Publisher — Missing Assets and Char/Paragraph Style on Opening Files from V1.10

[mirabeau]

I was sorry to see these important details absent when opening up files in a newly installed v2.5 on a new machine. This includes templates as well as actual . Yes I can reconstruct them from the content of earlier files. But I'm surprised that I'd have to do this.

[thomaso]

Assets in the Asset Panel are stored in the application user preference folder, not with Affinity documents, unless you check the option to "Embed in current document" and save the document. Then you get asked when re-opening this document to install the assets from the document in the Asset panel.

Used text styles of the Text Style Panel are saved with their document and should also be available when a document is opened on another computer. – What text styles are you missing, custom created or default styles of the application?

If you install Affinity v.2.x on a computer that has v1.x installed you get offered to migrate some user preference content to make it available in the new app version. If you didn't use the option yet but still have v.1 installed you may try the option in the app reset dialog. To display this dialog launch your app with the CTRL key pressed.

[mirabeau]

Thanks, Tomaso. This is all good to know.

When I try Assets>Preferences>Import, it hands me a directory as if I know where to find these assets.
When I ShowAssets>Preferences, I don't see anything like your screen shot. This is what I see:

:

Also, this is happening on a new machine on which the version was installed, without previous versions. The earlier files has been brought over from the another machine.

[thomaso]

On 8/8/2024 at 5:11 AM, mirabeau said:

When I try Assets>Preferences>Import, it hands me a directory as if I know where to find these assets.
When I ShowAssets>Preferences

There might be misunderstandings:

• Via the Asset Panel's menus you can't import the Affinity asset system file. This file is always named "assets.propcol" and stores all content of your Asset Panel (each category, each asset). It is located in your operating system's user folder (see below). There is one "assets.propcol" file per Affinity application and user folder, regardless of the number of Asset Categories or assets.
• Assets don't have preferences (they rather are preferences, see above). (… I don't know what you mean by "Asset>Preferences" and "ShowAsset>Preferences".
• Your screenshot looks like an Affinity application preference menu, it is / has nothing like Affinity assets).

Other than an "<name>.propcol" file, you can import "<name>.afasset" files. They are files that have been named & exported before via the Asset Panel by yourself or another user, on your or another computer, for instance to make assets available on another computer or to other users. – As far I understand, this way is exactly what you want to avoid for restoring your assets in the Asset Panel from a previous app version, right?

On 8/8/2024 at 5:11 AM, mirabeau said:

I don't see anything like your screen shot.

As mentioned, you get the window titled "Clear User Data" this way:

On 8/8/2024 at 4:45 AM, thomaso said:

To display this dialog launch your app with the CTRL key pressed.

Alternatively to this migration option you could try to manually copy/move your "asset.propcol" of Affinity v.1 from the older to the newer computer and replace the default "asset.propcol" file in your user folder of Affinity v.2. – This post may shed some light where to find the related folder(s) on various computers, platforms etc., (note, other than in V1 in V2 the Assets may (or must ?) be stored in a shared location).

For V1 the location may vary, unfortunately I can't find the according Serif info thread at the moment. To me on an older macOS and with app purchase from the Serif Store the folder/file path is this for instance.

~/Library/Application Support/Affinity Publisher/user/assets.propcol

[walt.farrell]

2 hours ago, thomaso said:

Assets don't have preferences (they rather are preferences, see above). (… I don't know what you mean by "Asset>Preferences" and "ShowAsset>Preferences".

The 3-bar icon for each studio panel is that panel's Preferences.

E.g., from the Assets Panel Help in Publisher:

Quote

Importing and exporting assets

Assets can be exported to and imported from external files (add-ons) via the Panel Preferences menu. For more information on add-ons, see the About add-ons topic.

 

[thomaso]

40 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

The 3-bar icon for each studio panel is that panel's Preferences.

Ah, correct, thanks for this info! – I never noticed that Affinity menus are called "Preferences" but rather expected & experienced vice versa "Preferences" as a possible menu item itself, especially with menu commands like "Rename", "Delete", "Create"…

Interestingly a level below this icon leads to an "options menu":

Quote

The following options are available from subcategory options menus:

• Rename—allows you to rename the subcategory.
• Delete—removes the subcategory (and all its assets) from the panel.

