Zoom amount?

[Jeremy Bohn]

I did a search and I'm not seeing this... where can I see what my current zoom level is at? Other design apps have it in the bottom left corner of the window. Also sometimes I'd like to be able to type in a specific zoom amount.

[ivbera]

Next to the document title in the tab or navigator panel.

[Jeremy Bohn]

Thanks. You know, I've seen it before. Why I couldn't find it when I actually needed it... I don't know. Anyway, you can't type in an amount manually so I'd like to see them add it. There's room at the bottom of the window to do it like other apps. Might as well.

[ivbera]

You can type it in the navigator panel, but I would also prefer an input and display somewhere in the context menu, since I dont use the navigator panel that often.

I imagine the pages panel and navigator panel combined.

[walt.farrell]

Both the Pan Tool (Hand) and the Zoom Tool display the zoom amount in the Context Toolbar, and it's a typable field.

 

2 hours ago, Jeremy Bohn said:

Why I couldn't find it when I actually needed it... I don't know.

It's only there in some cases (see above for 2 of them).

[EJD1]

It would be so very much easier if the zoom level were simply in the toolbar at the top, so just a glance will tell you what % you're at & adjustments are within the working page. Just the extra time to change tools & change them back again when you're working, or finding the proper panel is very time consuming. Especially if you use your center button to scroll up & down rather than zoom in or out. Please consider this for the final version.

Thanks!

[Fixx]

I think it is enough to have it in window bar.

[EJD1]

The window bar serves as gravy, not potatoes. Sure, it's nice in those odd times I'm just curious about the zoom %.

However, we're talking tool here, not info.

If I could change the zoom on the fly in the window, it would be usable. But since I can't, it's not.

When working on a piece, I need to zoom tightly for a character or few words, then right back out again. Is the ability buried in the works there somewhere? Sure. But it sure ain't quick. We still need a constant, context-free icon in the toolbar for speedy zoom changes as we're working, not having to remember which of the many tools, panels & boxes we need to stop, figure out or remember & find just for a quick zoom change, in & out.

[Aammppaa]

There are many default keyboard shortcuts for zooming.

Here are a few I use…

Ctrl + 1 (2, 3, 4) <- 100%, 200%, 400% and 800% respectively.

Ctrl + 0 <- Zoom to fit (shows the whole page / artboard)

Alt + Shift + 0 <- Zoom to width (of page / artboard)

Ctrl + Alt + 0 <- Zoom to selection (though this only zooms to the selected object, not selected letters / nodes)

 

You can of course customise them (Preferences > Keyboard Shortcuts > View).

Also consider using the mouse wheel to zoom - very quick.

 

[EJD1]

Thanks, Aammppaa. Yep, I finally figured out all that.

I'm not so much asking the group for a workaround, as I am asking the Affinity programmers to make a change here BEFORE this goes live in a few wks.

While that kind of zoom selection works well on photos & images, for text it's much too clunky to deal with.

I'm often going between 50 - 75 - 100 - 125 - 150 - 300 for various documents at various points, to solve various problems / challenges. Especially for comparing multiple documents, to make sure they're at the same magnification, to facilitate comparison or for moving easily between them. Adobe allows this, Word allows it. Pages allows this. I'm even trying to remember back to my old Quark days, I believe they had this option as well.

Even if it were there were in the Toolbar for the Text Tool, life would be considerably easier. Trust me.

At the very least, I see no reason for not offering a Zoom Icon in the Customize Toolbar option in the View Menu. Then, you & I could each customize it to our needs...

Thanks!

[walt.farrell]

22 minutes ago, EJD1 said:

I'm not so much asking the group for a workaround, as I am asking the Affinity programmers to make a change here BEFORE this goes live in a few wks.

Unlikely, as the method of operation is common between Photo, Designer, and Publisher. A change like that would affect the capabilities and operation of all 3, and probably would come in a later common release (1.7.1, 1.8, etc.).

[EJD1]

Walt, please do not take offense, but I am not looking to debate this topic or discuss it, I am attempting to make a direct request of the Affinity Publisher Beta Team. If THIS IS NOT THE PROPER PLACE, WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE POINT ME TO IT? Thanks!

I tried searching all over the Affinity site & couldn't find a direct Beta app response link / space. This is the closest I've found. If I AM in the wrong place, would sincerely appreciate the assist to the proper spot.

Thanks, all!

 

[walt.farrell]

2 hours ago, EJD1 said:

Walt, please do not take offense, but I am not looking to debate this topic or discuss it, I am attempting to make a direct request of the Affinity Publisher Beta Team. If THIS IS NOT THE PROPER PLACE, WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE POINT ME TO IT? Thanks!

