Macromedia InDesign - CS6 User Guide

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ADOBE® INDESIGN® CS6

ADOBE INDESIGN CS6

SCRIPTING GUIDE: APPLESCRIPT

Adobe® InDesign® CS6 Scripting Guide: AppleScript

Document Update Status

(for entire document; see each chapter for chapter-specific update status)

CS6 Updated Throughout document, changed CS5 to CS6 and version 7.0 to 8.0.

If this guide is distributed with software that includes an end user agreement, this guide, as well as the software described in it, is furnished under license and may be used or copied only in accordance with the terms of such license. Except as permitted by any such license, no part of this guide may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of Adobe Systems Incorporated. Please note that the content in this guide is protected under copyright law even if it is not distributed with software that includes an end user license agreement.

The content of this guide is furnished for informational use only, is subject to change without notice, and should not be construed as a commitment by Adobe Systems Incorporated. Adobe Systems Incorporated assumes no responsibility or liability for any errors or inaccuracies that may appear in the informational content contained in this guide.

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Any references to company names in sample templates are for demonstration purposes only and are not intended to refer to any actual organization.

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Adobe Systems Incorporated, 345 Park Avenue, San Jose, California 95110, USA. Notice to U.S. Government End Users. The Software and Documentation are “Commercial Items,” as that term is defined at 48 C.F.R. §2.101, consisting of “Commercial Computer Software” and “Commercial Computer Software Documentation,” as such terms are used in 48 C.F.R. §12.212 or 48 C.F.R. §227.7202, as applicable. Consistent with 48 C.F.R. §12.212 or 48 C.F.R. §§227.7202-1 through

227.7202-4, as applicable, the Commercial Computer Software and Commercial Computer Software Documentation are being licensed to U.S. Government end users (a) only as Commercial Items and (b) with only those rights as are granted to all other end users pursuant to the terms and conditions herein. Unpublished-rights reserved under the copyright laws of the United States. Adobe Systems Incorporated, 345 Park Avenue, San Jose, CA 95110-2704, USA. For U.S. Government End Users, Adobe agrees to comply with all applicable equal opportunity laws including, if appropriate, the provisions of Executive Order 11246, as amended, Section 402 of the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act of 1974 (38 USC 4212), and Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended, and the regulations at 41 CFR Parts 60-1 through 60-60, 60-250, and 60-741. The affirmative action clause and regulations contained in the preceding sentence shall be incorporated by reference.

Contents

1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

How to Use the Scripts in this Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

About the Structure of the Scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

For More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

2 Scripting Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Script Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Getting the Current Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Script Versioning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Targeting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Compilation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Using the do script Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Sending parameters to do script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Returning values from do script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Controlling Undo with do Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Working with Script Labels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Running Scripts at Startup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

3 Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Basic Document Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Creating a new document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Opening a document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Saving a document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Closing a document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Basic Page Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Defining page size and document length . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Defining bleed and slug areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Setting page margins and columns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Changing the appearance of the pasteboard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Guides and grids . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Changing measurement units and ruler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Defining and applying document presets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Setting up master spreads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Adding XMP metadata . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Creating a document template . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Creating watermarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Selecting pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Resizing and reframing pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Transforming pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Master page overlay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Making an Adaptive Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Making a flexible layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Adding guides for a guide-based layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Setting constraints for an object-based layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Creating alternative layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Collecting and Dropping Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Printing a Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Printing using page ranges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Setting print preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Printing with printer presets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Exporting a Document as PDF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Exporting to PDF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Setting PDF export options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Exporting to grayscale PDF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Exporting a range of pages to PDF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

Exporting individual pages to PDF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

Exporting PDF with interactive features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Exporting as a PDF form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Exporting Pages as EPS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Exporting all pages to EPS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Exporting a range of pages to EPS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Exporting as EPS with file naming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Exporting to EPub . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Exporting the current document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Setting EPub export options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

4 Working with Layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Understanding the Layer Object Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Scripting Layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Creating layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Referring to layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Deleting layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Moving layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Duplicating layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Merging layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Assigning page items to layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Setting layer properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5 Text and Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

Entering and Importing Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

Creating a text frame . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

Adding text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Stories and text frames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Replacing text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Inserting special characters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Placing Text and Setting Text-Import Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Exporting Text and Setting Text-Export Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

Understanding Text Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Working with text selections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Moving and copying text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Text objects and iteration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Working with Text Frames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Linking text frames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Unlinking text frames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Removing a frame from a story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Splitting all frames in a story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Creating an anchored frame . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

Fitting text frames to content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Formatting Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Setting text defaults . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Working with fonts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Applying a font . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Changing text properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Changing text color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Creating and applying styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

Deleting a style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Importing paragraph and character styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Finding and Changing Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

About find/change preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

Finding and changing text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

Finding and changing text formatting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Using grep . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Using glyph search . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Working with Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Adding Path Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Using Autocorrect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Adding Footnotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Spanning Columns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Setting Text Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Working with Linked Stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Creating linked stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Changing linked story options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Frequently asked questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

6 Working with Page Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Creating Page Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Page-item geometry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Grouping Page Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Duplicating and Moving Page Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116

Creating compound paths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Using Pathfinder operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

Converting page-item shapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Arranging page items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Transforming Page Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Using the transform method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Working with transformation matrices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

Coordinate spaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

Transformation origin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124

Resolving locations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

Transforming points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126

Transforming again . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

Resize and Reframe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Working with Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Retrieving an article list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Adding new articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Removing an article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Reordering articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Adding new members to an article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Reordering members of an article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

Removing members from an article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

7 User Interfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

Dialog Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

Your First InDesign Dialog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Adding a User Interface to “Hello World” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Creating a More Complex User Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Working with ScriptUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Creating a progress bar with ScriptUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

8 Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

Understanding the Event Scripting Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

About event properties and event propagation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

Working with Event Listeners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Sample afterNew Event Listener . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

Sample beforePrint Event Listener . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143

Sample Selection Event Listeners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

Sample onIdle Event Listener . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146

9 Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Understanding the Menu Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Localization and menu names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

Running a Menu Action from a Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

Adding Menus and Menu Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

Menus and Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

Working with scriptMenuActions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

A More Complex Menu-scripting Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

