Brushes Palette icons?

[Laura Ess]

I noticed these just now and don't know what they mean.

Some Brush Categories have a chain/link icon next to their names, and others don't (see image below). I was trying to figure out the meaning of these. At first I thought it might mean that they're "locked" somehow but that doesn't seem to be the case. The Artefix brushes I bought and imported don't have the symbol, but the TESTING Only category that I created to play around with copies of brushes has?

What does this mean?

 

[Ron P.]

The Chain Link icons mean those brushes are linked between the Affinity applications. The icons looking like a Shopping Bag indicate purchase from the Serif/Affinity Store.

[markw]

In addition to what Ron has said, to Link a category so that it is present in all three Affinity apps; select the un-linked category, click on the hamburger menu icon top right in the Brushes panel and select Link Category.

[walt.farrell]

Also, the Help: https://affinity.help/photo2/en-US.lproj/pages/Addons/linkingContent.html

[Laura Ess]

Ah, a reference! Great, because I can pass this on to others. 🙂

[keiichi77]

On 5/1/2024 at 9:32 AM, Ron P. said:

The icons looking like a Shopping Bag indicate purchase from the Serif/Affinity Store.

... and it means that I cannot even change the smallest unimportant settings of these brushes because the edit command is greyed out, what makes all my purchased brushes totally unusable, unless I start to copy brushes one by one to another unlocked category. stupid stupid stupid thing. it is unbearably stupid stuuupid.
 

[walt.farrell]

15 minutes ago, keiichi77 said:

... and it means that I cannot even change the smallest unimportant settings of these brushes because the edit command is greyed out, what makes all my purchased brushes totally unusable, unless I start to copy brushes one by one to another unlocked category. stupid stupid stupid thing. it is unbearably stupid stuuupid.
 

You can change a brush while you're using it, using the More button in the Context Toolbar.

Or, you could uninstall that set of brushes completely, and instead of downloading it via the Account dialog you can download them manually from your account at https://affinity.store/account/downloads and then manually import them into the application(s). Then they are no longer "Store" content, and you can change them however you want.

The difficulty if you've downloaded/installed via Account is that it would become impossible to refresh them if the version at the Store is updated. So some functions are prevented unless you do a manual download/install of the brush pack.

[keiichi77]

28 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

You can change a brush while you're using it, using the More button in the Context Toolbar.

Yes but it reverts back instantly after.
Thank you for the workaround tips! 😊 Now I'm going to reinstall every brushpacks manually.

[walt.farrell]

1 hour ago, keiichi77 said:

but it reverts back instantly after.

No, not instantly. Only after you switch to a different Brush. As long as you stay using that Brush it will maintain your changes and you can use them in painting.

Also, you can click the Save As button, but (unfortunately) that will save it into the same locked Brush category it came from, which is not completely useful. You should Copy the Brush to a new category first, which is only useful for changing a few brushes, as you mentioned.

Manual installation sounds like it may be best for you