Comments on: Synchronize Multiple InDesign Documents

By: David Blatner

David Blatner — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 18:16:02 +0000

Someone else just emailed me with a sample document with this same problem (pages not renumbering properly). The solution: Just choose Update Numbering > Update Page & Section Numbers from the book panel menu. That seems to make it work. Perhaps InDesign just got confused and forgot to update the numbers.

By: David Blatner

David Blatner — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 13:24:28 +0000

@Bader: It’s hard to say what could be going wrong in your document, but my guess is that if you open the numbering & section dialog box in each document, you’ll find that some are set to Automatic Page Numbering, and some are set to “Start on Page…”.

By: Bader

Bader — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 15:14:53 +0000

I have 10 docs in a book. However, My book is not numbering the pages in sequence. Every doc is continuing numbering from the preceding doc, only, but I’m not able to get the numbering continues all over the 10 docs. How can I sort that?

By: Klaus Nordby

Klaus Nordby — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:45:08 +0000

Ah, everything’s “better/easier” with the old, tried, boring techniques. I’m not talking about them, but a Radical Crazy Approach — which works nicely, and isn’t old and boring.

By: David Blatner

David Blatner — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:40:47 +0000

Klaus, if you’re talking about printing to PDF, we covered that in this post. But I think Acrobat is probably the better/easier way to go.

By: Klaus Nordby

Klaus Nordby — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 18:53:18 +0000

David, there actually IS a way to convert a full-color InDesign file, with placed color images, to black-only inside ID and output a fairly decent black-only PDF. So . . . what am I offered for giving up this little trade secret?

By: David Blatner

David Blatner — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 11:47:36 +0000

@M: There is no way to make that conversion inside the InDesign document. You can simply print to grayscale (that’s an option in the Print dialog box). Or use Adobe Acrobat Pro to convert color pdf files to grayscale.

By: M

Fri, 12 Sep 2008 18:50:29 +0000

How do I convert 4 process inks into 1 process ink (black) in indesign CS3?

By: David Blatner

David Blatner — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 12:21:18 +0000

@Patricia: Sander’s problem is easily fixed by choosing the correct setting in the Book Page Numbering Options dialog box (see image in the post above). InDesign doesn’t randomly add pages; it just does it when it’s repaginating, based on those options.

For example, if chapter 1 ends on page 29 and you have “start on next odd page” selected, then ID has to add a new blank page 30.

However, if you have “Continue from Previous Document” selected (which is the default), then InDesign makes the first page of chapter 2 start on page 30 — a left-hand page! Suddenly, chapter 2’s pages are all flipped (what was a left-page turns into a right page). But only because “you asked for it.”

If you disable Automatically Update Page Numbers, then this will not happen.

Of course, another alternative is to simply use the Load Styles feature in the Paragraph Styles panel menu.

By: Patricia Robinett

Patricia Robinett — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 19:45:48 +0000

does anyone know how to save paragraph styles for use in other documents? i have 5 books i want to all be alike. don’t want to risk the odd-even mess mentioned by sander. thanks.