Jump to content
You must now use your email address to sign in [click for more info] ×

Recommended Posts

I own PagePlus and have been waiting on Affinity Publisher.  The available information does not compare Affinity to PagePlus so I am not sure if it really has any additional features.  I was hoping someone could run down a comparison for me.  I don't like wasting money on new software if it is not needed and I have upgraded Serif products in the past and many times there weren'y any benefits to me. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, juliandracos said:

I own PagePlus and have been waiting on Affinity Publisher.  The available information does not compare Affinity to PagePlus so I am not sure if it really has any additional features.  I was hoping someone could run down a comparison for me.  I don't like wasting money on new software if it is not needed and I have upgraded Serif products in the past and many times there weren'y any benefits to me. 

Why don’t you go through the Publisher official tutorials, available in these forums, to see for yourself?   You would surely be best suited to compare what you are now doing with what you might be able to do.


24" iMAC Apple M1 chip, 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU, 16 GB unified memory, 1 TB SSD storage, Ventura 13.6.  Photo, Publisher, Designer 1.10.5, and 2.3.
MacBook Pro 13" 2020, Apple M1 chip, 16GB unified memory, 256GB  SSD storage
,  Ventura 13.6.   Publisher, Photo, Designer 1.10.5, and 2.1.1.  
 iPad Pro 12.9 2020 (4th Gen. IOS 16.6.1); Apple pencil.  
Wired and bluetooth mice and keyboards.9_9

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Because it doesn't really answer the question.  The tutorial are common things that people who have not used the software would need to know.  As a list of topics, nothing seems new compared to PagePlus.  Previous versions of PagePlus would list the new things a new version could do that the previous versions could not. 

My assumption, although I could be wrong, is that there are people who used PagePlus who have now used Affinity Publisher.  So that someone can point out something that Affinity Publisher has that Pageplus does not, or vice versa.  Or ideally, someone from Serif would make a nice list of things that its software offers that other software does not and post it up on the Affinity Publisher page like they did with PagePlus and its new versions. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 minutes ago, juliandracos said:

Previous versions of PagePlus would list the new things a new version could do that the previous versions could not

(This will be long-winded. Sorry.)

Serif does that for the Affinity products, too. But Publisher is not a new version of PagePlus. It is completely new, and unrelated other than also being a DTP Program.

I think that your question is in some ways similar to someone asking for the list of differences between InDesign or QuarkExpress and Publisher.

For all these cases there are many differences, including functions that are unique to one or the other, or functions that exist but must be done differently. 

And only you will know whether any given lack of function matters ("Do I use that?") or whether a difference in how something works is significant to your workflow, either in a good or bad way.

Short of looking at the Tutorials, I can only recommend you wait for the 10-day trial version to be available and try it yourself. Or buy it from the Affinity Store and use it for the 14-day refund period to see if you like it well enough to keep it.

Or perhaps read the Publisher feature requests forum (Suggestions for Publisher on Desktop) to get an idea of what people think is missing.

But having said that, yes, you may find users who will tell you which of their favorite PagePlus features are missing, or which functions Publisher does better.

You will probably find that PagePlus has many more functions than this release of Publisher, because this is release 1 of Publisher and, what, release 19 of PagePlus? But there are functions unique to Publisher or better in Publisher, I'm sure.

I think a better question may be whether Publisher has enough at this point to make it useful to you for the work you do. :)

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

53 minutes ago, juliandracos said:

Because it doesn't really answer the question.  The tutorial are common things that people who have not used the software would need to know.  As a list of topics, nothing seems new compared to PagePlus.  Previous versions of PagePlus would list the new things a new version could do that the previous versions could not. 

My assumption, although I could be wrong, is that there are people who used PagePlus who have now used Affinity Publisher.  So that someone can point out something that Affinity Publisher has that Pageplus does not, or vice versa.  Or ideally, someone from Serif would make a nice list of things that its software offers that other software does not and post it up on the Affinity Publisher page like they did with PagePlus and its new versions. 

First and foremost is it is a native Mac application. Pageplus was never designed for MacOS. That is huge! Artboards, multiple strokes, Studiolink, infinite document size (I haven't been able to max it out), and very smooth operation (best on Mac because of Metal).

I had Pageplus since about 1992 (vs 2.0 I think) and it was a great product for it's time. By 2000 it was clearly dated and not keeping up just as Aldus Pagemaker was not, and it moved towards the MS Publisher way of doing things. It had unique things that I really liked but the work coming out of it was just not what prepress and printers could use without serious modifications in the PDFs.

