Double Down(save)
I’m sitting here in Denver, digesting airport pizza, en route to the InDesign conference in Seattle. Hmm, what should I do with a 2-hour layover? I could do laundry. Note to self: never put a light-colored jacket in the X-Ray machine again. I could check out the gigantic Croc kiosk… Nah. When in doubt, blog.
The other day I was in on a discussion about whether it was still true that you can’t downsave an InDesign document more than one version at a time. Previously we’ve all heard and repeated the truism that you had go CS3 to CS2, then CS2 to CS. But that was then, this is now. Had things changed now with CS4? Is it possible to go directly from CS4 to CS2? Inquiring minds want to know. I want to know!
I think the answer is no and yes.
First the no part. If you export an INX from CS4, the dialog box makes it clear that you’re saving in CS3 format, not CS2. If you open the DOM documentation and compare CS4 to CS3, there are a lot of differences. But in theory, most of them shouldn’t matter. When processing the INX, CS2 should just ignore what it doesn’t understand and move on. However, if you drop INX from CS4 on top of CS2, you get an error: “Can’t open the document … The version of InDesign Interchange format used in this document cannot be opened by this product.”
Fair enough. But no one said we had to tell ID the truth about where that INX came from. It is just a text file, after all. Shall we tempt fate and edit the INX so CS2 thinks it came from CS3? Hopefully I won’t have my serial numbers revoked for even suggesting such underhanded dealings.
So I peeked over my should to make sure no one was looking, and I opened the INX and changed the XML declaration from:
<?aid style=”33″ type=”document” DOMVersion=”6.0″ readerVersion=”5.0″ featureSet=”257″ product=”6.0(352)” ?>
to:
<?aid style=”33″ type=”document” DOMVersion=”5.0″ readerVersion=”4.0″ featureSet=”257″ product=”5.0(662)” ?>
That is, I told CS2 my file was from version 5 (aka CS3), and could be read by version 4 (CS2). I changed the “product” attribute to boot, just in case CS2 was looking at that also.
Inside my head, the dialog went something like this:
Me: “Knock, knock.”
CS2: “Who’s theeeere?”
Me: “INX delivery, I got a document downsaved from CS3 for ya.”
CS2: “Oh thank you. The door’s open. Leave in in the front window.”
Me: “Muhwahahahahah. CS2, you just got Punk’d!”
So yes, the document opened in CS2. The deception worked, but I feel a little guilty lying to my favorite app. Plus even though the document looks OK, who knows how stable or unstable it is. I feel like it’s kind of a Frankenstein experiment. The thing’s alive, but it might be evil. Bob Levine offered some sage advice to immediately re-INX the file in CS2. Done.
My feeling is that if you have CS3, it still might be better to go the long route, and downsave twice. Since I had to trick InDesign, we can be sure this is not supported behavior. But if you’re in a tight spot and have no access to CS3, this is the way to get your CS4 document into CS2. Further testing will reveal how well this trick holds up.
And now I think I hear my flight being called. See you in Seattle!
so… question is… when will we get the “plugin” that does all this magic “double-down” for us? seems crazy that adobe couldn’t design a plugin that could do this to put in the box. maybe they want to save some work for developers, but it does bother me that this shouldn’t be as hard as they make it.
Me like!
Nice tip!
Love the trick, but why should we even need a plugin to do this?!? If it’s this easy (and you may call it a hack, but a rose by any other name …) why can we not do it from within CS4?!?
First: Is INX really DownSaving?
Real downsaving would create an .indd file as that has always been the format for any version of InDesign.
Second: People often already see changes in things like textflow and will complain about it
The more that is stripped/discarded the less likely the file will look or behave the same
example: an InDesign CS3 user has added many word to the dictionary to define the hyphenation the way he likes, sends an INX and lowe and behold, everything is reflowed and hyphenated differently
I think this what made Adobe Decide NOT to include a real Downsave function to assure consistant looks as much as possible
I already found the Reader version some 18 months ago when CS3 was launched but even though I’m in support, chose not to share it because not being able to rely that what I read, is what was written by a certain InDesign version, make troubleshooting near to impossible
Therefore if you ever have to use this trick because someone on the other side has 2 or 3 versions down make clear you have done this tweaking so they won’t hang on the Phone with support when it misbehaves
Hi Mike,
did the document that you double-downsaved contain any features CS3 has, but CS2 hasn’t? For example cell styles? The XML header says “feature set:257″, which sounds like a definition of what features the reader version knows and will be taking out of the xml. So what if CS2 tries to interpret a feature it doesn’t know. Will it ignore it (good) or will it be confused forever and fall apart (not so good)?
I think Mike has said in the post already that it will read the XML file and ignore what it doesn’t understand. But it needs the header information to be correct to be read by InD CS2.
But I think his double-entendre really was that double down(save) on a .inx is a gamble.
You have a 42% chance of beating the house with a 5 or 6 when you play blackjack, so that’s when you double down.
I’m not saying that there’s a 42% chance that your file will work, I’m drawing on Mike’s double-entendre.
But you wouldn’t do this sort of gamble on a file that you really needed to work properly and really relied on, it’s not something to gamble on.
If you can’t afford to double down(save) then don’t.
DRWatson-
In the tests I’ve done so far, it behaves pretty well. For example, if there were cross-references in the CS4 doc, those based on paragraph styles are converted to regular text, those based on text anchors are stripped out. Nothing I’ve seen so far completely breaks the file. Stay tuned.
