January 23 2009 • 11:30 AM
InDesignSecrets Podcast 095
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- Trip reports: David in Dubai and at Macworld; Anne-Marie at lynda.com recording studio and at the Chicago InDesign User Group
- News: InDesignProxy update; Leopard update fixes InDesign hiding glitch
- Follow InDesignSecrets on Twitter
- The vestigial Master Text Frame checkbox in the New Document dialog
- Five Quizzler winners and their favorite InDesignSecrets posts from 2008!
- Obscure InDesign Feature of the Week: Skip by Leading
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Sweet Deals from our sponsors:
>> UK-based Certitec, an Adobe Authorized Training Center, is giving away one free 2-day InDesign class to a lucky InDesignSecrets.com listener. Classes will be held in Cardiff or London, U.K. To enter the drawing for the free class, go to http://www.certitec.com/indesignsecrets.html and fill out the form. Quick! You only have 14 days from the date of this podcast to enter the drawing. If you don’t win, you can always register for any 2009 class at Certitec for 10% off if you mention “InDesignSecrets” when registering.
>> Recosoft’s PDF2ID Professional 2.0 is a new version of the the amazing program that converts PDFs to editable InDesign (Mac/Windows) files. New features include conversion presets, smart frame linking, and bringing in just the annotations (comments) from a PDF. Limited-time offer for InDesignSecrets fans, get $30 off the $369 cost for the Pro version by ordering it at this link by January 31, 2009.
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Download the PDF of the Quizzler results! (Which popular posts of 2008 did you miss?) Includes links to the posts and comments from the entrant about why it was their favorite.
Quizzler winners were selected randomly from qualifying e-mails:
Grand Prize, the Spyder3 Elite: Noel Burgess
Runners-up, a copy of Schott’s Almanac 2009: Jean-Claude Tremblay, Nigel Harris, Les O’Neil, and David Parker
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Links mentioned in this podcast:
Fun article about David’s Dubai seminar
InDesignSecrets’ Twitter Tweets
Fritz’s post about Master Text Frames
Fun article about David’s Dubai seminar
InDesignSecrets’ Twitter Tweets
Fritz’s post about Master Text Frames
Anne-Marie’s InDesignProxy and Leopard update posts
Hi Anne-Marie and David. I enjoyed the show!
Two issues with Skip by Leading:
1. When the interruption is at the top of a column, InDesign ignores the preference. PageMaker used to get this right by using the leading from the last line of the previous column. There’s not much you can do about this but grit your teeth.
2. If you are setting text that includes inline math equations (e.g., from MathType), then Autoleading will push a line down from the previous line of text to make space for that part of the equation that is above the baseline, but what to do about that which is below the baseline? Answer: switch on Jump Object Text Wrap for the equation. This will push the next line of text down below that part of the equation that extends below the baseline. But, if you have Skip by Leading on, it pushes it down to the next leading increment. For this you have to switch off Skip by Leading — in my opinion, this should be a per-object setting, not a document-wide one.
Dave
Lost my text wrap,
What’ll I do?
Lost my text wrap,
What’ll I do?
Lost my text wrap,
What’ll I do?
Skip by my leading, my darlin’.
Skip, skip, skip by my leading,
Skip, skip, skip by my leading,
Skip, skip, skip by my leading,
Skip by my leading, my darlin’.
I’ll ignore text wrap
better than you,
I’ll ignore text wrap
better than you,
I’ll ignore text wrap
better than you,
Skip by my leading, my darlin’.
Skip, skip, skip by my leading,
Skip, skip, skip by my leading,
Skip, skip, skip by my leading,
Skip by my leading, my darlin’.
Took the lyrics right out of my mouth.
@Dave: Thank you for those comments on Skip by Leading. If I didn’t say that it only works in the middle of a column (that is, text above and below), then I should have. Very good point. I agree that having more object-level control would be good.
It’s also true that when its off InDesign often skips some space, but the amount always baffles me. Sometimes more, sometimes less. Grrr.
Meanwhile, I hope we didn’t sound too zoned out in this episode. It was late night for Anne-Marie and I felt kind of out of it myself. Realized the next day that I had a fever and ended up on antibiotics. Happy to be home and recovering now.
Regarding the OFotWEEE
Preferences are for letting the users choose how the program interacts with them. Proper examples of preferences are units, spelling language, and Story Editor display. Changing preferences should not change the way the current document looks. Preferences also should not change how copied text appears when pasted in another document.
Preferences are not for storing options that will have a global effect of the appearance of a document. Things that should not be preferences include Advanced Type preferences (superscript and subscript), Skip by Leading, and Text Wrap Only Affects Text Beneath. Those commands belong (respectively) in the Character panel, the Text Wrap panel, and the toilet (as it is only there to keep QuarkXPress users from getting smarter).
It’s frustrating that Adobe seems reluctant to add truly useful options to Preferences, yet leaves in so many options that don’t belong there, or anywhere.
David, just a detail but the sound of this podcast is much better! Volume, deepness, are you using a different microphone in Dubai? You should keep it for the next shows. Maybe I’m the only one, but I often listen to you while commuting and have always been uncomfortable with the sound quality and volume. Just wanted to say that this episode is a welcome improvement.
Great content deserves great sound!
Thanks // ep
@ep: That’s very interesting! Yes, I was actually using a new headset — another Plantronics, but this time a travel-sized one that came with a copy of MacSpeech Dictate. I’m glad you thought it was better quality. I’ll try using it again.
As for creating PDFs from files in Acrobat, if you want specific resolution and crops etc, like you would have for export from InDesign, do you have to have everything set up in InDesign AND a specific Distiller setting open? I know if I want to have a high resolution or printer spec to happen with Export to PDF, I have to have the right Distiller setting pulled down. Was this addressed already? Do I make any sense?
D
PS is it wrong that I smile when A-M freaks out and gets excited about things?