InDesign "Tip of the Week"

[Sparky]

Jan 26, 2006:
Search and Replace Quote Marks
I was recently sent a file that had straight quotation marks (both
single and double) instead of curly (typographer's) quotes. It turns
out that it's harder to replace these than it should be. Here are two
methods, each with their pros and cons.

Method 1: Find/Change
It's easy to search for quotes: Just type a single or double quote
mark in the Find What field of the Find/Change dialog box. But how
do you convert a straight single quote to a curly quote? There is a
keyboard shortcut (different on Mac OS and Windows) to type curly
quotes, but why bother trying to remember it? Just pick a special
character from the little flyout menu to the right of the Change To
field (it's the one labeled with a small black triangle).

Unfortunately, you have to pick either the left or the right quote --
so you should probably search for a space character followed by a
quote first. That will find most of the beginning quotes (because there
is usually a space before an open quote mark). Replace that with a
space followed by the Single or Double Left Quotation Mark (from that
flyout menu). Next search for all the paragraph characters (again, from
that menu) followed by a quote mark. That'll find all the quote marks
at the beginning of a sentence. The quote marks that are left over are
probably close marks, so you can search for all the rest of the quote
marks and change them to the Single or Double Right Quotation Mark.

Method 2: Export/Import
Here's a far faster way to accomplish the same thing. (Thanks to Anne-
Marie Concepcion for the clue to this solution.) Place the flashing text
cursor in the story and choose File > Export. Then choose InDesign
Tagged Text from the Format popup menu and click Save (noting where
you're saving the file, of course). Now select the whole text story in your
document, delete it, choose File > Place, and select the file you just saved
out. Before you click OK, turn on Show Import Options. Now, when you
click OK, InDesign offers you the option of replacing your quotes with
typographer quotes. Turn it on, click OK, and you're done.

The first solution takes longer, but is great when you have a bunch of
different text stories in your document (or you want to search across
multiple open documents). The second solution is faster, but only works
one story at a time.

--David Blatner


Feb 2, 2006

Follow-up on Search and Replace Quote Marks
One of my favorite things about tips & tricks is that they are
sometimes so obvious, and yet I learn new ones all the time.
Here is a great example.

In response to last week's tip about converting straight quotes
to curly ("typographer's") quotes, Martin Braun wrote to us from
Germany:

"I think there is an even faster way to set all quotation marks to
typographer's style: Just replace all quotation marks by another
character or combination of characters that is not included in the
text (e.g. "xlink "). Then replace "xlink " with " (the quotation mark).
InDesign will automatically use the correct quotation mark." (Note
that this only works when the Use Typographer's Quotes checkbox
is turned on in the Preferences dialog box.)

Thanks, Martin!
--David Blatner

Since my return to the forums, things have changed in my life. I will post a few of these at a time until I get caught up to the present day.

Enjoy, Sparky 8)

[Sparky]

=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========
Feb 16, 2006

Target That Page

If you drag the vertical scroll bar halfway down, you'll end
up about halfway through your long InDesign document.
But if you follow that by pressing Shift-Page Down (to jump
to the next page), you may end up on a very unexpected
page. Why? Because this keyboard shortcut takes you to the
next page after the currently-targeted page in the Pages
palette, not the one you're actually looking at. So after
dragging the scroll bar, click once anywhere on the page or
pasteboard. That targets this spread. Now the shortcut will
work as expected. --David Blatner

=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========
March 2, 2006

Go and Fit in Window

You know you can jump to a particular page by double-clicking
on it in the Pages palette. But did you know that you can hold
down the Option/Alt key while double-clicking to jump to that
page and switch to Fit Page in Window at the same time?
--David Blatner

=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========
March 16, 2006

Duplicating a Page

Need to make a slight variation on a layout but keep the
original? You can duplicate a page in your document by
holding down the Option/Alt key while dragging it in the
Pages palette. --David Blatner

[Sparky]

OK this will take forever, and I don't have all the tips in my archives, but here's where you can find them all:
http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/22813.html

Have fun, I'm gonna pull this out of "Sticky" mode soon, so bookmark this URL

Sparky

[Pointyhat]

Bookmarked added, thanks Sparky!

[Sparky]

For those who are too lazy to click on a URL here's another

=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========

Build Guide Libraries
You can save a page's guides by selecting them and
choosing Add Item from the Library's palette menu
or by clicking the New Item button at the bottom of
the palette. Then, when you want to use the same set
of guides on another page, simply select it in the
Library and choose Place Item(s) in the palette menu.
This places the same guides, in the same positions,
on the new page. You can't add to or place guides
from a Library using drag and drop

-- Erica Gamet, from InDesign Magazine #7

[Sparky]

=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========
March 7, 2007

Sample Images with the Eyedropper
Use the Eyedropper tool to sample colors from placed images.
With the Eyedropper tool selected, move over the desired color
in the placed image. Click to sample the color, then click the
New Swatch icon in the Swatches palette, or Add to Swatches
from the Color palette to store the color as a swatch. The
eyedropper samples the color in the same color mode as the
placed graphic. For example, sampling an RGB image creates an
RGB swatch. Now you can apply that new color to an item by
clicking on it with the full Eyedropper. When you want to sample
a new color, be sure to use Option/Alt-click to get the empty
Eyedropper

-- Erica Gamet, from InDesign Magazine #7
http://www.indesignmag.com/idm/issues.html

============================================

Did you miss a tip? Check out past tips here:
http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/22813.html

[born2print]

Good stuff Sparky, thanks.
I just wish I had the replace quote info about 3 weeks ago though!
:wink:

[Sparky]

=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========
March 22, 2007

Paragraph Styles = Diagnostic Tool
When you edit a file created by someone else, you
may not know the full range of styling applied to
text. To find out, place the cursor in the text and
create a New Paragraph Style. The dialog box
immediately displays every style applied to the object.

-- Tracey Lawrence, from InDesign Magazine #7

[Sparky]

I N D E S I G N M A G A Z I N E
Tip-of-the-Week
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=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========
April 19, 2007

Add Ruler Guides Fast
To quickly add a ruler guide, double-click on a ruler
to create a guide out from that point. For instance,
for a vertical guide at 3 inches, double-click at 3
inches on the horizontal ruler. Add the Shift key to
snap to the nearest ruler tick mark

-- Erica Gamet, from InDesign Magazine
http://www.indesignmag.com/idm/issues.html

[Sparky]

I N D E S I G N M A G A Z I N E
Tip-of-the-Week
April 26, 2007
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If you're reading this...you must be bored.
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=========== T I P - O F - T H E - W E E K ===========

Move Precisely
Sometimes the most precise way to move objects on a page is to
use your keyboard's arrow keys. Press arrow keys to move items
in 1-pt increments. (That's the default; you can change this
preference in the Units & Increments panel of the Preferences dialog
box.) Add the Shift key to move items in 10-pt increments (or 10
times the current increment value). Press Command (Mac) or Ctrl
(Windows) and the Shift key to move items in .1-pt increments (or
one-tenth the increment value).

-- Keith Gilbert, from InDesign Magazine
http://www.indesignmag.com/idm/issues.html