• Registered: 2022-02-03
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Topic: Affinity Publisher

After struggling for some time with Affinity Publisher, the newest Serif Application, I've come to the conclusion that it is the least useful for publishing a paper book of some length.
PagePlus, neglected for a few years now is still the most useful and user friendly of all publishing programs even if it occasionally throws you out with a popup that offers to notify Serif of a difficulty that it has no intention of receiving.

There is no doubt that Publisher is designed purely to appeal to attract Apple users who produce magazines, Sales brochures and publicity material of just a few pages.
Even after some years it has still failed to produce a solution for footnotes/endnotes and cannot match the convenience of PagePlus's Writeplus.

The hardest change to absorb is the abandonment and standoffish attitude that is shown in the Serif forums nowadays towards its formerly loyal users of PagePlus.

A special thank you to Alfred for keeping this haven for the dispossessed going.
John

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

johnk wrote:

A special thank you to Alfred for keeping this haven for the dispossessed going.

You’re welcome, John. Belated thanks to you for joining us here!

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

I have had no problem in the past with running PagePlus in Windows 10 but after major breakdown of the OS and having to reinstall the OS Ifind that my Wacom stylus cannot now be relied upon to resize a text box. When I try to use it for that all it does is to move the whole pasteboard around.
Have you Alfred come across this sort of behaviour before? Perhaps you could suggest any way of putting this right please.
John

  • Registered: 2022-02-03
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Re: Affinity Publisher

I found the answer by going to the Wacom page, I had to untick the box that enables something called Windows ink and it did the trick. Sometimes I love the internet.
John

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

Johnk wrote:

Sometimes I love the internet.

And sometimes not so much, no doubt! Good to know that you resolved the problem.

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams

6 Reply by GRH (edited by GRH 2022-12-08 17:36:16)

  • GRH
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Re: Affinity Publisher

Affinity Publisher 2 does have - finally - the 'book' facility, which PagePlusX9 (and possibly before) had. If I had not had InDesign CS6, I would have used PP as, as you rightly say, AP it is best for leaflets and flyers et-al. I think it has quite some catch up to do before it becomes an InDesign replacement contender.
I have to say that in many ways, DrawPlus too is superior to AD, and I have some early software by Aldus - Freehand that still runs on Win 10, it too has facilities that AD does not, such as blend, a circle to a square for example.
I sometimes feel that the Affinity range took a retrograde step with the Affinity Suite.
Many moons ago, I worked for British Rail (NSC) and used Serif PP2 to design the emergency timetables (amongst many other things) when the guards went on strike in the early 90's, it was free on the disk from a computer mag. Happy days.

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

GRH wrote:

the 'book' facility, which PagePlusX9 (and possibly before) had.

Long, long before! PPX9 is version 19; BookPlus was added for PP10, released well over a decade ago.

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

I recently revisited reposted to an old topic, the last entry was in 2019.

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index. … nt-1035225

Patrick Connor replied, I think his answer demonstrated that loyalty to past customers was not a prime concern of the new Affinity setup.

John Kay

  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

MoviePlus V6 Problems
I am having a lot of bother with MTS files, I have loads of them from videos I shot on my SONY video camera 1n the1990s.
Every time I load them into MoviePlus I am told that they are locked and I need to contact someone at Serif to unlock them before they can be accepted for editing into the program. And we all know how useless that is.
Can any wise person help me out in this please?
John

  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

I am told by EduGeek that Serif used to send codes to fix this  but they no longer do this sorting out, so it doesn't look good.
John

  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

Hi fellow Serif Legacy Lovers
I’m in the process of Producing a paperback book which will include the following help PDFs for PagePlus (mainly X9), which once were readily available on line to download.
If there is anyone who is interested in this project let me know by email to millrind (at) btinternet.com and I’ll include you in an email list. This way I’ll be able to keep you in touch as to the progress I’m making.
I have put it together in PagePlus X9 and I’ve printed out two copies worth of pages. I shall bind them together as Perfect bound paperbacks. Then I shall see how much it will cost me per copy from a print-on-demand firm.
If it’s a feasible thing I can supply them at cost postal costs to anyone interested. I’ll see how I go with it.
Here’s the list.
John

Adding   
Advanced Typography    
Converting Text Data into a Table
Counting Words in a Publication    
Creating an eBook    
Customising PagePlus   
Designing A Book    
Display PDFs as booklets with facing  pages   
Enhanced paragraph options and texts   
Headers, Footers, and Page Numbering   
Mastering multiple Master pages    
Power of schemed logos (PagePlus X9)    
PDF Publishing (PagePlus)    
Optimising PDF Files    
Using guides for magazine layouts    
Using calendars

  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

Probably not a viable proposition after all but I can still let anyone have any PDF for the subjects I mentioned. just let me know and I'll send you it.
John

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

Johnk wrote:

Probably not a viable proposition after all but I can still let anyone have any PDF for the subjects I mentioned. just let me know and I'll send you it.
John

Is it too big to attach to this thread, John?

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
  • Registered: 2022-02-03
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Re: Affinity Publisher

Well the PDF is 4 meg in size, too big to send as an email attachment but if you send me an email I can share it to you from Google drive.
John

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

Johnk wrote:

Well the PDF is 4 meg in size, too big to send as an email attachment

You wouldn’t be sending it as an email attachment here, of course, you would be sending it as a forum attachment. I’m sorry to say that I can’t find a setting to increase the (apparently rather small) attachment limit, and I’m quite surprised that — as far as I can see — there isn’t an indication anywhere of what the limit actually is.

Johnk wrote:

but if you send me an email I can share it to you from Google drive.

Do you have a particular reason for preferring to share the link privately, rather than simply posting it here?

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

The file doesn't exist on line, it's only on my hard disk so I can't show it as a URL, I can only share it with an email address, if you can show me how to  include it on this site I'll do it, I have no preference at all. I don't have any interest in keeping it private, it is just the only way I know of sending such a large file. None of these PDFs I have included can be accessed on line now.
best wishes
John

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

If it were only on your local hard drive then you wouldn’t be able to share it from Google Drive, so it must also be available via a link to your cloud storage.

Google Drive Help: Share files from Google Drive

How-To Geek: How to Share Folders, Files, and Documents on Google Drive

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
  • Registered: 2022-02-03
  • Posts: 61

Re: Affinity Publisher

Yes  Alfred you are right, Im just being thick
here is the link for the PDF:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vbXg3F … &pli=1

I hope I have it right.
John

  • Alfred
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Re: Affinity Publisher

Your link works for me, John. Thanks for sharing!

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams