Designer hangs if copying a Layer Group containing a SF Symbol

[rkh]

I am working on a mockup of a iOS App and was trying to use Apple's SF Symbols within Affinity Designer. I discovered an easily reproducible bug that causes the app to get stuck in a spinning beachball, requiring force quit. SF Symbols is a library of icons/symbols provided by Apple to developers who are creating software for their platforms and is commonly used when developing iOS software. https://developer.apple.com/sf-symbols/

• App version: Designer 2.5.3, current version.
• OS: MacOS Version 14.5 (23F79)
• Can reproduce: Yes, see steps below.
• Does it happen for a new document: Yes. See below for steps.
• Hardware Acceleration: On. Crash also happens if it is off.
• Unusual hardware: This is a MacBook Pro attached to two external displays.
• Did this used to work before?: I have never tried to work with SF Symbols in Designer before.

Steps to reproduce

1. Create a new document.
2. Open the SF Symbols app and select a symbol (I used figure.indoor.cycle). Copy it (cmd C)
3. In Designer, create a text object and paste the symbol into the text (cmd V)
4. In the Layers panel, select the text that you created and add it to a group (cmd G)
5. Select the group that you just created and copy it (cmd C).

The app will now hang, requiring you to force quit the app.

I have attached a demo deign file and a video of the process culminating in a hang. I notice that the video doesn't show a beachball cursor for some reason, but the beachball appeared when performing the actions and I could only force quit the app.

bug demo.afdesign

Edited July 30, 2024 by rkh
added clarification that the video doesn't show a beachball, but in person a beachball appeared.

[kenmcd]

Your demo doc shows the font being used is SF Pro.
There have been a number of posts regarding long wait times for this font.

The SF Symbols apps have the font files incorporated in the app.
So that may be causing a hang-up if Affinity is trying to access it.

Do you have the SF Developer fonts installed?
(from the Apple developer site)
Last time I checked SF Pro was at v19.

Which version of the SF Symbols app? 5 or 6.
The app version 5 has the SF Pro v19, and version 6 has SF Pro v20.
SF Pro v20 has more glyphs.
But your demo glyph (U+10130A) is in both so it should not matter.

Installing the developer fonts may enable Affinity to find the font, and not hang.
Or it may cause some font name conflicts.
(but I doubt this because Affinity most likely cannot see the fonts in the app).

Obviously Affinity is going to have to test this.
But try installing the developer fonts directly and see what happens.

[NathanC]

Welcome to the forums @rkh,

I can't reproduce the app hang at the group copy step, however I can reproduce the app hang upon closing the document and attempting to quit the app, so i'll log this with the developers for further investigation. This was using SF symbols 5.1 with the latest the SF pro developer font installed.

[kenmcd]

4 hours ago, NathanC said:

This was using SF symbols 5.1 with the latest the SF pro developer font installed.

If you do not have the SF Pro developer font installed separately, what happens?
My guess was the hang was caused by Affinity trying to access the font where it expects it to be as an installed font.

[NathanC]

12 hours ago, kenmcd said:

If you do not have the SF Pro developer font installed separately, what happens?

The SF Symbols app simply won't let me copy the symbol and redirects me to the Apple Developer font downloads page.

[kenmcd]

11 hours ago, NathanC said:

The SF Symbols app simply won't let me copy the symbol and redirects me to the Apple Developer font downloads page.

For some reason I assumed the fonts were being used within the SF Symbols app.
Dunno what I was thinking (maybe like some music apps do).
But it sounds like the app actually installs the fonts in the normal way.
So my guess about the hang would be incorrect.