Stroke alignment with compound path

[D34DC3N73R]

Stroke alignment appears to be opposite for the interior of compound paths

Stroke aligned center

Stroke aligned inside (which is actually aligned "outside" of the interior shape)

Stroke aligned outside (which is actually aligned "inside" the interior shape)

This is mainly an issue when outlining text that includes an aligned stroke. Is there a way to fix this without stacking shapes?

[Scott Falkner · Accepted solution]

This bug has existed in InDesign for several versions. You can vote on it here.

[c.pfaffenbichler]

This bug has existed in InDesign for several versions. You can vote on it here.

By @Scott Falkner

I happened on this bug back in Indesign 15.0.2 and was reminded of it recently.

It seems disconcerting that it has not been fixed yet. 

[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @c.pfaffenbichler,

Thanks for following up. Could you confirm which version of InDesign you tested this on? If possible, please also share a short screen recording of the behavior so I can look into it further.

Looking forward to your update.

Abhishek

[c.pfaffenbichler]

Edit: Where are my manners? Thanks for following up! 

I originally noticed it in 15.0.2 and it seems to persist in 20.5, though I have not tested in all the intermittent versions – so it might be possible that the bug re-appeared. 

[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @c.pfaffenbichler,

Please correct me if I'm misunderstanding, but from your GIF it looks like:

Align to Center places the stroke evenly across the path on both shapes

Align to Inside moves the stroke fully inside the shape's boundary

Align to Outside pushes it fully outward beyond the shape's edge

From what I see, this seems to be working as expected. Are you noticing a difference after outlining the shapes?

Would really appreciate your clarification, so I can better understand what's not working.

Thanks!

Abhishek 

[c.pfaffenbichler]

The stroke is misaligned in the "holes" of the shapes.

Instead of inside (the side where the fill color manifests) its outside and vice

versa.

[c.pfaffenbichler]

Maybe these screenshots can help clarify where the Stroke is wrong; I added a duplicate of the paths with a thinner black stroke to illustrate the original paths. 

[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @c.pfaffenbichler,

Thanks for sharing the additional details and screenshots. I'm checking this behavior internally with the product team to understand and whether it's expected or a bug. I'll share an update with you as soon as I have more information from them.

Thanks, 

Abhishek

[c.pfaffenbichler]

Calling this behaviour »expected« would lead to the question why Illustrator and Photoshop treat such cases differently than Illustrator. 

Especially in the case of the »A«-shaped path the misalignment should be obvious because an inner stroke chokes the counter as the stroke is on opposing sides of what should essentially be one line. 

[Laubender]

D34DC3N73R says: "…This is mainly an issue when outlining text that includes an aligned stroke."

Yes, of course. It is no issue if you are working with editable text.

On the left editable text, in the center the same text converted to outlines ( stroke alignment changed! ), on the right stroke alignment position set to "outside". Also note that converting to ouline changed the stroke weight in the bottom row:

Why working with glyphs that are converted to graphic shapes?

Maybe you want to change position of individual path points of a glyph. Best do that with Adobe Illustrator and place an AI file after you finished.

Or do it with InDesign and create a new OpenType font from a shape.

You can do this with Jongware's and Marc Autret's script IndyFont so that you can still work with editable text and an outline like in the left column above.

For IndyFont see:

https://www.indiscripts.com/category/projects/IndyFont

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )