Something’s missing in Table and Cell Styles? Or am I missing something?
I’m up to the section in my book (InDesign CS3 Visual Quickstart) where I talk about the new feature for Table and Cell styles. I think someone has left something out of the whole paradigm.
The stroke settings for Table styles follow the same workflow for Table attributes and only allow you to control the stroke of the table borrder.
If you want to create stroke colors for the interior cells, you have to define a cell style.
This doesn’t follow the same logic as Paragraph and Character styles, where the Paragraph styles can control all attributes of the text, including character attributes.
As it is now, you have to define a new cell style in order to change the interior strokes of a table style.
I understand Adobe’s attempt to control cell styles this way. But shouldn’t there be a default cell style in all documents that is, by default, applied to the Basic Table style?
That way it would allow me to change the stroke color for a table by just redefining one area of the Table style and one area of the cell style. Right now I have to define a cell style, then open the Basic Table Style and then apply the cell style to all the areas of the Table.
I agree. While table and cell styles are very welcome, they seem very half-baked. I would love to see much more customization available. Hopefully in CS4 they will be beefed up as much as find/change.
CS3 Tables styles are consistent with the previous relationship between Table and Cell attributes: interior strokes are cell attributes, so they cannot be changed at the Table level.
It’s been that way at least since CS, possibly since ID 2.0. And it’s never made sense to me either.
Sandee, I agree that there are a number of things missing from table/cell styles. It could definitely be beefed up in the future. The feature I most want is a way to automatically set header or footer rows (”first 2 rows should be headers”). Without this, the whole auto-update from an Excel file is incredibly annoying (because you have to redefine the header row every time you update).
You’re right, Sandee, esp. in re the comparison to the relationship of Paragraph and Character styles.
One thing is that the Table style is obviously using some sort of parameter for Cell styles (how does it decide what the cell strokes should be?), it’s just that it’s an implied Cell Style. If they made it more explicit by adding a default Cell Style (”Basic Cell Style”) that a Basic Table Style used by default — which it already is — then at least we could edit that Basic Cell Style.
In the meantime, a workaround for defining cell strokes and fills in a Table Style without having to create a Cell Style is to go ahead and define Alternating ones for each. (Table Style Options has panels for Column Strokes, Row Strokes and Cell Fills but only if they’re the “alternating” type.)
But for each Alternating thing, enter the same settings for “First” and “Next.” An alternating fill of 20% green and 20% green results in a 20% green fill throughout.
> But for each Alternating thing, enter the same settings for “First” and “Next.” An alternating fill of 20% green and 20% green results in a 20% green fill throughout.
Yes, AM, I thought of that as a workaround. But I’m more upset that I have to explain this nonsense in my book and don’t want to have to deal with the lack of similarity between Table styles and Paragraph styles.
Worse, I’m precluded from entering cool workarounds and tips like thiat because I have to keep the page count down on the book.
So I leave it up to InDesign Secrets to post these types of things or let David and Ole handle it in their book.
Hoping that Smart Styles (woodwing) will be released soon for CS3.
Wa Veghel wrote: “Hoping that Smart Styles (woodwing) will be released soon for CS3.”
Yes, indeed. I working on a publication with some 150 pages of tables and I’m taking 50% longer to do the job using the new table styles rather than Smart Styles. And, I’ll not have time to make refinements that would have been added automatically with Smart Styles.
LTM
I would love to learn more about the differences between the Smart Styles plug-in — for tables — and the CS3 implementation of table and cell styles. What does the plug-in do that ID isn’t doing? Can you (Wa or L. Thomas) go into details?
AM
AM, the big difference is that with Smartstyles you can format the Column width, row height, headers and footers and it can preserve local formating. besides, you don’t need cell/table styles.
I’m working on a weekly publication with 50 different tables. The data of these tables changes every week but the format remains. Once I set the format (and drag it to the SS library), it takes seconds to format a table.
You can find more info and a 30 days trial version (CS & CS2) here:
http://www.woodwing.com/en/Smart_Styles
Sandee said:
“Right now I have to define a cell style, then open the Basic Table Style and then apply the cell style to all the areas of the Table.”
You’re talking about the “Cell Styles” area in the Table Styles Options dialog General panel, right? You don’t have to assign the cell style to all the areas — only body rows. The other areas are set to “[Same as Body Rows]” by default.
Also, if you do this with no document open, then essentially you have what you’re looking for, and it’s a pretty quick workaround:
1. Close all docs
2. Create a new cell style, called “Default” or some such
3. Edit [Basic Table]. In the General panel, under the Cell Styles area, under the “Body Rows” dropdown, choose the cell style you created in step 2.
Now all new tables have that cell style applied on all cells. All strokes, interior and exterior take on the attributes in the cell style.
Smart Styles is a smart library, saving formatting rather than objects. It records the formatting of an example and it records, and can reapply, every detail. And, it can be used for text as well as tables.
Today a typesetter says to me, “Table Styles isn’t working”. So I go and check it out. You make a table, set it up just how you like it and then you select the whole table and click on the “New Table Style” icon in the panel. A new Table Style appears. You make a new table somewhere else and try to apply that Table Style, and nothing happens. This function does not behave in the same way as the text and object styles. Am I missing something here?
I seem to remember hearing somewhere that the Table Styles / Cell Styles feature in CS3 is related to the IDCS2 plugin “Table Styles/Cell Styles Pro” from Teacup Software. Anyway, these comments ring familiar. With this program, I create a new table style, and when I want to use it, I alt+click on [No table style] to strip out any existing formatting and then click on the table style I want. It apparently doesn’t format any character or paragraph styles, nor does it format the geometry (table size, # of rows, column widths, etc.). Wish it did. I haven’t used the Woodwing plug-in.
Sandee — Any chance one of the InDesignSecrets.com gurus could post a tip on how to properly use the new Table Styles and Cell Styles panels? It would be really helpful. Just when I think I understand how the panels interact, they don’t do what I think they will :( BTW — love this website — it is a great ID resource and I visit often.
I too would really love a table/cell guide on how to use this feature it’s not working for me either!
I’d like to add to the discussion about table styles not working. I followed a video by Anne-Marie (so I know I’m doing it right!) and my new table style won’t apply to any other tables!
I’ve tried bringing over pre-made tables, which is what I usually work from, and tables that I’ve made from scratch. Applying the table style will either a) apply SOME formatting but not all or b) absolutely nothing.
I’m using InDesign 5.0.2 and OS X 10.5.2.
I kind of doubt Adobe will be fixing this problem in CS4, although it would be nice. If they haven’t addressed the problem since CS…I guess you just have to find a workaround.
That’s the one thing I hate about Adobe: they already want my kidney when I upgrade simply because I live in Europe, and then they omit lots of features which we’ll then have to purchase as plug-ins costing a liver.
The Smart Styles plug-in would be perfect for a job I’m about to start on, but $200 is above budget at the time.