10 Working with Preflight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

Exploring Preflight Profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

Listing preflight profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

Listing preflight rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

Listing preflight data objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

Importing a Preflight Profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

Creating a Preflight Profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

Adding Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

Processing a Profile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

Custom Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

Available Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

ADBE_BlankPages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

ADBE_BleedSlug . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

ADBE_BleedTrimHazard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171

ADBE_Colorspace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

ADBE_CrossReferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

ADBE_FontUsage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

ADBE_ImageColorManagement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

ADBE_ImageResolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

ADBE_PageCount . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

ADBE_PageSizeOrientation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

ADBE_ScaledGraphics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

ADBE_ScaledType . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

ADBE_SmallText . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

ADBE_SpotColorSetup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

ADBE_StrokeRequirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175

ADBE_TextOverrides . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175

ADBE_TransparencyBlending . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175

11 Creating Dynamic Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

Importing Movies and Sounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

Creating Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Creating Multistate Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180

Working with Animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182

Basic animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182

TimingSettings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183

Animating transformations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186

Motion presets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187

Design options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

Key frames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

Adding Page Transitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189

12 XML . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

The Best Approach to Scripting XML in InDesign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

Scripting XML Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

Setting XML preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

Setting XML import preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

Importing XML . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192

Creating an XML tag . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Loading XML tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Saving XML tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Creating an XML element . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Moving an XML element . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194

Deleting an XML element . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194

Duplicating an XML element . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194

Removing items from the XML structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

Creating an XML comment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

Creating an XML processing instruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

Working with XML attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

Working with XML stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197

Exporting XML . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Adding XML Elements to a Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Associating XML elements with page items and text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Marking up existing layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

Applying styles to XML elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

Working with XML tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205

13 XML Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

Why use XML rules? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208

XML-rules programming model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208

XML Rules Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214

Setting up a sample document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

Getting started with XML rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216

Changing the XML structure using XML rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

Duplicating XML elements with XML rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222

XML rules and XML attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

Applying multiple matching rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225

Finding XML elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226

Extracting XML elements with XML rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

Applying formatting with XML rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230

Creating page items with XML rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235

Creating Tables using XML Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236

Scripting the XML-rules Processor Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

14 Track Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240

Tracking Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240

Navigating tracked changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240

Accepting and reject tracked changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240

Information about tracked changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

Preferences for Tracking Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242

Chapter Update Status

CS6 Unchanged

Introduction

This document shows how to do the following:

 Work with the Adobe® InDesign® scripting environment.

 Use advanced scripting features.

 Perform basic document tasks like setting up master spreads, printing, and exporting.

 Work with page items (rectangles, ellipses, graphic lines, polygons, text frames, and groups).

 Work with text and type in an InDesign document, including finding and changing text.

 Create dialog boxes and other user-interface items.

 Customize and add menus and create menu actions.

 Respond to user-interface events.

 Work with XML, from creating XML elements and importing XML to adding XML elements to a layout.

 Apply XML rules, a new scripting feature that makes working with XML in InDesign faster and easier.

We assume that you have already read the Adobe InDesign Scripting Tutorial and know how to create, install, and run scripts. If you need to know how to connect with your scripting environment or view the InDesign scripting object model from your script editor, that information can be found in the Adobe InDesign Scripting Tutorial.

How to Use the Scripts in this Document

For the most part, the scripts shown in this document are not complete scripts. They are only fragments of scripts, and are intended to show only the specific part of a script relevant to the point being discussed in the text. You can copy the script lines shown in this document and paste them into your script editor, but you should not expect them to run without further editing. Note, in addition, that scripts copied out of this document may contain line breaks and other characters (due to the document layout) that will prevent them from executing properly.

A zip archive of all of the scripts shown in this document is available at the InDesign scripting home page, at: http://www.adobe.com/products/indesign/scripting/index.html expanded the archive, move the folders corresponding to the scripting language(s) of your choice into the Scripts Panel folder inside the Scripts folder in your InDesign folder. At that point, you can run the scripts from the Scripts panel inside InDesign.

. After you have downloaded and

CHAPTER 1: Introduction About the Structure of the Scripts 10

About the Structure of the Scripts

The script examples are all written using a common template that includes the handlers “main,” “mySetup,” “mySnippet,” and “myTeardown.” We did this to simplify automated testing and publication—there is no reason for you to construct your scripts this way. Most of the time, the part of the script you will be interested in will be inside the “mySnippet” handler.

For More Information

For more information on InDesign scripting, you also can visit the InDesign Scripting User to User forum, at

http://www.adobeforums.com

newest scripts. The forum contains hundreds of sample scripts.

. In the forum, script writers can ask questions, post answers, and share their

Chapter Update Status

CS6 Updated “Script Versioning” on page 12 and its three subsections have been updated, corrected, and clarified.

Scripting Features

This chapter covers scripting techniques related to InDesign’s scripting environment. Almost every other object in the InDesign scripting model controls a feature that can change a document or the application defaults. By contrast, the features in this chapter control how scripts operate.

This document discusses the following:

 The script preferences object and its properties.

 Getting a reference to the executing script.

 Running scripts in prior versions of the scripting object model.

 Using the do script method to run scripts.

 Working with script labels.

 Running scripts at InDesign start-up.

We assume that you have already read Adobe InDesign Scripting Tutorial and know how to write, install, and run InDesign scripts in the scripting language of your choice.

Script Preferences

The script preferences object provides objects and properties related to the way InDesign runs scripts. The following table provides more detail on each property of the script preferences object:

Property Description

enable redraw

scripts folder

scripts list

Turns screen redraw on or off while a script is running from the Scripts panel.

The path to the scripts folder.

A list of the available scripts. This property is an array of arrays, in the following form:

[[fileName, filePath], ...]

Where fileName is the name of the script file and filePath is the full path to the script. You can use this feature to check for the existence of a script in the installed set of scripts.

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Getting the Current Script 12

Property Description

user interaction level

This property controls the alerts and dialogs InDesign presents to the user. When you set this property to any alerts or dialogs. Set it to disable dialogs. Set it to alerts and dialogs. The ability to turn off alert displays is very useful when you are opening documents via script; often, InDesign displays an alert for missing fonts or linked graphics files. To avoid this alert, set the user-interaction level to then restore user interaction (set the property to completing script execution.

version

The version of the scripting environment in use. For more information, see

“Script Versioning” on page 12

version of the application.

Getting the Current Script

You can get a reference to the current script using the active script property of the application object. You can use this property to help you locate files and folders relative to the script, as shown in the following example (from the ActiveScript tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myScript to active script display dialog ("The current script is: " & myScript) tell application "Finder"

set myFile to file myScript

set myParentFolder to container of myFile end tell display dialog ("The folder containing the active script is: " & myParentFolder)

end tell

never interact, InDesign does not display

interact with alerts to enable alerts but

interact with all to restore the normal display of

never interact before opening the document,

interact with all) before

. Note this property is not the same as the

When you debug scripts using a script editor, the active script property returns an error. Only scripts run from the Scripts palette appear in the

Script Versioning

InDesign can run scripts using earlier versions of the InDesign scripting object model. To run an older script in a newer version of InDesign, you must consider the following:

 Targeting — Scripts must be targeted to the version of InDesign in which they are being run (i.e., the

current version). The mechanics of targeting are language specific as described in “Targeting” on

page 13.

 Compilation — This involves mapping the names in the script to the underlying script IDs, which are

what InDesign understands. The mechanics of compilation are language specific as described in

“Compilation” on page 13

 Interpretation — This involves matching the IDs to the appropriate request handler within InDesign

so that InDesign correctly interprets a script written for an earlier version of the scripting object model. To do this, either explicitly set the application’s script preferences to the old object model within the

active script property.

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Script Versioning 13

script (as shown in “Interpretation” on page 13) or run the script from a folder in the Scripts panel folder as follows:

Folder For InDesign version of scripts

Version 8.0 Scripts

Version 7.0 Scripts

Version 6.0 Scripts

Version 5.0 Scripts

Version 2.0 Scripts

Targ eting

A script must always target the version of InDesign under which it is running (the current version), either explicitly or implicitly. Targeting is implicit when the script is launched from the Scripts panel.

Otherwise, explicit targeting for AppleScripts is done using the tell statement:

--Target InDesign CS6 tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

Compilation

Typically, AppleScripts are compiled using the targeted application’s dictionary. This behavior may be overridden by means of the InDesign dictionary for compilation purposes. For example, to use a CS5 script (version 7.0) within CS6 (version 8.0):

CS6

CS5 and CS5.5

CS4

CS3

CS2

using terms from statement, which substitutes a different version of the

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" --target CS6

using terms from application "InDesign CS5" --compile using CS5

--InDesign CS5 version script goes here. end using terms from end tell

For this to work, you need to generate a CS5 version of the AppleScript dictionary, use the publish

terminology command, which is exposed on the application object. The dictionary is generated into a

folder (named with the version of the DOM) that is in the preferences folder. For example, to generate the CS5 dictionary into the

/Users/<username>/Library/Preferences/Adobe InDesign/Version 8.0/<locale>/Scripting Support/7.0-J folder:

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--publish the InDesign CS5 dictionary (version 7.0 DOM) publish terminology version 7.0 end tell

Interpretation

The InDesign application object contains a script preferences object, which allows a script to get/set the version of the scripting object model to use for interpreting scripts. The version defaults to the current version of the application and persists.

Scripting Support folder in your application’s

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Using the do script Method 14

For example, to change the version of the scripting object model to CS5 (7.0):

--Set to 7.0 scripting object model set version of script preferences to 7.0

Using the do script Method

The do script method gives a script a way to execute another script. The script can be a string of valid scripting code or a file on disk. The script can be in the same scripting language as the current script or another scripting language. The available languages vary by platform: on Mac OS

AppleScript or JavaScript; on Windows

The

do script method has many possible uses:

 Running a script in another language that provides a feature missing in your main scripting language.

, VBScript or JavaScript.

For example, VBScript lacks the ability to display a file or folder browser, which JavaScript has. AppleScript can be very slow to compute trigonometric functions (sine and cosine), but JavaScript performs these calculations rapidly. JavaScript does not have a way to query Microsoft contents of a specific spreadsheet cell, but both AppleScript and VBScript have this capability. In all these examples, the

do script method can execute a snippet of scripting code in another language,

to overcome a limitation of the language used for the body of the script.

, you can run

Excel for the

 Creating a script “on the fly.” Your script can create a script (as a string) during its execution, which it

can then execute using the

do script method. This is a great way to create a custom dialog or panel

based on the contents of the selection or the attributes of objects the script creates.

 Embedding scripts in objects. Scripts can use the do script method to run scripts that were saved as

strings in the

label property of objects. Using this technique, an object can contain a script that

controls its layout properties or updates its content according to certain parameters. Scripts also can be embedded in XML elements as an attribute of the element or as the contents of an element. See

“Running Scripts at Startup” on page 18

Sending parameters to do script

To send a parameter to a script executed by do script, use the following form (from the DoScriptParameters tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Create a list of parameters. set myParameters to {"Hello from do script", "Your message here."}

--Create a JavaScript as a string. set myJavaScript to "alert(\"First argument: \" + arguments[0] + \"\\rSecond argument: \" + arguments[1])"

--Run the JavaScript using the do script command. do script myJavaScript language javascript with arguments myParameters

--Create an AppleScript as a string. set myAppleScript to "tell application \"Adobe InDesign CS6\"" & return set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "display dialog (\"First argument: \" & item 1 of arguments & return & \"Second argument: \" & item 2 of arguments)" & return set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "end tell"

--Run the AppleScript using the do script command. do script myAppleScript language applescript language with arguments myParameters

end tell

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Using the do script Method 15

Returning values from do script

The following script fragment shows how to return a value from a script executed by do script. This example uses a JavaScript that is executed as a string, but the same method works for script files. This example returns a single value, but you can return multiple values by returning an array (for the complete script, refer to the DoScriptReturnValues script).

set myDocument to document 1 set myPage to page 1 of myDocument set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of myPage tell myDocument

set myDestinationPage to make page end tell set myPageIndex to name of myDestinationPage set myID to id of myTextFrame set myJavaScript to "var myDestinationPage = arguments[1];" & return set myJavaScript to myJavaScript & "myID = arguments[0];" & return set myJavaScript to myJavaScript & "var myX = arguments[2];" & return set myJavaScript to myJavaScript & "var myY = arguments[3];" & return set myJavaScript to myJavaScript & "var myPageItem = app.documents.item(0).pages.item(0).pageItems.itemByID(myID);" & return set myJavaScript to myJavaScript & "myPageItem.duplicate(app.documents.item(0).pages.item(myDestinationPage));" & return

--Create an array for the parameters we want to pass to the JavaScript. set myArguments to {myID, myPageIndex, 0, 0} set myDuplicate to do script myJavaScript language javascript with arguments myArguments

--myDuplicate now contains a reference to the duplicated text frame.

--Change the text in the duplicated text frame. set contents of myDuplicate to "Duplicated text frame."

Another way to get values from another script is to use the script args (short for “script arguments”) object of the application. The following script fragment shows how to do this (for the complete script, see DoScriptScriptArgs):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Create a string to be run as an AppleScript.

set myAppleScript to "tell application \"Adobe InDesign CS6\"" & return

set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "tell script args" & return

set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "set value name \"ScriptArgumentA\"

value \"This is the first AppleScript script argument value.\"" & return

set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "set value name \"ScriptArgumentB\"

value \"This is the second AppleScript script argument value.\"" & return

set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "end tell" & return

set myAppleScript to myAppleScript & "end tell"

--Run the AppleScript string.

do script myAppleScript language applescript language

--Retrieve the script argument values set by the script.

tell script args

set myScriptArgumentA to get value name "ScriptArgumentA" set myScriptArgumentB to get value name "ScriptArgumentB"

end tell

--Display the script argument values in a dialog box.

display dialog "ScriptArgumentA: " & myScriptArgumentA & return & "ScriptArgumentB: " & myScriptArgumentB

--Create a string to be run as a JavaScript.

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Controlling Undo with do Script 16

set myJavaScript to "app.scriptArgs.setValue(\"ScriptArgumentA\", \"This is the first JavaScript script argument value.\");" & return

set myJavaScript to myJavaScript & "app.scriptArgs.setValue(\"ScriptArgumentB\", \"This is the second JavaScript script argument value.\");" & return

--Run the JavaScript string.

do script myJavaScript language javascript

--Retrieve the script argument values set by the script.

tell script args

set myScriptArgumentA to get value name "ScriptArgumentA" set myScriptArgumentB to get value name "ScriptArgumentB"

end tell

--Display the script argument values in a dialog box.

display dialog "ScriptArgumentA: " & myScriptArgumentA & return & "ScriptArgumentB: " & myScriptArgumentB end tell

Controlling Undo with do Script

InDesign gives you the ability to undo almost every action, but this comes at a price: for almost every action you make, InDesign writes to disk. For normal work you using the tools presented by the user interface, this does not present any problem. For scripts, which can perform thousands of actions in the time a human being can blink, the constant disk access can be a serious drag on performance.

do script command offers a way around this performance bottleneck by providing two parameters

The that control the way that scripts are executed relative to InDesign’s Undo behavior. These parameters are shown in the following examples:

--Given a script "myAppleScript" and an array of parameters "myParameters"... tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" do script myJavaScript language javascript with arguments myArguments undo mode fast entire script undo name "Script Action" end tell

--undo modes can be:

--auto unto: Add no events to the Undo queue.

--entire script: Put a single event in the Undo queue.

--fast entire script: Put a single event in the Undo queue.

--script request: Undo each script action as a separate event.

--The last parameter is the text that appears in the Undo menu item.

Working with Script Labels

Many objects in InDesign scripting have a label property, including page items (rectangles, ovals, groups, polygons, text frames, and graphic lines), table cells, documents, stories, and pages. This property can store a very large amount of text.

The label of page items can be viewed, entered, or edited using the Script Label panel (choose Window > Utilities > Script Label to display this panel), shown below. You also can add a label to an object using scripting, and you can read the script label via scripting. For many objects, like stories, pages, and paragraph styles, you cannot set or view the label using the Script Label panel.

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Working with Script Labels 17

The label property can contain any form of text data, such as tab- or comma-delimited text, HTML, or XML. Because scripts also are text, they can be stored in the

label property.

Page items can be referred to by their layers) can be referred to by their

label, just like named items (such as paragraph styles, colors, or

name. The following script fragment demonstrates this special case of the

label property (for the complete script, see ScriptLabel):

set myDocument to make document set myPage to page 1 of myDocument set myPageWidth to page width of document preferences of myDocument set myPageHeight to page height of document preferences of myDocument

--Create 10 random page items. repeat with i from 1 to 10

set myX1 to my myGetRandom(0, myPageWidth, false)

set myY1 to my myGetRandom(0, myPageHeight, false)

set myX2 to my myGetRandom(0, myPageWidth, false)

set myY2 to my myGetRandom(0, myPageHeight, false)

tell myPage

set myRectangle to make rectangle with properties {geometric bounds:{myY1, myX1,

myY2, myX2}}

end tell

if my myGetRandom(0, 1, true) = 1 then

set label of myRectangle to "myScriptLabel"

end if end repeat set myCount to 0 repeat with i from 1 to count of page items of myPage

if label of page item i of myPage is "myScriptLabel" then

set myCount to myCount + 1

end if end repeat display dialog ("Found " & myCount & " page items with the label.")

--This function gets a random number in the range myStart to myEnd. on myGetRandom(myStart, myEnd, myInteger)

set myRange to myEnd - myStart

if myInteger = true then

set myRandom to myStart + (random number from myStart to myEnd)

else

set myRandom to myStart + (random number from myStart to myEnd) as integer end if return myRandom

end myGetRandom

In addition, all objects that support the label property also support custom labels. A script can set a custom label using the

insert label method, and extract the custom label using the extract label

method, as shown in the following script fragment (from the CustomLabel tutorial script):

CHAPTER 2: Scripting Features Running Scripts at Startup 18

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell view preferences of myDocument

set horizontal measurement units to points

set vertical measurement units to points end tell set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myRectangle to make rectangle with properties

{geometric bounds:{72, 72, 144, 144}}

--Insert a custom label using insert label. The first parameter is the

--name of the label, the second is the text to add to the label.

tell myRectangle

insert label key "CustomLabel" value "This is some text stored in a custom label."

--Extract the text from the label and display it in an alert.

set myString to extract label key "CustomLabel" end tell display dialog ("Custom label contained: " & myString)

end tell

Running Scripts at Startup

To run a script when InDesign starts, put the script in the Startup Scripts folder in the Scripts folder (for more information, see “Installing Scripts” in Adobe InDesign Scripting Tutorial).

Chapter Update Status

CS6 Changes • Updated list of what this chapter shows you how to do.

