PublishingDesk

1. Getting started

Create a document

File → New… (or the New toolbar button) opens the template gallery:

• Paper — A-series (A3/A4/A5…) and US (Letter/Legal…).
• Social Media — Instagram, YouTube, X, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, TikTok, and more.
• Print — business card, postcard, poster, and similar.
• Custom — type an exact width × height.

Each card shows an aspect-accurate preview and its dimensions; use the Landscape toggle to flip orientation before creating. Documents open as tabs — you can have several open at once. A tab with unsaved changes shows a *, and closing a tab or the app prompts you to save.

A 60-second tour

1. Click Add Text (or Add اردو for complex-script) to drop a text frame, then double-click it to type.
2. Click Add Image to place a picture; Add Shape for a rectangle/ellipse.
3. Drag objects to move them; drag the corner handles to resize; drag the small handle above an object to rotate.
4. Use the Properties panel (right) to set exact position, size, rotation and opacity.
5. File → Save (Ctrl+S) to a .pubdesk file.

2. The workspace

• Menu bar — File, Edit, Page, Arrange, Table, View, Tools, Help.
• Toolbar (icons) — New / Open / Save / Export / Print · Undo / Redo · Add Image / Text / اردو (Urdu) / Shape · z-order · Delete.
• Format bar (appears when a text frame is selected) — font, size, bold/italic, alignment, colour. Its contents differ for English vs Urdu frames.
• Canvas — your page, with optional rulers, grid, margins/guides.
• Layers panel (top-right) — every object on the current page; toggle visibility and lock, drag to restack.
• Properties panel (right) — grouped, collapsible cards for the selected object.
• Pages strip (bottom) — page thumbnails, page tools, master-page chips, navigation, and zoom.

Ruler guides

Turn on View → Rulers, then drag out of a ruler to place a guide — down from the top ruler for a horizontal one, right out of the left ruler for a vertical one. Drag a guide to move it, or drag it off the page to remove it, and objects snap to it as you position them. Guides are yours to place (unlike the derived margin/column guides) and never print or export.

3. Pages

All page tools live in the Pages strip at the bottom (and mirror in the Page menu).

• Add page (＋), Duplicate page, Delete page.
• Move page earlier / later (up/down arrows) to reorder.
• Previous / Next (‹ / ›) buttons and clickable page thumbnails to navigate. The selected page is highlighted with a blue border.

Page size, orientation, margins

• Page → Page Size… — change the current page’s dimensions.
• Page → Portrait / Landscape — flip orientation.
• Page → Margins & Guides… — set margins (left/top/right/bottom), columns (count + gutter) and a baseline-grid spacing. These are non-printing guides; show/hide them with View → Margins & Guides. (New pages start with no margins, so set them here first if the toggle shows nothing.)

Page numbers

• Page → Insert Page Number — drops an auto-updating page-number field on the current page.
• Page → Insert Page Number on All Pages — numbers every page at once (skips any that already have one); a single Undo removes them all.

4. Master pages

A master page is a reusable template that sits behind your pages and holds repeating “furniture” — headers, footers, page numbers, logos, borders. Design it once and apply it to the pages you choose; change the master and every page using it updates. (Same concept as InDesign’s parent pages or PowerPoint’s slide master.) One master applies per page — applying a different one replaces the previous.

In the MASTERS section of the pages strip:

• A / B / C chips — one per master; click a chip to edit that master.
• ＋ — create a new master.
• Apply ▾ — choose Apply to This Page → (master), or Remove from This Page.

While editing a master, no page is highlighted; click any page to return to it. Each page thumbnail shows a small badge with the letter of the master applied to it. The same actions are in Page → Master Pages.

5. Layers & objects

Every object — text, image, shape, imported path — is a layer on the current page. Add them from the toolbar: Add Image, Add Text (English), Add اردو (Urdu/complex-script), Add Shape.

Selecting & manipulating

• Click to select; click empty page to deselect; Ctrl+click to multi-select.
• Drag the body to move; drag a corner/edge handle to resize; drag the handle above an object to rotate (hold Shift to snap to 15°).
• Smart snapping/guides appear while dragging; turn on Snap to Grid in the View menu for grid snapping.

