Dreadful move on Serif's part. Thanks for creating this section!

Found it now https://punster.me/serif/viewtopic.php?id=612

And I still haven't noticed any mention of Affinity on the Canva website.

I agree, Ali, and you’re welcome! Speaking of welcome, I welcome members’ thoughts on extending and/or refining this section of the forums.

Thanks, Ali. I think the rationale behind their subdivisions is that a great deal of the functionality is ‘cross-product’. The UI for the iPad apps is obviously very different, but apart from the artboards in Designer, the single canvas (with no pasteboard) in Photo and the pages in Publisher, the apps have so much in common that dividing issues by product is often rather arbitrary, and your suggested ‘General & Cross-product’ section is quite likely to end up being used much more than the app-specific sections.

I think that one needs to ask 'What does a user with a problem want when they go to a forum?'
They are agitated enough by the problem and may have bald patches or no hair at all.
I have been on many forums where it is impossible to find the right section without lots of searching through, only to find no answer and give up and go back to pulling out the remaining strands.
So I think clear signposting on the landing page is important - rather like what is now fast disappearing - a department store. Gentlemen’s floor One - they only need a small section of one floor for all their needs it seems. Ladies: Floor Two lingerie, Floor Three Shoes etc.

I like Ali's suggestion, but agree with Alfred about the General and Cross Product 'floor' - why bother having three distinct floors if all the buckets and mops are mixed with the beds and sofa's, shoes, make-up and perfume, cat litter and dog treats on the Ground Floor, or even the Basement.

Affinity Publisher, for example. could have sections, perhaps:

AF PUB-
           |_Mac OS
           |_Ipad
           |_Windows

and the same format for the other applications, so with a couple of clicks one would find oneself on the right floor with a list of the current queries, a quick scroll or search (limited to that floor only) would soon have you reading an answer, or in the absence of such, formulating ones own cry for help.

That's my sixpence worth, or should that be 'tanners worth', anyway.

A small edit.

Alfred is too much of a gentleman to mention it I am sure, so to avoid all the throat-clearing, tie-straightening and shoe-shuffling
and general prevaricating and beating-about-the-bush, may I suggest a discreet 'Donate' button to help with the defraying of costs that are likely to accrue with this additional rise in traffic and administration? I know, I know, but it had to be broached, forget I mentioned it, but there it is.

I said you were a gentleman Alfred, and you proved me right.

Nice maybe, but this would exponentially increase the amount of storage required and would incur extra costs for Alfred, so I think it might not be possible. If the forum remains mainly text-based, it'll remain relatively cheap to run.

To summarize my view on Canva's move:

Grrrr! GRRRRRRRR!!!

I signed up on Discord to see what it was like, and what I saw was a constant avalanche of messages.

It might be a good place to communicate live, but it's definitely not the place to ask for help with software.

There are so many messages coming in that any questions that don't get an immediate response disappear into the depths of the channel, making them very difficult, if not impossible, to find again.

Serif's decision is a disaster.

My 2 cents: Discord absolutely is not a substitute for a product support forum, & from what has been said by the staff somewhere in one of the now huge topics about the transition it is not intended to be.

There is now just the form for that, which of course is not a good substitute for a community driven, user-to-user forum.

Just think about the definitions of "forum" & "community" it should be obvious why user interaction is a necessary part of this.

That’s the general idea, Chris! As @R C-R has observed, Discord is not a substitute for a product support forum. With the official Affinity forums due to become read-only in little more than 48 hours, I thought it made every sense to add unofficial Affinity forums here.