Engine update: older Publisher files, tables and shapes come out closer to the original

A large batch of engine work went live on 28 September. This is the whole list, kept short. The method hasn't changed: we put our output next to Publisher's own PDF and fix what differs. Each fix applies to the PDF export unless the item says otherwise.

Files from Publisher 97 and Publisher 2000

Older Publisher files store their design differently from newer ones, and we were missing parts of it. This release fills many of those gaps.

  • Lines keep their real weight and colour, and arrowheads are back. Before, lines in these files came out thin and black, and arrows had no heads.
  • Borders around pictures and form checkboxes are drawn. Many of them were missing.
  • Rounded boxes have rounded corners and the right outline.
  • Decorative page borders use their real tiles (flowers, checks, push pins) in the frame's own colour. Some used to come out as a flat grey band.
  • Speech-bubble callouts and other shapes such as arrows, stars and hearts no longer come out as plain rectangles.
  • Clip art is cropped the way Publisher crops it. Some pictures used to slide out of their frame, or showed the whole image instead of the close-up.
  • Clip art with a see-through colour no longer sits on a solid box. This fix is in PDF and InDesign files.
  • Coloured backgrounds behind clip art, shaded frames and Publisher 97 text-box shadows are back.

Business cards, labels and postcards made in Publisher 2000 now export as the full Letter or A4 sheet with repeated copies, the way Publisher prints them. Before, you got one card-sized page. This fix is in PDF and Word files.

Tables

  • Some Publisher 97 tables showed the wrong content. A calendar could show a list of names, and another table could show the calendar. Each table now gets its own text. This fix applies to every format.
  • Gridlines are drawn as the file records them, side by side, each with its own colour and width. Before, many tables got a plain black grid around every cell. This covers old and new Publisher files.
  • Gradient cells show their gradient, and partly see-through cell colours stay see-through.

Shapes, lines and arrows

  • Diagonal lines and connectors run the way Publisher draws them. They always ran from top left to bottom right, so arrows in diagrams could point the wrong way. This fix is in every format.
  • Lines turned a quarter turn point the right way. A horizontal rule could come out vertical. Every format.
  • Trapezoids are wide at the top. They were upside down. Every format.
  • Mirrored shapes stay mirrored. A flipped triangle, arrow or brace faces the way you set it. Every format.
  • Shape handles count. If you dragged the yellow handle on a triangle, hexagon or similar shape, we now use your setting, not the default shape. Every format.
  • Boxes with Publisher's 3-D style get their shaded front and side walls. They used to come out flat.
  • Curved freeform shapes, such as half circles and swooshes, curve to the correct side.

WordArt

  • Outlined WordArt looks the way it does in Publisher. The outline used to be drawn twice as thick and under the fill, so letters looked heavier than they should. Now the fill goes first, with one outline of the set width on top.
  • Multi-line WordArt fills its box. It could come out as small plain text, and a second line could go missing.
  • Arched WordArt follows the arc you set. Every arch used to get the same shallow curve.
  • The slanted floor shadow under some WordArt styles is drawn.

Pictures

  • White stays white. We used to make large white areas of a picture see-through, so the page showed through photos and textures. Now we only remove a colour the file marks as transparent.
  • Darkened pictures stay dark. If you turned down the brightness or turned up the contrast in Publisher, the picture now matches. Heavily darkened pictures could turn into a flat grey block.
  • Photos in a frame with a see-through background stay solid. The photo itself used to fade.
  • Pictures turned a quarter turn keep their border on the right edges.
  • Thin BorderArt frames show their single strip of tiles instead of no border at all.

Pages and sheets

  • Designs a little larger than the paper are no longer shrunk. An A4 design set on a Letter sheet now comes out full size and centred, the way Publisher prints it.
  • In two-page spreads, an object that crosses the fold shows on both pages. The facing page used to lose the part that hung over.
  • Portrait and landscape follow the file. Some templates came out in the wrong orientation. They now use the print setting stored in the file. Every format.
  • On sheets of business cards, notes left outside the card stay there. They used to print onto the next card.

Word, InDesign and ODG files

  • Smaller Word files. If a picture appeared many times, such as a logo on every page, the Word file stored a full copy each time. It now stores one. In our tests, one Word file went from about 970 MB to 28 MB. Word files with repeated pictures are about 40% smaller on average. ODG files got the same fix. Nothing on the page changes.
  • Letter spacing closer to Publisher. Publisher only kerns letter pairs in text of 14 pt and larger. Our Word, InDesign and ODG files now follow the same rule, so line lengths come closer to the original.
  • InDesign page numbers. Page numbers in small boxes no longer overflow and vanish. In folded booklets, each page shows its booklet page number, not the sheet number.
  • InDesign booklets. Folded booklets with linked text now come out as folded sheets with the right page count, not twice as many flat pages.
  • InDesign shapes. Mirrored shapes, diagonal lines, gradients inside groups and open shapes such as braces now match the PDF.

If one of your files came out wrong in any of these ways, run it again. You don't need to buy again. The preview is free, and conversions are a one-time $49, up to 2 GB and 20 files per job.