Properties panel

Grouped into collapsible cards: LAYER (name + opacity), TRANSFORM (X/Y, W/H, rotation), and a type-specific card — text frame fill & effects, English text size/spacing/effects, shape appearance, or image stretch/crop.

Layers panel & Arrange

• Toggle visibility and lock (a locked layer can’t be moved, resized, rotated or edited); drag a layer up/down to restack it (changes z-order, undoable).
• Arrange → Align Left / Center / Right / Top / Middle / Bottom (needs 2+ objects) and Distribute Horizontally / Vertically (needs 3+ objects).

6. English (Latin) text

Add with Add Text and double-click to type. English frames use a rich-text editor, so you can mix fonts, sizes, weights and colours within one frame. The format bar controls font, size, bold/italic, alignment (left/center/right/justify) and colour.

How formatting is applied:

• Text selected → changes only the selection.
• Caret only, editing → sets the pending format — what you type next uses it; existing text is untouched (like Word).
• Frame selected, not editing → changes the whole frame.

7. Urdu / complex-script text

This is PublishingDesk’s specialty. Add with Add اردو; double-click to type. Letters join correctly (Nastaliq shaping) for Urdu, Persian, Pashto and Arabic. The format bar offers Language, Font, Size, alignment and Colour; the Properties → TEXT card adds line spacing, effects and a content box.

Typing Urdu

An in-app Urdu keyboard translates your keystrokes, chosen automatically from the frame’s language. Change it in Tools → Options → Urdu (Standard / Phonetic Roman→Urdu / System Windows keyboard). Mixed direction works — English words and numbers inside an Urdu frame sit left-to-right in the right-to-left line, and Urdu numerals read the right way round.

Fonts, justification, kashida (kasheeda)

Switch among the bundled Nastaliq/Arabic fonts from the Font dropdown, or add your own (see Installing fonts). Set a paragraph to Justified and PublishingDesk fills each line by elongating the script’s connecting strokes (tatweel) instead of opening gaps between words.

Character detail & tab stops

Edit → Character… sets fine typographic detail on the selection (or the whole frame): decoration (underline, double underline, overline, box, pattern or reverse), letter-spacing, horizontal scale and baseline shift. Tab stops are editable in the Paragraph dialog as comma-separated positions — handy for lining up figures, and preserved when you open an InPage document.

8. Tables & lists

Tables

The Table menu places a table at the cursor in the selected complex-script frame:

• Insert Table… — choose rows and columns.
• Edit Table… — change the grid, cell text, cell fills, per-cell borders (solid, dashed or dotted), column widths and merged cells.
• Delete Table — removes the table and its anchor.

Tables are drawn identically on screen and in every export, and a column-spanning cell keeps its rule from running through it. Cell text is edited in the dialog’s grid.

Bulleted & numbered lists

Set a paragraph’s List and Level from Edit → Paragraph. Numbering counts per level and nests — a nested list resumes its parent’s sequence after the indented items — and numbers are written in Urdu digits (۱، ۲، ۳) in a right-to-left paragraph. When a Nastaliq face has no bullet glyph, PublishingDesk draws the bullet itself as a disc, ring or square that cycles with depth.

9. Text effects

Select a text frame and use the Effects editor in its properties card: apply a preset, or set individual Fill, Outline and Shadow (plus glow, inner-shadow and bevel). Effects render on both English and Urdu frames and are saved with the document.

10. Opening InPage files

PublishingDesk reads InPage files directly — the pages, frames and text come across as a real layout you can edit, not as a flat picture or a wall of plain text.

• File → Open and pick the .inp file. (PublishingDesk recognises an InPage document by its contents, so it works even if the file has an odd extension.)
• Or File → Import → InPage Document (.inp), which does the same thing.

What comes across: pages and page setup, master pages, every frame with its position, size, rotation, columns, border and background; linked/threaded text that flows from box to box; per-word formatting (font, size, bold/italic, colour, decoration); paragraph settings (alignment, indents, spacing, tab stops); tables including merged cells and column widths; pictures; rules and lines; and ruler guides. Files from InPage 2.21 through 2024 all work.

