Document files won't open!!! Please help

[chinamarie06]

My document files that are saved using Affinity Designer will not open when I click on them from the desktop of my mac, or in a folder. I am able to open the program itself, but when clicking on a saved document when the program is open, this message appears saying that a retail version of the program is required in order to use the file....I already have a retail version purchased. Would I need to download a beta version of Affinity Designer too? Please help me with this issue. I don't understand why this is happening. 

[R C-R]

From your screenshot, it appears you already have a beta version installed, that being "1.6.1 (RC1)" for release candidate 1. Apparently that beta is trying to open your file, thus the warning.

So try this: right click on one of your Affinity Designer documents in Finder & check the "Open with ..." list that pops up. If you see more than one Affinity Designer item, or just the beta version, then you need to make sure you still have the current retail version installed, find the beta version, & move it to the trash.

[Pšenda]

4 hours ago, R C-R said:

find the beta version, & move it to the trash.

Is not better to uninstall it?

But maybe Mac/Finder will do it when moving to the trash.

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, Pšenda said:

Is not better to uninstall it?

But maybe Mac/Finder will do it when moving to the trash.

As best as I can remember, there is no uninstaller for the Mac betas, so the only way to uninstall it is to drag the application to the trash. This does leave a few support files on the drive, but they are not large & do not interfere with anything.

[Pšenda]

3 hours ago, R C-R said:

do not interfere with anything

However, there are some non-functional links in the registry, for example mentioned "Open with ...".
Each installed application should go uninstall, at least at the OS level.

[gdenby]

I had to do what R C-R described. Just had to re-assign the files to the purchased version once I had moved on from the betas. Hadn't even given a thought to the dormant beta.

[R C-R]

7 minutes ago, Pšenda said:

However, there are some non-functional links in the registry, for example mentioned "Open with ...".
Each installed application should go uninstall, at least at the OS level.

There is no registry on Macs, nor any way I have found to use "Open with ..." to open any of the files left behind by just dragging the app to the trash & emptying it.

It is probably different on Windows but on a Mac everything not in the application 'package' (a folder treated as a single user facing item) is in per user Library > Containers folders, each of which begins with a "com.seriflabs." prefix, followed by a name unique to the app, including "beta" for the beta versions. Many of the items in those folders are Mac OS aliases, included to give the app access to various sandboxed Mac OS features, & are tiny. Many of the rest are 'propcol' (property collection) files that can't be opened other than by the app & user account that owns them.

The only conceivable way these files could cause any issues is if a user dug down into these Container folders & replaced the ones in the retail version's Container folder with them. Even then it probably would have no effect because the UUID's would be different so they would just be replaced with new default files, the same ones that would be created when the app is opened for the first time.

[R C-R]

18 minutes ago, gdenby said:

I had to do what R C-R described. Just had to re-assign the files to the purchased version once I had moved on from the betas. Hadn't even given a thought to the dormant beta.

In general, it is not a good idea to do that (at least not without a good backup) because there is no guarantee that all those files will work correctly with the purchased version. But as I mentioned above, any conflicting or inapplicable ones probably were overwritten anyway, so likely there is no harm done.