•Added section “Making an Adaptive Layout” on page 43

•Added section “Collecting and Dropping Content” on page 46

• Added subsection “Exporting to grayscale PDF” on page 53

• Added subsection “Exporting as a PDF form” on page 56

•In “Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout” on page 41

, “Resizing and reframing pages” on page 41, and “Transforming pages” on

page 42, removed outdated references to features being new in CS5.

Documents

The work you do in InDesign revolves around documents—creating them, saving them, printing or exporting them, and populating them with page items, colors, styles, and text. Almost every document-related task can be automated using InDesign scripting.

This chapter shows you how to do the following

 Perform basic document-management tasks, including:

 Creating a new document.

 Opening a document.

 Saving a document.

 Closing a document.

 Perform basic page-layout operations, including:

 Setting the page size and document length.

 Defining bleed and slug areas.

 Specifying page columns and margins.

 Change the appearance of the pasteboard.

 Use guides and grids.

 Change measurement units and ruler origin.

 Define and apply document presets.

 Set up master pages (master spreads)

 Set text-formatting defaults.

 Add XMP metadata (information about a file).

 Create a document template.

 Create watermarks.

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Document Operations 20



Apply different sizes to different pages (multiple page sizes).

 Apply flexible layout formats to the same pages for use in different devices or documents with

different sizes or orientation.

 Print a document.

 Export a document as Adobe PDF.

 Export pages of a document as EPS.

 Export a document as an ePub file.

We assume that you have already read Adobe InDesign Scripting Tutorial and know how to create, install, and run a script.

Basic Document Operations

Opening, closing, and saving documents are some of the most basic document tasks. This section shows how to do them using scripting.

Creating a new document

The following script shows how to make a new document using scripting. (For the complete script, see MakeDocument.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document

end tell

To create a document using a document preset, the make command includes an optional parameter you can use to specify a document preset, as shown in the following script. (For the complete script, see MakeDocumentWithPreset.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Replace "myDocumentPreset" in the following line with the name

--of the document preset you want to use. set myDocument to make document with properties {document preset:"myDocumentPreset"}

end tell

You can create a document without displaying it in a window, as shown in the following script fragment (from the MakeDocumentWithParameters tutorial script):

--Creates a new document without showing the document window.

--The "showing window" parameter controls the visibility of the document.

--Hidden documents are not minimized, and will not appear until

--you tell the document to create a new window. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document with properties {showing window:false}

--To show the window:

--tell myDocument

--set myWindow to make window

--end tell

end tell

Some script operations are much faster when the document window is hidden.

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Document Operations 21

Opening a document

The following script shows how to open an existing document. (For the complete script, see OpenDocument.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--You'll have to fill in your own file path. set myDocument to open "yukino:myTestDocument.indd"

end tell

You can choose to prevent the document from displaying (that is, hide it) by setting the showing window parameter of the performance of a script. To show a hidden document, create a new window, as shown in the following script fragment (from the OpenDocumentInBackground tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--You can use the "showing window" parameter to open files

--without displaying them. This can speed up many scripting

--operations, and makes it possible for a script to operate

--on a file in the background. To display a document you've

--opened this way, tell the document to create a new window.

--You'll have to fill in your own file path. set myDocument to open "yukino:myTestDocument.indd" <lb> without showing window

--At this point, your script could change or get information

--from the hidden document. Once you've done that, you can show

--the document window: tell myDocument to make window

end tell

open command to false (the default is true). You might want to do this to improve

Saving a document

In the InDesign user interface, you save a file by choosing File > Save, and you save a file to another file name by choosing File > Save As. In InDesign scripting, the shown in the following script fragment (from the SaveDocument tutorial script):

--Saves the active document.

--If the active document has been changed since it was last saved, save it. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if modified of active document is true then

tell active document to save

end if

end tell

The save command has two optional parameters: The first (to) specifies the file to save to; the second

stationery) can be set to true to save the document as a template, as shown in the following script

( fragment (from the SaveDocumentAs tutorial script):

--If the active document has not been saved (ever), save it. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if saved of active document is false then

--If you do not provide a file name, InDesign displays the Save dialog box. tell active document to save saving in "yukino:myTestDocument.indd"

end if

end tell

You can save a document as a template, as shown in the following script fragment (from the SaveAsTemplate tutorial script):

save command can do either operation, as

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Document Operations 22

--Save the active document as a template. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document tell myDocument

if saved is true then

--Convert the file name to a string.

set myFileName to full name

set myFileName to my myReplace(myFileName, ".indd", ".indt") else

--If the document has not been saved, then give it a default file

--name/file path. You'll have to fill in the file path.

set myFileName to "yukino:myTestDocument.indt" end if save to myFileName with stationery

end tell end tell on myReplace(myString, myFindString, myChangeString)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to myFindString

set myTextList to every text item of (myString as text)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to myChangeString

set myString to myTextList as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""

return myString end myReplace

Closing a document

The close command closes a document, as shown in the following script fragment (from the CloseDocument tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

close document 1

--document 1 always refers to the front-most document.

--Note that you could also use:

--close active document

end tell

The close command can take up to two optional parameters, as shown in the following script fragment (from the CloseWithParameters tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Use "saving yes" to save the document,

--or "saving no" to close the document without saving,

--or "saving ask" to display a prompt. If you use

--"saving yes",you'll need to provide a reference

--to a file to save to in the second parameter (saving in).

--If the file has never been saved (it's an untitled file),

--display a prompt.

if saved of active document is not equal to true then

close active document saving ask

--Or, to save to a specific file name

--(you'll have to fill in the file path):

--set myFile to "yukino:myTestDocument.indd"

--close active document saving yes saving in myFile

else

--If the file has already been saved to a file, save it. close active document saving yes

end if end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 23

You can close all open documents without saving them, as shown in the following script fragment (from the CloseAll tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell documents to close without saving end tell

Basic Page Layout

Each document has a default page size, assigned number of pages, bleed and slug working areas, and columns and margins to define the area into which material is placed. Again, all these parameters are accessible to scripting, as shown in the examples in this section.