I tried searching all over the Affinity site & couldn't find a direct Beta app response link / space. This is the closest I've found. If I AM in the wrong place, would sincerely appreciate the assist to the proper spot.

Thanks, all!

 

I do not take offense. It is perfectly fine for you to ask for something. I was merely pointing out that (in my view and opinion) it is unlikely you will get what you asked for in the timeframe you asked for it.

You're in the right place. But I will point out that Serif usually does not comment on suggestions. They read them, and factor them into their planning.

I simply doubt that even if they like your idea they will do it in the next 11 days. But if they do like it, it is likely to appear in some future release.

[EJD1]

Thanks, Walt. That's much of the information I was seeking. Much appreciated.

Some apps in beta have a designated location just for the testing process comments, which I do not see with the Affinity site here. From what you've said, and what I've seen on other threads here, Affinity's are just woven into general group discussion of the beta. Nothing wrong w/ that; it just wasn't clear.

Also, I then saw some commenters marked as Moderators (or official spokespeople of some sort) answering some posts on some topics but not others. So it was confusing as to whether these boards were being looked at.

As per the chance of their fixing the placing of the zoom capability in the main toolbar, the Text Tool toolbar or the footer of the open document so that it's readily available while you're working IN the document w/o wasting time jumping to some other placement in the app -- it's the beta period still, so all things are up for grabs. And this item is as important to me as other items on the boards, like InDesign import/export, etc., are to other users. Plus, I've long since stopped assuming which code changes are simple, quick fixes and which are complex & tedious, as I've ended up on the wrong side of both assumptions too many times.

If it's not yet released, it's still open for improvement. One safe assumption is that the Affinity folks will be tinkering with something or other, right up to the very moment they hit Submit on the release announcement.

So I put this need out there for their consideration, asking that it be added either in the remaining release time here, or for one of the initial updates.

Thanks!

[fde101]

8 hours ago, EJD1 said:

One safe assumption is that the Affinity folks will be tinkering with something or other, right up to the very moment they hit Submit on the release announcement.

Hopefully they are fixing as many bugs as possible, rather than trying to add lots of new things at the last minute.  If you look at the numerous reports of problems in the non-beta bugs forums that popped up after Photo and Designer 1.7 were released last week, combined with how many moderators were logged into the forum this afternoon, and the multi-day backlog their support team (email) is trying to catch up with, I would estimate they are scrambling right now to get those things fixed, and rightly so - fixing existing bugs should always have priority over adding new features (which often means new bugs also).

So far, the Affinity main toolbar has consisted exclusively of buttons, not of editable fields or other controls.  On the Mac, it is possible to add such controls, not sure what they have to deal with on the Windows side.  I would not be opposed to having that option there, but it would break with what they have done in the user interface so far.  Adding zoom level to the context toolbar seems a bit arbitrary, not sure I like that idea quite as much...  but the main toolbar makes sense (again, as an option) if they can handle that reasonably, and the status/help bar along the bottom of the document window seems like a good fit as well - plenty of other apps place such controls there.

Pages provides a popup menu on the main toolbar but only offers a limited set of zoom levels to select from:

 

Nisus Writer Pro puts a popup menu on its status bar, and offers an "Other..." option that pops up a box to enter a custom level:

 

Mellel does basically the same:

 

Scribus has a directly editable field immediately below the main document view:

 

QuarkXPress has a directly editable field on the status bar:

 

Swift Publisher and PrintWorks both place a popup menu on a bar just under the main toolbar, with a limited selection of choices (that bar also handles page navigation, etc.):

 

What these all have in common is that they are consistently accessible.

[thomaso]

... not to forget the missing ability to save a specific zoom factor which can be necessary when working with two monitors to make 100 % be really 100 %.

[ivbera]

@thomaso You can save zoom-factors in the navigator-panel. You have to check the advanced settings in this panel. Unfortunately it is saved in the document and not globally.

[thomaso]

2 hours ago, ivbera said:

@thomaso You can save zoom-factors in the navigator-panel. You have to check the advanced settings in this panel. Unfortunately it is saved in the document and not globally.

Advanced setting? Have you tried? To me it's too useless because of too many onlys: it saves not only for a specific document only but also for one specific page only. That way it's similar to the Edit > View > New View which also can be used to work on a specific page in a specific zoom factor. Unfortunately if I use the pages panel for navigation then the zoom factor always gets reset to full page/spread when showing the selected pages.

[ivbera]

10 minutes ago, thomaso said:

it saves not only for a specific document only but also for one specific page only

Ah yes I forgot that.