Opening Documents and Templates


Opening documents with InDesign is pretty much the same as opening documents with any program. Simply choose File Open or press z +O or Ctrl+O, locate and click on the document you want to work on, then click the Open button. But InDesign offers a few options for opening documents you don't find in every program. For example, you can

  • Open more than one document at a time.

  • Open a copy of a document instead of the original. This keeps the original file from being overwritten accidentally ‚ very helpful if you're making several variations of one document.

  • Open a template under its own name . This makes editing templates easier than it is with other programs, specifically QuarkXPress.

  • Open documents created with PageMaker and QuarkXPress, as well as PDF files.

    Tip ‚  

    InDesign's File menu displays the names of the five most recently saved documents in the Open Recent submenu that appears under the Open option in the File menu after you have opened a file.

To open a file:

  1. Choose File Open, or press z +O or Ctrl+O.

    The Open a File dialog box, shown in Figure 4-4, is displayed.


    Figure 4-4: The Mac (left) and Windows (right) versions of the Open a File dialog box differ slightly. When you open a file, you have the option to open it normally (Open Normal), open the original copy of a template (Open Original), or open a copy of the file (Open Copy).

  2. Locate and open the folder that contains the document(s) you want to open. Click on a file name or hold down the z or Ctrl keys and click on multiple file names.

    In Windows, the Files of Type pop-up menu offers the option to display: PageMaker 6.5 ‚ 7.0 files, QuarkXPress 3.3 ‚ 4.1 files, InDesign files, InDesign Interchange, and All Formats. Choose any of these options to display a specific file format in the file list. On a Mac, the Open a File dialog box will display any supported file formats that have a Mac icon, and the dialog box includes a Preview pane that displays a thumbnail version of the selected file or, more commonly, its icon.

    Note ‚  

    InDesign Interchange is a format that permits InDesign 2 to open the document. InDesign CS does not let you save its files to InDesign 2 format, so if you work with InDesign 2 users, they'll need to get the optional InDesign Interchange plug-in to save and open these files. InDesign CS will open InDesign 2 files without any additional software; the purpose of InDesign Interchange is to let InDesign 2 users work with InDesign 3 files and save them in a format that retains InDesign CS-specific features, which InDesign 2 otherwise would not support.

    Tip ‚  

    In Windows InDesign, use All Files InDesign in the Files of Type pop-up menu to display Mac files with no extensions. In Macintosh InDesign, use All Documents in the Show pop-up menus to display Windows files without the InDesign icons.

  3. If you want to open the original document (rather than a copy of the document), click Normal under Open As. To open a copy of a document, click Open Copy.

    When you open a copy of a document, it's assigned a default name (Untitled-1, Untitled-2, and so on). If you want to use a template to create a new version of a publication, click Normal; InDesign will create a document based on the template. To open a template under its own name so that you can edit it, click Open Original. Templates are explained in the following section, "Opening documents versus opening templates."

  4. Click OK to close the dialog box.

    Each document you opened is displayed in a separate document window. The page and view magnification displayed when a document was last saved is used when you open the document.

    Tip ‚  

    You can also open an InDesign document or template by double-clicking on its file icon. If InDesign is not running, double-clicking on a document or template file ‚ as long as it has the proper icon on the Mac or file extension (.indd for documents and .indt for templates) in Windows ‚ will launch the application and open the document/template. If InDesign is already running, the document is displayed in a new window.

Opening documents versus opening templates

Whenever you save a document, you have the option of saving a standard document file or a template (more on saving templates later in this chapter). A template is an InDesign file that's used to create multiple iterations of the same publication. For example, if you produce a monthly newsletter, you'll save gobs of time and ensure consistency from issue to issue by using a template as the starting point for each edition of the newsletter. A template is essentially the shell of a publication that contains the basic framework ‚ page layout, master pages, style sheets, and so on ‚ but doesn't contain any actual content.

Cross-Reference ‚  

For more information about creating templates, see Chapter 7.

When you open a template, you have two choices: You can either open a copy of the file and use it to create a new publication, or you can open the original file, make changes, and then save an updated version of the template. If you want to use a template as the starting point for a new publication, choose File Open or press z +O or Ctrl+O, locate and select the template, and make sure Open Normal is selected in the Open a File dialog box (refer to Figure 4-4) before you click Open. If you want to modify a template, click Open Original. If Normal is selected, clicking OK opens a new document window and assigns the document a default name, Untitled-1, Untitled-2, and so on. If Open Original is selected, the original file is opened and the original name is displayed in the title bar.

Converting documents created with other programs

One of InDesign's hallmarks is its ability to open documents from other programs and convert them to InDesign documents. You can open PageMaker 6.5 ‚ 7.0 and QuarkXPress 3.3 ‚ 4.1 x documents. (Adobe has no plans to support files in the version 5 or 6 formats of QuarkXPress.)

Note ‚  

Well, most of the time you can open PageMaker and QuarkXPress documents. Because the other programs' formats are so different from InDesign's, and their capabilities differ as well, the chances of being able to import a foreign document and have it flawlessly convert to InDesign are small. So use this feature to do the first step in the conversion process, but expect to spend time cleaning up the converted files by hand. In some cases, you may see that the amount of cleanup work is more than simply re-creating the document in InDesign from scratch ‚ don't panic when that's the case. And be happy when your documents convert effortlessly.

