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optimize and explain paste dialogue


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I think it's unclear which of the following options will result in which behaviour. What is a Serif Persona Story? What does Rich Text Format mean?

I think Microsoft Office has a better solution by explaining the result, not the type of function, e.g. "Insert text only" or "keep source styling". Don't know what the actual English translation is.

Bonus: People working with MS Office already know the options and therefore the result, so it would again be better usability. 

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Screenshot from Microsoft Word

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Alexander Walther, Informationsdesigner B.A.

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@alexplus_de: Just to explain some terminology a bit (not commenting yet on your suggestion to change the wording)...

Paste Special lets you choose among the various formats that are present in the clipboard. Often, when you do a Copy, the application will put multiple formats on the clipboard, because it does not know where you will Paste the information, and does not know what formats that application will support. Usually, I think, the list will have the most complete/accurate version of the content on top, and the least complete on the bottom.

So, in order:

  1. Serif uses the term "Story" to refer to the content of a linked set of Text Frames. Presumably, "Serif Persona Story" is the internal native format used by Affinity, and will be the most accurate in terms of information that will be pasted. It would include all the information about the text you've copied, including all the paragraph and character options, styling, etc. in the form that Affinity uses it.
  2. Rich Text Format is a document format created by Microsoft but often used as an interchange format. RTF documents can be imported by Affinity Publisher into Text Frames, for example. In terms of copy/paste, it will include many aspects of the source text (font, size, color, ....) but probably not as much nor as accurately as Serif Persona Story.
  3. Unicode-Text is just that, the text, but without any of the formatting aspects.

About your suggestion: If nothing else, it would be helpful if the Affinity Help explained Paste Special, and described the formats that the Affinity applications understand. And explained Serif Persona Story :)  But except for that one, the other terms seem consistent with the usage in most other applications I have seen. I don't use Office, so I haven't seen what it does.

-- Walt
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Hi alexplus_de :)

I've also had this logged with our localisation team, as these options should be translated into your app language - thanks for bringing this to our attention!

Please Note: I am now out of the office until Tuesday 2nd April on annual leave.

If you require urgent assistance, please create a new thread and a member of our team will be sure to assist asap.

Many thanks :)

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Hey Walt, Hey Dan,

thank you for your quick replies. Also for the detailed explanation of the different options.

imho, this should not be hidden in the affinity help. You'll find "paste as unformatted text" in InDesign or even modern internet browsers like Firefox or Chrome.

I think you'll agree that "keep original formatting" and "paste as unformatted text" or "paste as plain text" is more clear as it reflects the intent of the user.

For me, it's okay. After thinking about what I want to do and chosing the wrong options several times, I already learned which one will give the best result. I'm also familiar with the different options through Microsoft Office and in general as I'm a web developer, too. Just ask about WYSIWYG-Editors in the web if you want to paste a text from Microsoft Word through the clipboard. Long story short: It's a mess.

But I just realizied that below "Inhalte einfügen..." ("paste content" in English), there are already options that use a more intuitive label. "Ohne Format einfügen..." is exactly what I was looking for most of the time.

Anyway, I'm happy to hear that my message will result in a better translation of these options above.

Thanks, guys!

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Alexander Walther, Informationsdesigner B.A.

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