Affinity Publisher: Stroke/Fill options on Text Frame grayed out

[Mr. B]

I'm trying to add a stroke to a text frame but the option to do so in the text frame window is grayed out (as is fill.) What do I need to do to enable strokes and fills on a text frame?

[Old Bruce]

Your screenshot shows that you have selected a Group, not a Frame Text text frame. Hit the little arrow on the left to expand the Group and then you can select the text frame.

9 minutes ago, Mr. B said:

I'm trying to add a stroke to a text frame but the option to do so in the text frame window is grayed out

 

[Old Bruce]

I forgot my (hopefully) helpful screenshot

[Mr. B]

Ah, got it. Thanks Old Bruce. Curious if it's possible to apply a stroke to a group? It looks as though only effects can be applied, which apply to everything within the group.

[Mr. B]

Or, alternately, is there a way to get a Shape Text layer to automatically expand/shrink to fit the parent group size?

[MikeTO]

2 hours ago, Mr. B said:

Ah, got it. Thanks Old Bruce. Curious if it's possible to apply a stroke to a group? It looks as though only effects can be applied, which apply to everything within the group.

You can add a stroke to all of the objects in a group but not to the group itself. Think of a group as an invisible container.

If you want to add a stroke to the group, just draw and stroke a rectangle with the same x/y/w/h as the group, and add it at the top of the group.

2 hours ago, Mr. B said:

Or, alternately, is there a way to get a Shape Text layer to automatically expand/shrink to fit the parent group size?

I'm not sure what you want to do here, but you can double-click a shape text frame's size handles to reduce its width and/or height to exactly contain its text.

[Mr. B]

I was trying to make a template/component of sorts that has both header and body text layers as well as optional icons that can be visible or not. The body layer can vary in size, so I was hoping that I could do away with a separate text box layer and just have the overall stroke for the group expand or contract as needed depending on how long the text inside the group is. I can make do with expanding the text box layer manually though.