What to expect afterwards

• Urdu text will look close, but not pixel-identical. InPage documents are set in Noori/Jameel-class Nastaliq faces, which can’t legally be shipped inside another app — so PublishingDesk substitutes its bundled Noto Nastaliq and rescales the text to compensate, and lines may break in slightly different places. For the closest match, add Jameel Noori Nastaleeq yourself and apply it to the imported frames (see Installing fonts).
• A table lands at the end of its frame’s text, rather than at the exact point in the flow where InPage had it. Drag it where you want it.
• Not yet drawn: hatch/pattern fills, arrowheads on lines, and picture frames clipped to an ellipse — these come through as plain fills, plain lines and rectangles.

11. Opening InDesign files

PublishingDesk reads InDesign (.idml) documents — the files InDesign writes with File → Export…, and the ones commercial template packs ship alongside their .indd.

• File → Open and pick the .idml file (it is recognised by its contents, like .inp).
• Or File → Import → InDesign (.idml).

What comes across: every page of every spread, with its size, margins, columns and ruler guides; master spreads as master pages (a facing master becomes an L and an R); text frames with position, size, rotation, columns, fill and stroke; threaded stories flowing from frame to frame in the order InDesign linked them; paragraph and character styles flattened onto the text (size, weight, italic, colour, tracking, baseline shift, underline, alignment, indents, space before/after, leading, tab stops, bullets and numbering); tables; rectangles, ovals, polygons and curved frames; lines; swatch colours in CMYK, RGB and Lab, with gradients and tints flattened to a solid; and placed images, cropped by their frame the way InDesign crops them.

What to expect afterwards

• A native .indd file cannot be read — it is an undocumented format. Open it in InDesign and File → Export… an .idml first; it is a one-click step, and most template packs include the .idml already.
• Keep the Document fonts folder next to the file. If the document was packaged from InDesign, PublishingDesk loads those faces automatically and the layout matches. Without the real fonts a substitute is used, and because InDesign sizes frames tightly around their text, a substitute with different proportions can push the last line of a frame out of its box. Installing the document’s fonts is the single biggest thing you can do for fidelity.
• Text does not wrap around objects yet. InDesign templates lean on text wrap heavily, so a column that ran around a photo will run through it for now. Everything is in the right place — the text just doesn’t step aside.
• Linked images need to be findable. A packaged document’s Links/ folder beside the .idml works; a link pointing at a folder that no longer exists leaves an empty frame. Vector placements (EPS, PDF, AI) are left empty rather than half-drawn.
• A line or two may still clip in a very tightly-sized frame. PublishingDesk measures a typeface by the full extent of its ink so that Nastaliq is never cut off, which places the first line slightly lower than InDesign does. Nudge the frame’s height a little and it resolves.
• Master items sit behind everything. A page filled edge to edge by a background rectangle will hide its own running header — move or restack the rectangle.
• Not carried: anchored objects, transparency and blend effects, nested and GREP styles, text on a path, and strikethrough.

12. Importing text, autoflow & SVG

File → Import is a single submenu: InPage and InDesign at the top, then Text, Autoflow and SVG.

Import text into a frame

File → Import → Text Into Selected Frame pours a .txt/.md/.docx file into the selected complex-script (Urdu) frame, preserving RTL.

Autoflow across pages

File → Import → Text, Autoflow Across Pages treats the selected frame’s page as a template, duplicates it as many times as needed, and threads the text through all the copies (carrying the page’s border/graphics).

Import SVG

File → Import → SVG brings an SVG’s vector shapes/paths in as editable Path layers. Embedded images, gradients and live text aren’t imported (vector shapes only).

Recolouring an imported shape: select it and the APPEARANCE panel gives you fill, stroke colour and stroke thickness, plus the object-style dropdown — the same controls as a shape you drew yourself. Setting a stroke colour on a shape that arrived without one gives it a hairline so the change shows.

13. Find & Replace

Ctrl+F (or Edit → Find & Replace…) searches all text frames — Urdu and English. Use Find Next, Replace and Replace All.

• Urdu keyboard checkbox: on → type Urdu (translated via the in-app keyboard); off → type plain Latin to find embedded English. It defaults to the selected frame’s script and you can flip it any time.
• Ignore case (Latin) affects embedded Latin only (Urdu has no case).