Defining page size and document length

When you create a new document using the InDesign user interface, you can specify the default page size, number of pages, page orientation, and whether the document uses facing pages. To create a document using InDesign scripting, use the creating a document, you can use the the following script fragment (from the DocumentPreferences tutorial script):

make document command, which does not specify these settings. After

document preferences object to control the settings, as shown in

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document

tell document preferences of myDocument

set page height to "800pt" set page width to "600pt" set page orientation to landscape set pages per document to 16

end tell end tell

NOTE: The application object also has a document preferences object. You can set the application defaults for page height, page width, and other properties by changing the properties of this object. You can also set individual page sizes; see “Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout”

Defining bleed and slug areas

Within InDesign, a bleed or a slug is an area outside the page margins that can be printed or included in an exported PDF. Typically, these areas are used for objects that extend beyond the page edges (bleed) and job/document information (slug). The two areas can be printed and exported independently; for example, you might want to omit slug information for the final printing of a document. The following script shows how to set up the bleed and slug for a new document. (For the complete script, see BleedAndSlug.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 24

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Create a new document.

set myDocument to make document

--The bleed and slug properties belong to the document preferences object.

tell document preferences of myDocument

--Bleed set document bleed bottom offset to "3p" set document bleed top offset to "3p" set document bleed inside or left offset to "3p" set document bleed outside or right offset to "3p"

--Slug set slug bottom offset to "18p" set slug top offset to "3p" set slug inside or left offset to "3p" set slug right or outside offset to "3p"

end tell end tell

Alternately, if all the bleed distances are equal, as in the preceding example, you can use the document

bleed uniform size property, as shown in the following script fragment (from the UniformBleed tutorial

script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Create a new document.

set myDocument to make document

--The bleed properties belong to the document preferences object.

tell document preferences of myDocument

--Bleed set document bleed top offset to "3p" set document bleed uniform size to true

end tell end tell

If all the slug distances are equal, you can use the document slug uniform size property, as shown in the following script fragment (from the UniformSlug tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Create a new document.

set myDocument to make document

--The bleed properties belong to the document preferences object.

tell document preferences of myDocument

--Slug set document slug uniform size to true set slug top offset to "3p"

end tell end tell

In addition to setting the bleed and slug widths and heights, you can control the color used to draw the guides defining the bleed and slug. This property is not in the

pasteboard preferences object, as shown in the following script fragment (from the

in the

document preferences object; instead, it is

BleedSlugGuideColors tutorial script):

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 25

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Assumes you have a document open.

tell pasteboard preferences of active document

--Any of InDesign's guides can use the UIColors constants... set bleed guide color to cute teal set slug guide color to charcoal

--...or you can specify a list of RGB values

--(with values from 0 to 255) set bleed guide color to {0, 198, 192} set slug guide color to {192, 192, 192}

end tell end tell

Setting page margins and columns

Each page in a document can have its own margin and column settings. With InDesign scripting, these properties are part of the new document, then sets the margins and columns for all pages in the master spread. (For the complete script, see PageMargins.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document

tell view preferences of myDocument

set horizontal measurement units to points

set vertical measurement units to points end tell tell master spread 1 of myDocument

tell margin preferences of pages

set top to 36 set left to 36 set bottom to 48 set right to 36

end tell end tell

end tell

margin preferences object for each page. This following sample script creates a

To set the page margins for an individual page, use the margin preferences for that page, as shown in the following script fragment (from the PageMarginsForOnePage tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell view preferences of myDocument

set horizontal measurement units to points

set vertical measurement units to points end tell tell margin preferences of page 1 of myDocument

set top to 36

set left to 36

set bottom to 48

set right to 36 end tell

end tell

InDesign does not allow you to create a page that is smaller than the sum of the relevant margins; that is, the width of the page must be greater than the sum of the left and right page margins, and the height of the page must be greater than the sum of the top and bottom margins. If you are creating very small pages (for example, for individual newspaper advertisements) using the InDesign user interface, you can

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 26

easily set the correct margin sizes as you create the document, by entering new values in the document default page Margin fields in the New Document dialog box.

From scripting, however, the solution is not as clear: when you create a document, it uses the application’s default-margin preferences. These margins are applied to all pages of the document, including master pages. Setting the document margin preferences affects only new pages and has no effect on existing pages. If you try to set the page height and page width to values smaller than the sum of the corresponding margins on any existing pages, InDesign does not change the page size.

There are two solutions. The first is to set the margins of the existing pages before you try to change the page size, as shown in the following script fragment (from the PageMarginsForSmallPages tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell margin preferences of page 1 of myDocument

set top to 0

set left to 0

set bottom to 0

set right to 0 end tell tell master spread 1 of myDocument

tell margin preferences of pages

set top to 0 set left to 0 set bottom to 0 set right to 0

end tell end tell

--At this point, you can set your page size to a small width

--and height (1x1 picas minimum). set page height of document preferences of myDocument to "1p" set page width of document preferences of myDocument to "6p"

end tell

Alternately, you can change the application’s default-margin preferences before you create the document, as shown in the following script fragment (from the ApplicationPageMargins tutorial script):

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 27

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell margin preferences

--Save the current application default margin preferences.

set myY1 to top

set myX1 to left

set myY2 to bottom

set myX2 to right

--Set the application default margin preferences.

set top to 0

set left to 0

set bottom to 0

set right to 0 end tell

--At this point, you can create a new document. set myDocument to make document

--At this point, you can set your page size to a small width and height

--(1x1 picas minimum). set page height of document preferences of myDocument to "1p" set page width of document preferences of myDocument to "1p"

--Reset the application default margin preferences to their former state. tell margin preferences

set top to myY1

set left to myX1

set bottom to myY2

set right to myX2 end tell

end tell

Changing the appearance of the pasteboard

The pasteboard is the area that surrounds InDesign pages and spreads. You can use it for temporary storage of page items or for job-tracking information. You can change the size of the pasteboard and its color using scripting. The

preview background color property sets the color of the pasteboard in Preview

mode, as shown in the following script fragment (from the PasteboardPreferences tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell pasteboard preferences of myDocument

--You can use either a number or a measurement string to set the

--space above/below.

set minimum space above and below to "12p"

--You can set the pasteboard background color to any

--of the predefined UIColor constants...

set preview background color to gray

--...or you can specify an array of RGB values

--(with values from 0 to 255)

--set preview Background Color to {192, 192, 192}

end tell

Guides and grids

Guides and grids make it easy to position objects on your document pages. These are very useful items to add when you are creating templates for others to use.

