you're going to select handwriting, check that Handwriting is enabled.

Is this option enabled currently, and do you see different behaviour with it disabled?

Secondly, this may be controlled by iPadOS Scribble feature, which can turn your drawn words into editable text. Do you have this option enabled currently in iPadOS settings? Do you see different behaviour with this option disabled?

7 hours ago, AvdA said:

So, focussing on the desired outcome rather than the exhibiting problem, I think the best place to control whether Designer 2 attempts to convert the clipboard content to text (or not) as part of the paste process, would be to have each behaviour specifically tied to one or other of those menu items you mentioned.

Ideally, Paste should consistently give one behaviour and Paste Without Format should give the other. The currently selected layer (if any) should be irrelevant.

I appreciate that you are seeing inconsistent behaviour within Affinity when pasting, but as I understand it the Affinity app itself does not specifically interpret this data in different ways - and there is no feature within Affinity to optically 'read' drawn content on your clipboard and paste this as text - this is either controlled by Goodnotes or iPadOS, and not the Affinity app directly.

Have you tried using a Pasteboard Inspector / Viewer app on iPadOS, to see what Goodnotes is directly copying to your Pasteboard as recommend above? I have not personally used these on iPadOS, however from a quick search there appears to be many free apps that can achieve this for you, and might indicate a reason for the results you're seeing when pasting in Affinity

[AvdA]

Thanks @Dan C - I hope you are feeling better!

1 hour ago, Dan C said:

the Affinity app itself does not specifically interpret this data in different ways - and there is no feature within Affinity to optically 'read' drawn content on your clipboard and paste this as text

It seems to me as though perhaps it should explicity manage these options then?

I will look into the Goodnotes and iOS settings you mentioned however if I am in Affinity and I paste and get one behaviour and then I paste again and get a different behaviour without even leaving the app and certainly without changing anything in the clipboard or any settings in any other app, then logically it seems that Affinity, even if unintentionally, is collecting something different sometimes or dealing with it differently sometimes for some reason.

It doesn't seem to be controlled by the way I copied in Goodnotes, or the settings when I copied, because the very same identical content is being pasted two different ways in Affinity. If it always pasted one way (from one piece of content ) and always another way (from a different piece of content) then it might feel as though I could control it elsewhere. That isn't the case though. It is the same content pasting two ways.

Anyway, I will try downloading a clipboard viewer - that will be interesting to see - maybe it will shed some light 🔦

I'll let you know what I find.

Take care.

[AvdA]

Ok, so the options for selection in Goodnotes are about whether you only get your handwriting (which just means the lines you've drawn) or whether this also includes images that you have pasted in, and equations that it has identified, or boxes. I thought you might be on to something for a minute @Dan C because it seemed to paste the image when I only had handwriting and it seemed to convert to text when I had the equation on as well. Until it didn't. Then it did the opposite. It is not dependent on this setting.

I also tried turning off scribble in iOS. Again this seemed promising however pretty soon I saw both types of content pasted. So I have turned scribble back on. This is not controlling the output.

I was unable to find a clipboard inspector. I did find an app to simply manage your clipboard however that didn't seem to provide any insight.

Guess I'll just have to cross my fingers before I paste 🤞

It still seems logical to me that if I am in Affinity and I paste and get one behaviour and then I paste again and get a different behaviour without even leaving the app or changing anything in the clipboard or any settings in any other app, then Affinity, even if unintentionally, could be collecting something different sometimes or dealing with it differently sometimes somehow.

Anyway I appreciate your input and taking the time to come up with some things to try.