Transfer InDesign files to Affinity Designer (via Viva Designer and IMDL)

 As I stated recently, I'm dumping the subscription-based Adobe Creative Cloud suite (Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator) for either free or pay-once software. 

The Affinity 2 software (which I picked up on sale for $30, deeply discounted from its regular price of $165) is my top candidate. They are solid, mature tools that can be used by a professional without difficulty. Additionally, they can use most Photoshop and Illustrator brushes. I also like how integrated they are: You can swap back and forth between the various tools without having to open/close/export the document. It's very easy to get quick results with Affinity by Serif Software.

BTW, I suspect they will be releasing vers 3 of their software any day now. My $30 purchase will not include version 3, but they offer pretty good discounts to upgrade between versions (usually 30% - 50%).

However...

There is one problem with ditching InDesign, and that is I have a LOT of projects created with InDesign and I cannot afford to lose access to them. And Affinity Publisher does NOT read native InDesign files, at least not directly.

A bit of techno babble:

• InDesign's native file format has the extension .indd (INDesign Document). 
• INDD files are always set to the current version of the software, which means that if I create a doc using Creative Cloud 3 and send it to you, but you have Creative Cloud 2, then you cannot open the document.
• In order to create backwards compatibility, InDesign can export its documents into this format (which is a form of XML): .idml (InDesign Markup Language). This writes a complex version of the document that can be interpreted by other programs, including Affinity Publisher.

The problem is, of course, how do I get the IDML file? I have the source file (INDD), but without Adobe InDesign I cannot export the file from one format to the other.

Possible Solutions

I did some research on how to do this and came across some possible ways to get away from paying for Adobe Creative Suite for a month, doing a lot of file conversions and then canceling my subscription. If all else fails, I could always do that.

One approach I discovered was that I could possibly use Viva Publisher to open the INDD file and then export it as IDML. I learned of this in this discussion at the Adobe forums: Link to discussion.

I Decided to Test this Approach 

Using Viva Designer 11, I was able to OPEN the INDD file. Viva did a pretty darn good job of interpreting the file, too. The doc looked exactly like it did in InDesign. Now, this was a moderately complex document. It had some defined stiyles, but no tables or TOCs.

Viva Designer 11 was not able to export it to IDML, however. The option was available via File > Export > Documents... The IDML option was readily available, but it no matter what I tried, the program crashed during the export (typically, it crashed about 1/3 though the process). I triple checked the document for missing fonts or images, but the source seemed rock solid, so I'm not sure what's going on.

I had better luck with Viva Designer 10. I was able to export the file, however there were LOTS of errors. The text seemed to be there, but the layout was messed up (items moved a bit and things like that). Also, the text frame linking was a complete disaster. 

UPDATE (11-03-2024): The errors in Viva 10 are not as bad as I thought. There are still some text overflow issues, but those are easy enough to fix. I think this is a workable solution. Go here for step-by-step instructions.

I'm going to continue experimenting to see if I can either stabilize Viva Designer 10 export, or get Viva Designer 11 to work.

If not, then I may have to go back to paying for InDesign for a single month and rushing through all the files.

There is also another option via IDMarkz tools.