“Feature set 257″ just means it’s a Roman file and not a Japanese one.
Phuuh, the trick is cool, and would help you sometimes. But I teach every times the same. Don´t convert Indesign documents to older versions. Its a dangerous game.
This may be a dumb question, but what program do you use to edit the XML info?
Thanks!
Leigh-
For a superquick edit like this, you could use almost anything that saves plain text. I was using BBedit on my Mac, but TextEdit works just as well.
-Mike
Actually, I just tried it again, and it’s even simpler than I thought. You only need to change ONE character. In the second line of XML, just change
readerVersion=”5.0″
to
readerVersion=”4.0″
Done.
Thanks Mike. This will really come in handy.
I was just wondering will this work in any other cs4 program?
Where is the inx file. How can i edit it.
@BT-
In CS3, you can create an INX file by choosing File > Export and selecting Format: InDesign Interchange in the Export dialog box.
InCS4, the format choice is InDesign CS3 Interchange (INX).
Since INX is just a text file, you can edit it with any text editing application. I like BBEdit on the Mac, but TextEdit would get the job done.
Hi!
My problem is that college has IDCS3 and I have IDCS4 at home.
I want to work at home on my page layout in IDCS4 and then work and print it out at college in IDCS3.
My page layout comprises two A4 sheets with a number of .jpgs, some text boxes, and coloured boxes. Very simple.
Is editing the INX file the way to achieve this transfer?
And if so do I just need to take only the edited INX file into college ie not other supporting files?
Any help or advice gratefully received
Best wishes
Bob
Bob-
If you only need to print the document, and do nothing else, it’d be easier to just export a PDF and print that.
But if you do want to use InDesign, it’s still pretty straightforward. You don’t have to edit the INX. When you’re done working in CS4, first package the file, so you have collected up those JPEGs, fonts, etc. Then choose File > Export, and in the dialog box, choose Format: InDesign CS3 Interchange (INX). Put the INX in the same folder as the JPEGs so it can find them for sure.
Bring the package folder with the INX, JPEGs, etc with you to college. Drop the INX on top of CS3, and you should be good to go.
Two potential “gotchas”:
1. Any page objects that use new CS4 features may be changed.
2. In order to open the INX, Cs3 must be updated to version 5.0.4 (go to Help > check for updates).
There’s another gotcha…it’s almost a given that text will reflow due to the differences in the text engines.
Life saver!
Just went from editing a CS3 doc (from work design centre Mac) in CS4 (personal mac) and double down saved to CS2 (for my work PC).
I shake my fist at you, Corporate World!
Thanks all for the tips! If you are a Windows user, the XML can be accessed by opening the document through Notepad.
Cheers!
I love you (Stop it! not that way!). That worked great!!
Thanks for the tip and all the other tips. Now if I can talk my boss into springing for CS4 I won’t have to do this!
I am trying to open a CS2 document in v2 by trying the trick you detailed above and I can’t seem to make it work. This may be a really silly question, but do I just open the InDesign document in TextEdit in order to alter the appropriate code (as per your comment above about using TextEdit)? I tried that and could never find anything in the thousands of lines of code that looked anything like ” <?aid style=”33? type=”document” DOMVersion=”6.0….”. I’m sure everything would be easier if I just upgraded…but that wouldn’t be as much fun!
InDesign version 2 cannot open any file created in later version of InDesign. You’re wasting your time even trying.
You’re going to need to “upgrade” to CS4. Why the quotes?
Because you’ve waited too long and you’re not even eligible for upgrade pricing.
Mike your post really saved my bacon with one of my clients. Thanks a ton!
The simple solution you provided is great and easy.
readerVersion=”5.0?
to
readerVersion=”4.0?
done.
Thanks!
Hi, I’m new to this program as my school has introduced it for use in a subject this year.
At school they have CS3 but at home i have CS4
I’ve been able to open the CS3 files at home but if i work on the document and resave it, will I be able to open it at school again?
Be nice to me, I’m not very technology savvy.
Thanks!
Sophie-
Check out the comments above by me and Bob Levine on Dec 10th.
That wasn’t so bad was it? : )
Thanks for this info. I was able to stay in the good graces of my partner (aka wife) after pulling this one off. It was looking dicey for a moment after all the work she put into that document.
I thought I’d follow up on my previous message. Our translation seemed to work, but once we got into the book length project back in CS2, the wheels fell off.
Everything seemed fine for a while, but suddenly we couldn’t get text to flow into new frames. We kept getting “unable to set bounding box” errors which we could neither decipher or eradicate.
Wahoo!!!
Thanks!
Thanks a ton. You’re a lifesaver, or marriage saver. Working from home on CS2 keeps the husband happier than having me in the office at all hours! Worked like a charm.
Thank you so much! This was really helpful! It saved my back!
THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! It worked! I did all the yearbook layout for my kids at home on CS4 and they can edit on CS2 at school. You are a lifesaver!
Excellent! I’m on a tight deadline and this tip rescued me. Thanks!
Great Hack. It took a fairly large and complex magazine layout and tried to downsave all the way to CS. It works, too. There were some outlines that were wrong and little bitty things that had to corrected but as a last resort hack, this is awesome. Thank you!
Brilliant solution. Thanks!