14. Exporting & printing

File → Export:

• As PNG — raster image (2× scale), colours and transparency preserved.
• As PDF — vector; Urdu shaping preserved as crisp glyph outlines.
• As SVG (Pro) — vector paths plus embedded images.
• As PDF for Print (Pro) — adds a bleed area and crop marks for professional printing.
• Preflight (Pro) — checks the document and reports issues before you export.

File → Print prints the current page, or use Print… (all pages) with a page range. Pages print at your printer’s own resolution, so fine Nastaliq strokes and hairline rules stay sharp. Per-layer opacity is honoured in every export and in print.

15. Free vs Pro

PublishingDesk is free to use — the whole designer is open, with no account and no time limit. A one-time Pro upgrade unlocks professional output.

The free watermark is a small “Made with PublishingDesk” badge in the corner of exported/printed pages; Pro removes it everywhere. Upgrade any time via Help → Upgrade to Pro…, or pick a Pro export and you’ll be offered the upgrade. Pro is a one-time purchase (not a subscription) and re-unlocks automatically on your other Windows devices signed in to the same store account — including when you’re offline.

16. Saving, recovery & files

• Save / Save As (Ctrl+S) writes a .pubdesk file capturing pages, every layer, effects, opacity, masters, tables and page setup (images are embedded, so the file is self-contained).
• Open from Explorer — double-click a .pubdesk or .inp file to open it in the running app.
• File → Open Recent lists recently used documents.
• Autosave & crash recovery — your work is autosaved periodically; if the app closes unexpectedly, it offers to recover unsaved changes on next launch.
• Window size/position is remembered between sessions.

17. Installing fonts

PublishingDesk ships with a curated set of free Nastaliq/Arabic-script fonts (Noto Nastaliq Urdu — the default — plus Gulzar, Amiri, Scheherazade New, Noto Naskh Arabic, Lateef, Markazi Text, Estedad, Vazirmatn), and uses your Windows system fonts for everything else. You can add any font you like — including popular Nastaliq fonts that aren’t bundled.

How to add your own fonts (3 steps)

1. In the app, go to Help → Open Fonts Folder… — this opens your personal fonts folder (always use this menu item rather than typing a path, so it works even when installed from the Microsoft Store).
2. Copy your .ttf / .otf font files into that folder (subfolders are fine).
3. Restart PublishingDesk. Your fonts now appear in the Font dropdowns.

18. Keyboard shortcuts

19. Troubleshooting

• My imported InPage file looks slightly different. Expected — the original Nastaliq faces can’t be shipped inside an app, so a substitute is used and text may break at different points. Add the original font (usually Jameel Noori Nastaleeq) and apply it to the frames — see Installing fonts.
• A table from InPage is in the wrong place in the text. Tables land at the end of their frame’s text rather than at the exact point in the flow. Drag it where you want it.
• Saving an imported file asks for a new name. By design — an imported document is untitled so Save can’t overwrite your original .inp or .idml. Save it as a .pubdesk file.
• PublishingDesk won’t open my .indd file. A native InDesign file is an undocumented format and can’t be read. Open it in InDesign and File → Export… an .idml — most template packs include one already.
• The last line of a frame is cut off in an imported document. InDesign and InPage size frames tightly around their text, and PublishingDesk measures a typeface by the full extent of its ink (so Nastaliq is never clipped), which places lines a fraction lower. First make sure the document’s own fonts are installed or packaged beside it — a substitute face is the usual cause. If it persists, nudge the frame’s height up a little in the properties panel.
• An imported InDesign page looks right but text runs through a photo. Text wrap (runaround) isn’t implemented yet, so text doesn’t step aside for objects. Everything is in its correct position — move or resize the frame to work around it for now.
• The guide toggle (Margins & Guides) shows nothing. The page has no margins/columns/baseline yet — set them in Page → Margins & Guides… first.
• A dropped-in font doesn’t appear. Make sure it’s a .ttf/.otf in the folder opened by Help → Open Fonts Folder…, then restart the app.
• Urdu types as Latin in a search box. Tick the Urdu keyboard checkbox in Find & Replace (or check the keyboard in Tools → Options → Urdu).
• Recovered the wrong/old version? Recovery offers your last autosave; if you’d already saved a newer copy, open that file from File → Open / Open Recent.