It is so wild that this got shared, as I was working on a project that very specifically was hoping to integrate a feature like this. Psyched to try it, I’ll credit the author in the credits of the site I’m building.
Curious to see how this worked, I tried this on Deepseek using Claude Code Router, following the author’s guide, with two small changes: Make it an emo song that uses acoustic guitar (or, obviously an equivalent), and it could install one text-to-speech tool using Python.
It double-tracked the vocals like freaking Elliott Smith, which cracked me up.
Quick add: I tested VivaDesigner on some old InDesign docs and I found it did not handle color blend modes very well, which is kind of an essential for a risograph project like 404’s. Nonetheless, the fact that it was able to open an InDesign doc more or less intact makes it a useful tool for a switcher.
Thanks for pointing out VivaDesigner—I’m surprised in the many obsessive searches to find something like this, it never came up! (I will note that there are a lot of pretty obscure layout programs out there. At my first newspaper, I was brought in to help with the transition to CCI, which was a full-stack publishing tool popular with newspapers of the era. As a result of this, I was introduced to their old system, by Harris, which relied on Windows NT 3.1. Fun times.)
This project is probably a no-go with it (for kicks, I did try importing a PDF of the final doc) but I will keep it in mind in the future from an analysis standpoint.
The other point I’d make is kind of a tipping-point argument. While VivaDesigner can export into IDML it looks like, Affinity has gone just mainstream enough that it won’t be turned away at print shops, which is a real risk. PDFs can get you most of the way, granted, but some print shops want to edit the file, which makes sense.
I downloaded an unoptimized game and tested it (Stray, a few years old at this point) and got some graphical glitches, but between 10-20 FPS on a three-year-old phone. That it’s even possible is impressive, and I imagine it will only get better as more games get optimized.
Affinity I believe is C++ with C# used for the front end on Windows.
The code doesn’t have nearly the legacy of Adobe’s code, so the result is that Affinity already runs very well in WINE thanks to some passionate fans that really want to see this use case.
They mention Hollow Knight in their update, but I should note that Silksong also works on my M1 Air flawlessly. Games with more 3D graphics also work to some degree. I tried Bakeru on it and got decent results though the texture load time was significant.
Asahi has been fun to watch, and I’m happy it’s still moving along, even with the messiness of the past twelve months. I rarely boot into MacOS on the machine these days, and while I’m mostly using a PC these days, I am debating getting a used M1 Pro or Max for the battery life benefits (and access to Mac graphics programs on the rare occasions I need them).
The fact that M3 is technically possible, even if likely a while off, is promising.
I use Craft CMS’ GraphQL capabilities with my Eleventy site. Works well and helps me keep my page loads static. I would also recommend Directus for this, as it has some nice quality-of-life benefits.
To manage deploys, I have used Cleavr, which does a good job at it without being too user-unfriendly. That’s a paid service, about $6/month.
I’ve used Maestral a few times and find it works best with narrower folder limits—I ultimately went with the official Dropbox client for my M1 but I use it on an x86 machine in which I only need a handful of folders.