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Does Publisher compete with prototyping tools?


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Is Publisher going up against newish tools like Sketch and Adobe XD? In many ways those tools are layout software so it seems like similar to what Publisher would do. I have spent far less time with Publisher then I have with the other Affinity tools so it's hard for me to know how much it competes with prototyping. What I have seen so far it looks like it is more of a competitor to ID and Quark.

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I could think about Affinity writing a replacement for Balsamiq Mockups. :)

But I hope the DAM comes first. :D

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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  • 3 weeks later...

@MEB To me it seems like the most logical way to start a layout tool in 2019 (as opposed to 1999 or 1985 when prototyping tools were not really around yet) is to build prototyping in (along) with eBook support. Also modern computers have so much more resources these days that adding the additional functionality wouldn't be a problem it seems (as long as it is split into different personas so it doesn't become bloated.) I am sure if it makes sense for a company like the one which makes Sketch to only have one product instead of an entire suite of products working together.

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2 hours ago, Mark Oehlschlager said:

@MEB @KipV

I would hope that Publisher remains focused on the use case of Desktop Publishing, and that if Affinity wishes to create a Web/App UI/UX prototyping  tool, that they would either extend Affinity Designer or, better yet, create a stand-alone application dedicated to the purpose of Web/App UI/UX workflows. 

Or I wonder about having that persona in both Designer and Publisher? The weird thing about prototyping tools is that they occupy this middle ground between layout and drawing. Also worthy of pointing out Publisher will also be a drawing persona and does good and layout (which the other two products don't do all that well.) This is why it made more sense to me to work it into Publisher, but like I said putting it into both apps might be an answer as well.

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Publishing and prototyping are two very different fields though many tools are useful in both. I wish Affinity will produce either a separate prototyping application which works alongside with Designer or adds prototyping functions as plugins to Designer. Either way they would do more revenue to Affinity.

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I think for this Publisher is more suited as Designer, because for prototyping you need more than just one page.

You usually show a planed workflow trough an mocked UI. In my daywork I use Balsamiq Wireframes which also has multiple pages per mockup and exports a PDF with linked pages for an "interactive UI".

Publisher comes packed with Assets for iOS 12 prototyping so I got a strong feeling that Serif has this use case in mind.

So in this regard I don't really understand the feedback from @MEB at the beginng of the thread how Designer compares to Sketch.

 

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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15 hours ago, Fixx said:

Publishing and prototyping are two very different fields though many tools are useful in both.

In a lot of ways they are not that different.

- Both are layout tools.

- Both can have multiple page sizes (at least InDesign can.)

- Have photo and drawing tools built in.

- Rely on a third party plug-in system for to do the workflow.

15 hours ago, Fixx said:

I wish Affinity will produce either a separate prototyping application which works alongside with Designer or adds prototyping functions as plugins to Designer. Either way they would do more revenue to Affinity.

I would just wonder how an Affinity product like that would be different from the competition that is currently out there.

12 hours ago, Steps said:

Publisher comes packed with Assets for iOS 12 prototyping so I got a strong feeling that Serif has this use case in mind.

Yeah, interesting point. Like I said in other threads just remaking InDesign / Quark / Sketch / XD doesn't make a lot of sense which one of the Serif guys agreed with and said that had plans to go beyond what those products could do (this was before Publisher was released.) The question I have for the people who say "make prototyping a separate app" is how exactly is this different from what we already have today? If they can't answer that question then it is hard to justify making the software.

12 hours ago, Steps said:

So in this regard I don't really understand the feedback from @MEB at the beginning of the thread how Designer compares to Sketch. 

I think I can guess what he meant. At this point in time Designer has had several years to mature so they have been able to advance the product more in several areas including prototyping. I didn't take that as meaning that Serif would necessarily avoid adding prototyping to Publisher in the future.

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4 hours ago, KipV said:

The question I have for the people who say "make prototyping a separate app" is how exactly is this different from what we already have today?

I am really not doing much UI work nowadays but I have kinda heard using Designer to create UI elements and getting those elements to other party's prototyping tool is a hassle now. Workflow would be smoother with Affinity's own prototyper.

Possibly it would be just easier to create an export plugin for some other vendor's prototyping system.

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On 1/6/2019 at 8:16 AM, Steps said:

I think for this Publisher is more suited as Designer, because for prototyping you need more than just one page.

I thought Designer was supposed to get support for multiple pages in 1.7?

I know the current beta doesn't have that but I believe someone from the Affinity team indicated that this was going to happen in some past thread or another...  can't find it at the moment but I don't remember anything being said about that changing.

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20 minutes ago, fde101 said:

I thought Designer was supposed to get support for multiple pages in 1.7?

I know the current beta doesn't have that but I believe someone from the Affinity team indicated that this was going to happen in some past thread or another...  can't find it at the moment but I don't remember anything being said about that changing.

Ok, if we go there just enable the pages tab everywhere as we said in the other topic.