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 28

Defining guides

Guides in InDesign give you an easy way to position objects on the pages of your document. The following script fragment shows how to use guides. (For the complete script, see Guides.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document set myPageWidth to page width of document preferences of myDocument set myPageHeight to page height of document preferences of myDocument tell page 1 of myDocument

set myMarginPreferences to margin preferences

--Place guides at the margins of the page.

make guide with properties {orientation:vertical,

location:left of myMarginPreferences}

make guide with properties {orientation:vertical,

location:(myPageWidth - (right of myMarginPreferences))}

make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal,

location:top of myMarginPreferences}

make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal,

location:(myPageHeight - (bottom of myMarginPreferences))}

--Place a guide at the vertical center of the page.

make guide with properties {orientation:vertical,

location:(myPageWidth / 2)}

--Place a guide at the horizontal center of the page.

make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal,

location:(myPageHeight / 2)} end tell

end tell

Horizontal guides can be limited to a given page or extend across all pages in a spread. From InDesign scripting, you can control this using the

fit to page property. This property is ignored by vertical guides.

You can use scripting to change the layer, color, and visibility of guides, just as you can from the user interface, as shown in the following script fragment (from the GuideOptions tutorial script):

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 29

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell myDocument

--Create a layer named "guide layer".

set myLayer to make layer with properties {name:"guide layer"}

--Add a series of guides to page 1.

tell page 1

--Create a guide on the layer we created above. make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, <lb> location:"12p", item layer:myLayer} make guide with properties {item layer:myLayer, <lb> orientation:horizontal, location:"14p"}

--Make a locked guide. make guide with properties {locked:true, <lb> orientation:horizontal, location:"16p"}

--Set the view threshold of a guide. make guide with properties {view threshold:100, <lb> orientation:horizontal, location:"18p"}

--Set the guide color of a guide using a UIColors constant. make guide with properties {guide color:gray, <lb> orientation:horizontal, location:"20p"}

--Set the guide color of a guide using an RGB array. make guide with properties {guide color:{192, 192, 192}, <lb> orientation:horizontal, location:"22p"}

end tell end tell

end tell

You also can create guides using the create guides command on spreads and master spreads, as shown in the following script fragment (from the CreateGuides tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell spread 1 of myDocument

--Parameters (all optional): row count, column count, row gutter,

--column gutter, guide color, fit margins, remove existing, layer.

--Note that the create guides command does not take an RGB

--array for the guide color parameter.

create guides number of rows 4 number of columns 4 row gutter "1p" <lb>

column gutter "1p" guide color gray with fit margins and remove existing end tell

end tell

Setting grid preferences

To control the properties of the document and baseline grid, you set the properties of the grid

preferences object, as shown in the following script fragment (from the DocumentAndBaselineGrid

tutorial script):

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 30

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document set horizontal measurement units of view preferences of myDocument to points set vertical measurement units of view preferences of myDocument to points tell grid preferences of myDocument

set baseline start to 56

set baseline division to 14

set baseline grid shown to true

set horizontal gridline division to 14

set horizontal grid subdivision to 5

set vertical gridline division to 14

set vertical grid subdivision to 5

set document grid shown to true end tell

end tell

Snapping to guides and grids

All snap settings for a document’s grids and guides are in the properties of the guide preferences and

grid preferences objects. The following script fragment shows how to set guide and grid snap

properties. (For the complete script, see GuideGridPreferences.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document tell guide preferences of myDocument

set guides in back to true

set guides locked to false

set guides shown to true

set guides snapto to true end tell tell grid preferences of myDocument

set document grid shown to false

set document grid snapto to true

--Objects "snap" to the baseline grid when guidePreferences.guideSnapTo

--is set to true.

set baseline grid shown to true end tell

end tell

Changing measurement units and ruler

Thus far, the sample scripts used measurement strings, strings that force InDesign to use a specific measurement unit (for example, “8.5i” for 8.5 inches). They do this because you might be using a different measurement system when you run the script.

To specify the measurement system used in a script, use the document’s shown in the following script fragment (from the ViewPreferences tutorial script):

view preferences object, as

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 31

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document tell view preferences of myDocument

--Measurement unit choices are:

--picas, points, inches, inches decimal, millimeters, centimeters, or ciceros

--Set horizontal and vertical measurement units to points.

set horizontal measurement units to points

set vertical measurement units to points end tell

end tell

If you are writing a script that needs to use a specific measurement system, you can change the measurement units at the beginning of the script, then restore the original measurement units at the end of the script. This is shown in the following script fragment (from the ResetMeasurementUnits tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document tell view preferences of myDocument

set myOldXUnits to horizontal measurement units

set myOldYUnits to vertical measurement units

set horizontal measurement units to points

set vertical measurement units to points end tell

--At this point, you can perform any series of script actions that depend on

--the measurement units you've set. At the end of the script, reset

--the measurement units to their original state. tell view preferences of myDocument

set horizontal measurement units to myOldXUnits

set vertical measurement units to myOldYUnits end tell

end tell

Defining and applying document presets

InDesign document presets enable you to store and apply common document set-up information (page size, page margins, columns, and bleed and slug areas). When you create a new document, you can base the document on a document preset.

Creating a preset by copying values

To create a document preset using an existing document’s settings as an example, open a document that has the document set-up properties you want to use in the document preset, then run the following script (from the DocumentPresetByExample tutorial script):

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 32

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if (count documents) > 0 then

set myDocument to active document

--If the document preset "myDocumentPreset"

--does not already exist, create it.

try

set myDocumentPreset to document preset "myDocumentPreset"

on error

set myDocumentPreset to make document preset with properties {name:"myDocumentPreset"}

end try

--Fill in the properties of the document preset

--with the corresponding

--properties of the active document.

tell myDocumentPreset

--Note that the following gets the page margins from the margin preferences

--of the document; to get the margin preferences from the active page,

--replace "myDocument" with "active page of active window" in the

--following line (assuming the active window is a layout window). set myMarginPreferences to margin preferences of myDocument set left to left of myMarginPreferences set right to right of myMarginPreferences set top to top of myMarginPreferences set bottom to bottom of myMarginPreferences set column count to column count of myMarginPreferences set column gutter to column gutter of myMarginPreferences set document bleed bottom offset to document bleed bottom offset of document preferences of myDocument set document bleed top offset to document bleed top offset of document preferences of myDocument set document bleed inside or left offset to document bleed inside or left offset of document preferences of myDocument set document bleed outside or right offset to document bleed outside or right offset of document preferences of myDocument set facing pages to facing pages of document preferences of myDocument set page height to page height of document preferences of myDocument set page width to page width of document preferences of myDocument set page orientation to page orientation of document preferences of myDocument set pages per document to pages per document of document preferences of myDocument set slug bottom offset to slug bottom offset of document preferences of myDocument set slug top offset to slug top offset of document preferences of myDocument set slug inside or left offset to slug inside or left offset of document preferences of myDocument set slug right or outside offset to slug right or outside offset of document preferences of myDocument

end tell end if

end tell

Creating a document preset

To create a document preset using explicit values, run the following script (from the DocumentPreset tutorial script):

