Combing documents for printing books

Jedidiah Smith

This topic has 3 replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 6 years, 8 months ago by Lindsey Martin.

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- August 19, 2017 at 10:48 am #96927
  
  Jedidiah Smith
  Member
  
  I have a book created for a handbook. Each chapter is a separate document. When I print these, I would like for all the pages to be filled. For example, the last page of one of the documents only takes up 1/3 of the page. I would like the first page of the next document to resume where the previous document left off so there is not so much white space. Is this possible? I hope this is somewhat clear. :) Thanks!
- August 22, 2017 at 3:57 am #96965
  
  Masood Ahmad
  Participant
  
  I think you have to consult a Script writer to get this automated if this is something regular, else you have to do it manually.
- August 22, 2017 at 9:22 am #96986
  
  Jedidiah Smith
  Member
  
  Thank you. How would I do it manually? Whenever I print, it prints all documents, so I’m not sure how I would manually move them up. Thanks.
- August 22, 2017 at 4:10 pm #97013
  
  Lindsey Martin
  Member
  
  I assume what is wanted here is for the beginning of a chapter to start not at the top of a new page but some distance below the last text of the preceding chapter. There is no automatic way to do this when the chapters are in separate documents. You need to combine all chapters into one document.
  
  [Method 1] If you copy and paste the text from chapter two at the end of the text of chapter one and so on, you will end up with all the text in one story. A lot of work and chance of introducing error. Then, set the para. style for the chapter titles to begin a certain distance below the last text of the preceding chapter. You may need a style to bump the title to the top of the next page in some instances as well.
  
  [Method 2] If you drag the proxies from the pages panel in chapter two and insert after the last page of chapter one and so on, you will end up with each chapter still in its own story. A little less work and less liable to error. Then, add a text frame below the end of the text in the preceding and link it to first text frame of the next chapter. You will then be able to shift the top of the new text frame up and down until the title has the space you want above it.
  
  The script Merge TextFrames from Ajar Productions will combine the text frames into one. There may be other scripts; search for ‘ID merge text frames’. You could then proceed as in Method 1.
  
  If this is a project you are going to be doing over and over, Method 1 or the variant of Method 2 with a script. If it were my project, I would keep the separate files arranged in a book and go back and play with the typesetting and layout to see if I could eliminate the short pages at the ends of the chapters.
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