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Merge 2 Publisher documents?


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How can I insert pages from one AfPub document into another? I created two separate documents (long story), and now, other than copying and pasting for 50 pages, cannot see how to either merge or insert or even group copy and paste many pages. 

Am I missing something obvious?

 thanks.

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Hi! When you say "mark", do you mean right-click-copy? Or select all-copy? <-- i've tried both but i am able to do a simple copy of text boxes / shapes from one page to another.

Note: on the pages in question, I have a master applied and then multiple text boxes. I can copy/paste from one page to another page. I then have to recreate the master pages in the new document, but I guess that's okay. (I'd like to be able to export the masters but havent figured that out yet!)

Ideally, I'd like to take several pages, copy the page and insert it into another document (so i dont have to create all new pages and then go 1:1 with the copying and pasting.)

For now, I am PDF'ing both documents and then using IlovePDF to merge them! Not ideal, but possible...

 

Does this make sense? THANKS for your reply and trying to help me figure this out.

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@Wim Daniels Yes this is what I've been doing, but I (of course) want more... Some ability to move pages, whether through a copy/paste, import or anything really - even if it is just importing masters... I also wanted to be sure that I'm not missing something obvious and making more work for myself!! Thanks for confirming that my workaround is necessary.

PS this is an amazing product. I am so grateful for the speed I'm working at right now, compared to what I'd be doing otherwise!

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  • 2 months later...

Nope, as far as I can see there is currently no option to actually import pages from another document.

You can just copy the contents, but not the page itself.

I want to create a photobook and I have two different PSD templates I want to merge together: the cover and normal sites.

Both documents have different sizes and their own guide lines.

It's currently just not possible. Is it?

Windows 10 Pro x64 (1903). Intel Core i7-9700K @ 3.60GHz, 32 GB memory, NVidia RTX 2080
Affinity Photo 1.7.2.471, Affinity Designer 1.7.2.471, Affinity Publisher 1.7.2.471

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  • 7 months later...
On 7/27/2019 at 7:46 PM, dweekley said:

Being able to import one publisher file into another or merge them in some way would be really helpful for my work also. 

A workaround and compromise instead of copy/paste content page by page:

Use File > Place... or the Place Image Tool to import an .afpub into an .afpub and place it as a linked resource. In the context toolbar you can choose what page/spread is shown. On double-click it is editable in a separate document window.

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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20 hours ago, thomaso said:

Use File > Place... or the Place Image Tool to import an .afpub into an .afpub and place it as a linked resource

The major limitation being that this too needs to be repeated for each page.  For an occasional merge of a very small document that might be ok...  If trying to merge a dozen 50-page documents, this won't be a particularly sensible use of someone's time.  I can see why lack of this feature would be a showstopper for some users to start making use of Publisher for some workflows.

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@ fde101, I am aware of this; that's why I added "compromise" to "workaround". – Of cause the feature request does make sense.

My post was just a little shortcut to stay in one document once you got placed an afpub and to select specific pages from the pull-down menu for copies of the 1 placed object. But even this does not really work, as I just realized:

Even with a simple 8 page .afpub with 1 text frame on each page my choice in the pulldown menu seems not to work, or just occasionally only:
In this sample I start with page 8 and then I try to choose other spreads of the placed afpub:

870267747_placedafpubpageselection0.jpg.2aff25c326f6125331c8fb554ac4de81.jpg  >>>   1995130294_placedafpubpageselection1.jpg.5b684e9f6da5d4a419e2f5a126b96ede.jpg >>> 837747085_placedafpubpageselection3.jpg.ccfa894274f6d08687d97e3a91a04559.jpg


So, actually this "not actualizing" is a bug – and hopefully makes the need more obvious for a better UI to merge documents.

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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  • 2 months later...

I have just discovered this problem, and it really matters to me. I edit a 48 page magazine that has contributions from various authors of 6 to 8 pages each, that I capture individually so I can send individual proofs to each author, and also decide on the order to assemble them in the final document later.

I have been using PagePlus very effectively to do this for a number of years, and use the insert > publication method simply to append one document after another. I am surprised and shocked that Publisher does not do this or something even better. I originally used MS Publisher but ditched that as soon as I could because it could not do anything similar, even with a third party tool.

Does Affinity have any plans to include this facility in due course?

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  • Staff

@microjez

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums :)

To all readers of this thread,

The ability to insert a number of pages of one publisher document into another publisher document is being worked on actively at the moment, and will appear in a beta when it is ready for customer beta appraisal. It requires quite a lot of programming to achieve what would be desired with respect to text styles, master pages, index links, text flow etc, as you have seen from the participants of this and other threads.

 

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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8 hours ago, Patrick Connor said:

with respect to text styles, master pages, index links, text flow etc,

This "etc." sounds exciting, like color swatches being transferred, too. That also, possibly, might mean even a simple copy/paste of an object between documents will transfer its swatch, too.  9_9

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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  • Staff

That's a little bit like "etc" meaning every other feature ever requested xD.

As I'm not a developer I added "etc" to cover things I wasn't aware of behind the scenes, not to cover all related things.

I'm sure once this is in beta that improvements can be requested.

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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  • 2 months later...

Has any progress been made with this document merge facility since my original post from October? I desperately need the ability to do this (which was possible in PagePlus) to avoid the need to make a load of pdfs of individual articles and join them together in Acrobat (having fudged the page numbering). My own requirement is simply to merge individual Publisher documents all created using the same Master Page and fonts.

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  • 1 month later...
56 minutes ago, WhiteX said:

It's time to dowload the beta then... I was quite happy with the stable releases lately, but this feature is a necessity.

Yes. I downloaded the beta a while back, and it did exactly what I needed. However, I shall not be taking full advantage of this until the beta has led to a new release - just in case!

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