InQuestion: Automatic Table and Figure Numbering
Jamie McKee shows how to use defined lists to take the time and toil out of numbering tables and figures in InDesign.
Q: I’m editing and repurposing a book containing several dozen figures and tables. Each is titled and numbered consecutively, but most of these figures/tables are going to be shuffled and reordered. Is there a GREP or script that can help me renumber them once the project is finished so I don’t have to do it all by hand?
A: You’ve run into a common scenario that many people have to deal with. And while given enough time (and likely money), a script could likely be written to solve this, there’s an easier solution right within InDesign that can handle this task for you: Defined Lists.
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I tried to do this several months ago with a document that contained more than one figure on a page — the numbering became hopelessly tangled, with InDesign’s sense of sequence interfering with the document’s presentation. For example, if figure 1.1 was at the bottom of the first column and figure 1.2 was in the middle of the second column, the automatic numbering reversed their numbers and no matter what I did with regard to cutting and reinserting, the numbering remained capricious and unstable. Any way to avoid?
@Nita: are you anchoring the graphics or just placing them on the page? If the former, ID goes from left-to-right and top-to-bottom. Anchoring should avoid this problem.
Well how cool! I will try that. Thanks!
If I anchor graphics to text, then I am only creating the same f**ked up scenario as MS Word! If I have a half page graphic that’s anchored, it’ll go berserk if it’s close to the end of a page. You need to help us solve the place graphic problem instead of this crazy idea of anchoring.
John, you do have a point… a non-anchored solution would be terrific.
It think it depends on the methods used to anchor the graphic. I find the visual method of click on the anchor icon and dragging it to the text very unreliable.
I prefer adjusting the custom settings under the Object>Anchored Object>Option/Insert dialog box (after changing from Inline to Custom).
However, InDesign is not as intelligent when anchoring a graphic at the top/bottom of a page when one has a multi-column layout (unlike Adobe FrameMaker).
>>You need to help us solve
Who is “you”?