InDesign will alert you to any import issues of PageMaker and QuarkXPress files with a dialog box that appears after the import is complete, as Figure 4-5 shows.


Figure 4-5: InDesign shows a Conversion Warnings dialog box if there are any issues in importing foreign file formats.
Cross-Reference ‚  

InDesign cannot import PDF files so that the text and images are editable, but it can bring in PDF files as graphics for placement in your document. Chapter 23 covers this process in detail.

QuarkXPress

InDesign can read QuarkXPress files from version 3.3 through 4.1 x . Because there are so many differences between QuarkXPress and InDesign, it's impossible to predict all the conversion issues that may arise. The good news is that a great many things work well, but some don't. Here are some common conversion issues to pay attention to:

  • If your QuarkXPress document relies on XTensions (a type of plug-in) to add capabilities (such as table creation), it will not convert correctly into InDesign and may not even import at all. Examples include any documents built with QuarkXPress's indexing and book features.

  • QuarkXPress's leading model is different than InDesign's, so expect leading to sometimes vary significantly, especially if you use additive leading as the automatic leading method in QuarkXPress.

  • InDesign won't retain kerning-table adjustments in QuarkXPress files. (It does retain any kerning applied manually, which InDesign 2 did not.)

  • The customizable dashes in QuarkXPress are converted to solid and dashed lines ‚ note that stripes do convert properly.

  • Special gradient blends, such as the diamond-pattern, are converted to linear blends or circular blends.

  • Text on a curved path is converted to regular text in a rectangular frame, even though InDesign supports text on paths.

  • H&J sets don't have an equivalent in InDesign, so they do not convert, although any H&J settings are carried over into the converted paragraph styles.

  • Libraries won't convert.

  • Printer styles won't convert.

    Cross-Reference ‚  

    Appendix C covers other issues in moving from QuarkXPress to InDesign.

PageMaker

InDesign can read PageMaker 6.5 and 7.0 files. Because PageMaker and InDesign offer many of the same features, there are fewer translation issues between them. Some to take note of include the following:

  • Fill patterns aren't supported.

  • Libraries won't convert.

  • Printer styles won't convert.

    Cross-Reference ‚  

    Appendix D covers other issues in moving from PageMaker to InDesign.

Importing text files

In addition to letting you open InDesign, PageMaker, and QuarkXPress files, InDesign also lets you work with text files created with word processing programs. However, you can't open word processing files using the Open command (File Open, or z +O or Ctrl+O). Instead, you must place, or import, text files using the Place command (File Place, or z +D or Crtl+D).

You can use the Place command to import Rich Text Format (RTF), Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Word, and text-only (ASCII). For Word and Excel, InDesign supports all Mac versions since version 98 and all Windows versions since version 97.

InDesign also supports two proprietary text formats: Tagged Text, a way of coding text files with InDesign formatting information, and InDesign Interchange, a format that lets InDesign CS and InDesign 2 users work on the same files. (InDesign 2 users must buy the InDesign Interchange software, which includes the Scripting and XML Reader plug-ins, to use this format.)

Cross-Reference ‚  

For more information about importing text files, see Chapter 9. For more on Tagged Text, see Chapter 14.

In addition to letting you import text files, InDesign lets you export text files. See the "Saving files in other formats" section later in this chapter for more information.

Recovering a document after a crash or power failure

InDesign includes an automatic-recovery feature that protects your documents in the event of a power failure or a system crash. As you work on a document, any changes you make after saving it are stored in a separate, temporary file. Under normal circumstances, each time you choose Save, the information in the temporary file is applied to the document. The data in the temporary file is important only if you weren't able to save a document before crashing. A word of warning: Although InDesign's automatic recovery feature is a nice safety net, you should still be careful to save your work often. Here's how it works:

  1. Relaunch InDesign or, if necessary, restart your computer and then launch InDesign.

  2. If automatic-recovery data is available, InDesign automatically opens the recovered document and displays the word "Recovered" in the document's title bar.

    This lets you know that the document contains changes that were not included in the last saved version.

  3. If you want to save the recovered data, choose File Save; "Recovered" is removed as part of the filename, and InDesign will ask if you want to overwrite the old file.

    Overwriting the old file is easier than using File Save As and entering a name ‚ unless you do want to save a copy of the file in case you want to go back to the old version later. If you want to use the last saved version of the document (and disregard the recovered data), close the file (File Close, or z +W or Ctrl+W) without saving, then open the file (File Open, or z +O or Ctrl+O).

    Note ‚  

    Sometimes, InDesign can't automatically recover the documents for you. Instead, it gives you the choice of recovering any files open during a crash or power outage , saving the recovery data for later, or deleting the recovery data. You'll typically want to recover the files immediately.




Adobe InDesign CS Bible
Adobe InDesign CS3 Bible
ISBN: 0470119381
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 344
Authors: Galen Gruman

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