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Affinity Publisher Equation Maker?


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I've used Affinity Designer to make lab reports for a couple years now, but always had two main issues (equation writing and having to import screenshots of tables). While you can imagine my joy at Publisher fixing the latter problem, I still think having an equation maker would be a huge step forward and a massive leg up over InDesign. Think of all the boring-looking papers being cranked out right now that could be so much better if only they were made in AP. Hell, maybe it can even tempt the LaTeX faithful...?

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My gut feeling is that it wont happen. At least not for several years. Also - the lack of a plug-in architecture in Affinity apps makes it virtually impossible for third part vendors to add value to the Affinity line with plugins - like the suggestions here - so it has to come from Serif:

Fortunately LaTeX is a fine free, deeply specialized platform independent companion for any program that can import PDF/EPS figures. If you can figure out how to layout your figures. Or am I wrong? 

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@Wafer  I can import an equation to AP as a non-editable vector, but there's no wrap setting for doing this without manually adjusting line separation:

 

texttexttexttexttexttexttexttexttext

texttexttexttexttexttexttexttexttext

                    [EQUA]

texttexttext [TION] texttexttexttext

texttexttexttexttexttexttexttexttext

 

Besides, whenever I do try any wrap of an imported equation the entire program crashes. I'll make a post about it on the bug forum.

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48 minutes ago, Lurien said:

@Wafer  I can import an equation to AP as a non-editable vector, but there's no wrap setting for doing this without manually adjusting line separation:

 

texttexttexttexttexttexttexttexttext

texttexttexttexttexttexttexttexttext

                    [EQUA]

texttexttext [TION] texttexttexttext

texttexttexttexttexttexttexttexttext

 

Besides, whenever I do try any wrap of an imported equation the entire program crashes. I'll make a post about it on the bug forum.

I am not @Wafer,

but I hope I can help to point you to the wrap settings:
Look for 'page over lines' icon in the toolbar when the imported file is selected (see screenshot).

1548852545_TextWrap.thumb.png.e330fc95f03ec2bacf7bc96d4ac8e71f.png

 

There are different options. 'Jump' should work for you.

d.

Affinity Designer 1 & 2   |   Affinity Photo 1 & 2   |   Affinity Publisher 1 & 2
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4 minutes ago, Lurien said:

@dominik  Hello! Jump does not allow the picture and text to exist on the same line, and in this case I only want one line to be sharing the horizontal space with the image (so square/tight/whatever doesn't work either). See attached for what I'd like as a wrap mode.

likethis.png

Hi @Lurien,

now I understand. Yes, you are right, this is not possible at the moment. I think anchored images will bring this functionality.

d.

Affinity Designer 1 & 2   |   Affinity Photo 1 & 2   |   Affinity Publisher 1 & 2
Affinity Designer 2 for iPad   |   Affinity Photo 2 for iPad   |   Affinity Publisher 2 for iPad

Windows 11 64-bit - Core i7 - 16GB - Intel HD Graphics 4600 & NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M
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9 hours ago, Lurien said:

@dominik  We can only hope for inline anchoring...

Hi @Lurien,

I do more than hope, I am confident that is coming. It is just not clear when :)

d.

Affinity Designer 1 & 2   |   Affinity Photo 1 & 2   |   Affinity Publisher 1 & 2
Affinity Designer 2 for iPad   |   Affinity Photo 2 for iPad   |   Affinity Publisher 2 for iPad

Windows 11 64-bit - Core i7 - 16GB - Intel HD Graphics 4600 & NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M
iPad pro 9.7" + Apple Pencil

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  • 1 year later...

Hey @Lurien,

I have the same problem since I work with Affinity Designer/ Publisher. An embedded equation maker would be great and may be a unique selling point. 

Until then I will use this workaround:

I use this LaTex equation editor (https://www.codecogs.com/latex/eqneditor.php) and export the equations as SVG files. You can then simply import the equation as a vector object.

Equation-Import.gif.3d49998c9dbdc688089c80516d98ccc4.gif

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I'd like to add a voice to the request for equation support, as almost every technical document I prepare has at least a few equations, and some documents are very heavy in equations.

I'd be willing to live without an interactive equation builder if AffPub allowed me to place MathML files in a frame, with proper formatting of the MathML content, of course, not just dumping the raw text into the frame.  MathML is a mature open format, and there are lots of tools to work with it (which is why it's not essential to have equation builder support inside AffPub).  MathML 3 support would be nice, but MathML 2 would be sufficient for what I work on.

There should be the same sort of link/embed/refresh options for placing MathML as for placing text or images.

It would be nice to have equations and text flow "inline" within a single frame (or sequence of linked frames), but I could get my work done with separate equation and text frames, especially if the equation frames (like image frames) offered the standard text wrap settings when placed over a text frame. [Added in edit] And, of course, it should be possible to pin an equation frame to a text location so that it will follow the text flow, just as image frames can.

Edited by sfriedberg
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  • 2 months later...
  • 1 month later...

Apple has informed me that they are dropping support for iBook Author soon and advising authors to switch to pages. Both iBook Author and pages have a small LATex type drop down editor available which I use extensively (option-command-E). Something along those lines would be greatly appreciated in Affinity Design and Publisher.

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