If you liked wizards you probably won't like Affinity Publisher or Designer. Affinity is truly for creatives who want complete control and not a bunch of templates where it inserts your information on to whichever "design" you like.

If you like having an amazing amount of control over the entire look and feel, then Affinity is right for you.

If you have specific tools that you want to know, just ask, and it will be confirmed for you.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Keep PagePlus and trial AF Publisher against it, much easier than someone trying to list all the differences, many of which might not affect you.

I've purchased the full Affinity Suite but I've also kept PhotoPlus, DrawPlus and PagePlus installed, for those things I want to do that none of the AFs can do yet.

With all the (good) work that Serif are doing/ and still have to do, I think it will be a long (long) time before the Windows users will have full AF Suites that can fully/truly replace the 'Plus range' ...... of course the Mac users do not have such, still good, products to 'fall back on'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As an occasional user (compared to the 25 hour/day experts!), I have to agree that it is all about what you use - make a list and compare. I find that I keep finding features in PagePlus that I NEED and which Publisher does not support. I am delighted to say that if enough people have the same problem something is often done about it.

When I last looked, my list (PagePlus can, Pub can't) comprised only

  • Fitting text to a defined frame.
  • Footnotes & End notes

These are significant enough to keep PPX9 on the HDD:)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 months later...
Quote

As an occasional user (compared to the 25 hour/day experts!), I have to agree that it is all about what you use - make a list and compare. I find that I keep finding features in PagePlus that I NEED and which Publisher does not support. I am delighted to say that if enough people have the same problem something is often done about it.

When I last looked, my list (PagePlus can, Pub can't) comprised only

  • Fitting text to a defined frame.
  • Footnotes & End notes

These are significant enough to keep PPX9 on the HDD

Agreed.

I also miss the object styles included in PPX9 which are not available in Publisher. The shearing shadow effect is also missing in Publisher. However, I believe the first of these features can be replicated to some extent in Designer.

I would like to be able to take some of the bundled assets and clipart from PPX9 for use in Publisher. I'm sure there will be a manual way of doing this.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

40 minutes ago, Michael S Harvey said:

However, I believe the first of these features can be replicated to some extent in Designer.

Object styles are also a Publisher function. as well a layer effects. There may be some style-related functions that you can only do in Designer, but if you own both Publisher and Designer you would then be able to do them in Publisher using the Designer Persona.

 

43 minutes ago, Michael S Harvey said:

I would like to be able to take some of the bundled assets and clipart from PPX9 for use in Publisher. I'm sure there will be a manual way of doing this.

My suggestion (untested): create a document in PPX9, and put those assets/clipart into the document. Export to PDF, and Open the PDF in Publisher. Extract the assets/clipart and save them as Publisher assets.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Object styles are also a Publisher function. as well a layer effects. There may be some style-related functions that you can only do in Designer, but if you own both Publisher and Designer you would then be able to do them in Publisher using the Designer Persona. 

 

My suggestion (untested): create a document in PPX9, and put those assets/clipart into the document. Export to PDF, and Open the PDF in Publisher. Extract the assets/clipart and save them as Publisher assets.

It is some of the presets I'd like to see in Publisher or Designer.  They are very effective.  I'll try the PDF method thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, Ralph said:

That, Walt, is what I call imaginative!

 

Probably not the first time it's been mentioned, though, by someone :)

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
PC:
    Desktop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 64GB memory, AMD Ryzen 9 5900 12-Core @ 3.00 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 

    Laptop:  Windows 11 Pro, version 23H2, 32GB memory, Intel Core i7-10750H @ 2.60GHz, Intel UHD Graphics Comet Lake GT2 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Laptop GPU.
iPad:  iPad Pro M1, 12.9": iPadOS 17.4.1, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard 
Mac:  2023 M2 MacBook Air 15", 16GB memory, macOS Sonoma 14.4.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...

While I understand that this is a new product, it does seem confusing in that I would have expected *some* relationship. The fact that Publisher does not even recognize PagePlus files is a non-starter for me. I have a series of those files that I would have loved to 'upgrade' and build on, but you're telling me, in essence, to start from scratch or keep using a software that has reached the end of its development life. 

How do I know this won't happen again should I re-build my library from scratch? Not worth it to me. Sorry, you've lost me on that decision.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Guidelines | We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.