However, indeed nearly each of this icons lead to "Preferences" in the Help, so it's obviously on purpose. While we also have this:

[walt.farrell]

8 minutes ago, thomaso said:

While we also have this:

In V2 that's Settings, depending on your release of macOS. 

[thomaso]

 

[MikeTO]

Affinity uses the term "panel preferences menu" because these menus used to do nothing more than modify the panels. The name is still used even though the menus in newer panels such as Books include action commands. IMO they should be renamed. I refer to them simply as panel menus in my manual to avoid confusion.

The term Preferences was introduced with the original Mac but Microsoft used the term Settings in Windows and Settings proved more popular. Apple adopted Settings for the iPhone and recently switched macOS to Settings. All Mac apps, including Affinity, now use Settings instead of Preferences.

[walt.farrell]

48 minutes ago, MikeTO said:

All Mac apps, including Affinity, now use Settings instead of Preferences

I think it's conditional for the Affinity apps on macOS, based on the macOS release. For older macOS releases I think it stays as Preferences.

[MikeTO]

6 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

I think it's conditional for the Affinity apps on macOS, based on the macOS release. For older macOS releases I think it stays as Preferences.

That's right, Affinity adds the command but macOS supplies the name for it. Monterey and earlier still use Preferences.

[thomaso]

1 hour ago, MikeTO said:

Affinity uses the term "panel preferences menu" because these menus used to do nothing more than modify the panels

Thanks. Oddly, I never noticed before "preferences menu" as the name for this UI item. In the forum it was, imho, mostly called "burger / hamburger menu" (or words referring to the icon's bars or to the top right position), accordingly we use in the forum the "cog menu" of the Find&Replace panel. By the way, “burger menu” is a fairly common term in web design (and I wonder if there is a more formal, official term; the W3C seems not to name specific menus).

However, I'll try to use the Affinity term "preference menu".

[mirabeau]

Many thanks to all… A lot to digest. I found a single assets.propcol, but can't get to it because the "Library" is a hidden folder (~/Library). The "Import Assets" directory refuses the full address (from the referred earlier post, "~/Library/Preferences/com.seriflabs.affinitypublisher2.plist"), nor "~Library", nor anything partway down that path.

Will futz around later this afternoon and will back with more questions as needed. Again, my thanks to everyone responding.

[walt.farrell]

24 minutes ago, mirabeau said:

The "Import Assets"

You can't use Import Assets. You will need to physically copy that file to the proper location for V2, replacing the same-named file you will find there.

Or you will need to Export .assets fonts from your V1 application to Import into V2.

[Old Bruce]

38 minutes ago, mirabeau said:

found a single assets.propcol, but can't get to it because the "Library" is a hidden folder (~/Library).

To show the ~/Library you'll need to open a Finder window, File > New Finder Window. Then go to View > View Options and then check the  Show Library Folder box.

[thomaso]

1 hour ago, mirabeau said:

I found a single assets.propcol, but can't get to it because the "Library" is a hidden folder (~/Library).

Your screenshot seems to inform that the file "assets.propcol" is currently selected in this Finder window. This is the file you apparently want to replace by the according "assets.propcol" file of Affinity V1 on your old computer.

2 hours ago, mirabeau said:

The "Import Assets" directory refuses the full address (from the referred earlier post, "~/Library/Preferences/com.seriflabs.affinitypublisher2.plist"), nor "~Library", nor anything partway down that path.

As mentioned already, you can not import a .propcol file. – The import menu is meant for assets that you have exported before. If you haven't them exported you don't have an according file to import them via the import command.

Apart from the "import" confusion: The file path you quoted is not the one to the assets.propcol file (that you want for restoring your assets) but it is a path to a .plist file which stores app settings only, not any app content.

To avoid issues done with system files in this procedure of finding and copying the assets.propcol, perhaps, if still have V1 installed, you better export the assets from the Asset Panel in Affinity V1 on your old computer and import them in Affinity V2 on your new computer. It may be cumbersome but it is less risky.