It's a strange thing anyway that Affinity is build to share a single format, but there are different file extensions.

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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2 minutes ago, Steps said:

It's a strange thing anyway that Affinity is build to share a single format, but there are different file extensions.

This is most likely to simplify determining which of the applications the document will open in if double-clicked in Windows explorer.

On the Mac it is possible for different documents with the same extension to open in different applications but I don't believe Windows has caught up on that one yet.

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3 hours ago, fde101 said:

On the Mac it is possible for different documents with the same extension to open in different applications but I don't believe Windows has caught up on that one yet.

Don't both operating systems have a "open in (app)" feature? I don't use Windows too much but it seemed like even old version of Windows had that.

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4 minutes ago, KipV said:

Don't both operating systems have a "open in (app)" feature?

Yes, recent versions of Windoze do have that, but double-clicking on a file on that platform goes strictly by its extension as far as I know.  So if a single extension was used and you created one document in Publisher and a different one in Photo, double-clicking on both of them would open them both in the same application (which may be Designer for example).

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14 minutes ago, fde101 said:

Yes, recent versions of Windoze do have that, but double-clicking on a file on that platform goes strictly by its extension as far as I know.  So if a single extension was used and you created one document in Publisher and a different one in Photo, double-clicking on both of them would open them both in the same application (which may be Designer for example).

I personally don't like the separation into three tools anyway.

I would like to install one single application that has all the capabilities and where I can license "modules" like the photo, vector or publishing modules.

In this regard I somehow feel to use the Photo Persona of Publisher I will have to install Photo even if I don't plan to use it as a single application.

If the Affinity app is in reality just one and the same and Designer, Photo and Publisher somehow just load different GUIs depeneding on an internal starting parameter baked in the EXE there should be no reason why I could not just enter a Photo license key into Publisher and activate the Photo Persona this way rather than having to install two apps.

Judging from the one file format and that you can have vector layers in Photo to as a result the separation into different apps feels artifical to me anyway.

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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3 minutes ago, Steps said:

I would like to install one single application that has all the capabilities and where I can license "modules" like the photo, vector or publishing modules.

I don't know how that could work. Their personas are subdivisions of the apps main function but if you rolled all the personas from all the apps into one it would probably take up most of a toolbar and I don't think that is the solution people are looking for. One of the great things about Affinity is that they don't have the bloat that Adobe is known for. I am very thankful for that.

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I think there is more to the separation than that.

The programs may share a common engine but the tools available are in some cases quite different and need not be included in all three apps just to make the files compatible.

I am wondering too about how unlocking the other personas will work.  I am wondering if it really is just an "unlocking" behavior or if Publisher will actually use binary code from the other apps to support those personas (use a framework/dylib/dll that is installed with Photo to provide the Photo persona for example).

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5 minutes ago, KipV said:

if you rolled all the personas from all the apps into one it would probably take up most of a toolbar

While I'm not convinced of the utility of merging these three applications, I don't think this need be the holdup.  For example, users could be allowed to pick and choose which personas to include in the toolbar, or it could be turned into a popup list selector instead of individual buttons.  Some of them might be context-sensitive, such as some of the personas from Photo only showing up when a pixel layer is selected, and having the the Photo persona would probably eliminate the need for Designer's Pixel persona, for example.

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8 minutes ago, fde101 said:

While I'm not convinced of the utility of merging these three applications, I don't think this need be the holdup.  For example, users could be allowed to pick and choose which personas to include in the toolbar, or it could be turned into a popup list selector instead of individual buttons.  Some of them might be context-sensitive, such as some of the personas from Photo only showing up when a pixel layer is selected, and having the the Photo persona would probably eliminate the need for Designer's Pixel persona, for example.

Yes. And being able to configure and save the workspace layout like Eclipse "perspective" has been asked before. So having some sort of drop down first with presets "Photo", "Vector", "DTP" (followed by custom configurations) would be a possible UX.

EDIT: And one day a "Prototype" configuration with own personas.

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 minutes ago, fde101 said:

While I'm not convinced of the utility of merging these three applications, I don't think this need be the holdup.  For example, users could be allowed to pick and choose which personas to include in the toolbar, or it could be turned into a popup list selector instead of individual buttons.  Some of them might be context-sensitive, such as some of the personas from Photo only showing up when a pixel layer is selected, and having the the Photo persona would probably eliminate the need for Designer's Pixel persona, for example.

I think Affinity's ability to pass a file back and forth between apps is adequate. I don't recall having any hardship with passing a file back and forth.

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2 minutes ago, KipV said:

I think Affinity's ability to pass a file back and forth between apps is adequate. I don't recall having any hardship with passing a file back and forth.

As said in another topic passing files between the apps is just not enough and highly annoying.

I don't like this "Edit in Photo..." thing right now and I understand it as workaround until the true solution "Photo Persona" is ready.

Passing files back and forth is way under Affinitys potential.

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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