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 33

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--If the document preset "myDocumentPreset" does not already exist, create it. try

set myDocumentPreset to document preset "myDocumentPreset" on error

set myDocumentPreset to make document preset

with properties {name:"myDocumentPreset"} end try

--Fill in the properties of the document preset. tell myDocumentPreset

set page height to "9i"

set page width to "7i"

set left to "4p"

set right to "6p"

set top to "4p"

set bottom to "9p"

set column count to 1

set document bleed bottom offset to "3p"

set document bleed top offset to "3p"

set document bleed inside or left offset to "3p"

set document bleed outside or right offset to "3p"

set facing pages to true

set page orientation to portrait

set pages per document to 1

set slug bottom offset to "18p"

set slug top offset to "3p"

set slug inside or left offset to "3p"

set slug right or outside offset to "3p" end tell

end tell

Setting up master spreads

After setting up the basic document page size, slug, and bleed, you probably will want to define the document’s master spreads. The following script shows how to do that. (For the complete script, see MasterSpread.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document

--Set up the document. tell document preferences of myDocument

set page height to "11i"

set page width to "8.5i"

set facing pages to true

set page orientation to portrait end tell

--Set the document's ruler origin to page origin. This is very important--

--if you don't do this, getting objects to the correct position on the

--page is much more difficult. set ruler origin of view preferences of myDocument to page origin tell master spread 1 of myDocument

--Set up the left page (verso).

tell margin preferences of page 1

set column count to 3 set column gutter to "1p" set bottom to "6p"

--"left" means inside, "right" means outside. set left to "6p" set right to "4p"

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 34

set top to "4p"

end tell

--Add a simple footer with a section number and page number.

tell page 1

set myTextFrame to make text frame ¬

with properties {geometric bounds:{"61p", "4p", "62p", "45p"}}

tell myTextFrame

set contents of insertion point 1 to section marker set contents of insertion point 1 to Em space set contents of insertion point 1 to auto page number set justification of paragraph 1 to left align

end tell

--Set up the right page (recto).

tell margin preferences of page 2

set column count to 3 set column gutter to "1p" set bottom to "6p"

--"left" means inside, "right" means outside. set left to "6p" set right to "4p" set top to "4p"

end tell

--Add a simple footer with a section number and page number.

tell page 2

set myTextFrame to make text frame ¬

with properties {geometric bounds:{"61p", "6p", "62p", "47p"}}

tell myTextFrame

set contents of insertion point 1 to auto page number set contents of insertion point 1 to Em space set contents of insertion point 1 to section marker set justification of paragraph 1 to right align

end tell

end tell end tell

end tell

To apply a master spread to a document page, use the applied master property of the document page, as shown in the following script fragment (from the ApplyMaster tutorial script):

--Assumes that the active document has a master page named "B-Master"

--and at least three document pages. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell active document

set applied master of page 2 to master spread "B-Master" end tell

end tell

Use the same property to apply a master spread to a master spread page, as shown in the following script fragment (from the ApplyMasterToMaster tutorial script):

--Assumes that the active document has master spread named "B-Master"

--that is not the same as the first master spread in the document. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell active document

set applied master of page 2 of master spread 1 to

master spread "B-Master" end tell

end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 35

Adding XMP metadata

Metadata is information that describes the content, origin, or other attributes of a file. In the InDesign user interface, you enter, edit, and view metadata using the File Info dialog (choose File > File Info). This metadata includes the document’s creation and modification dates, author, copyright status, and other information. All this information is stored using XMP (Adobe Extensible Metadata Platform), an open standard for embedding metadata in a document.

To learn more about XMP, see the XMP specification at

http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/pdf/MetadataFramework.pdf

You also can add XMP information to a document using InDesign scripting. All XMP properties for a document are in the document’s metadataPreferences object. The example below fills in the standard XMP data for a document.

This example also shows that XMP information is extensible. If you need to attach metadata to a document and the data does not fall into a category provided by the metadata preferences object, you can create your own metadata container (

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell metadata preferences of myDocument

set author to "Adobe"

set copyright info URL to "http://www.adobe.com"

set copyright notice to "This document is copyrighted."

set copyright status to yes

set description to "Example of xmp metadata scripting in InDesign CS"

set document title to "XMP Example"

set job name to "XMP_Example_2004"

set keywords to {"animal", "mineral", "vegetable"}

--The metadata preferences object also includes the read-only

--creator, format, creationDate, modificationDate,

--and serverURL properties that are automatically entered

--and maintained by InDesign.

--Create a custom XMP container, "email"

set myNewContainer to create container item ¬

namespace "http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/" path "email"

set property namespace "http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/" ¬

path "email/*[1]" value "someone@adobe.com"

end tell

email, in this example). (For the complete script, see MetadataExample.)

Creating a document template

This example creates a new document, defines slug and bleed areas, adds information to the document’s XMP metadata, sets up master pages, adds page footers, and adds job information to a table in the slug area. (For the complete script, see DocumentTemplate.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 36

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Make a new document. set myDocument to make document tell myDocument

tell document preferences

set page width to "7i" set page height to "9i"

set page orientation to portrait end tell tell margin preferences

set top to ((14 * 4) & "pt") as string

set left to ((14 * 4) & "pt") as string

set bottom to "74pt"

set right to ((14 * 5) & "pt") as string end tell

--Set up the bleed and slug areas. tell document preferences

--Bleed

set document bleed bottom offset to "3p"

set document bleed top offset to "3p"

set document bleed inside or left offset to "3p"

set document bleed outside or right offset to "3p"

--Slug

set slug bottom offset to "18p"

set slug top offset to "3p"

set slug inside or left offset to "3p"

set slug right or outside offset to "3p" end tell

--Create a color. try

set myColor to color "PageNumberRed" on error

set myColor to make color with properties {name:"PageNumberRed",

model:process, color value:{20, 100, 80, 10}} end try

--Next, set up some default styles.

--Create up a character style for the page numbers. try

set myCharacterStyle to character style "page_number" on error

set myCharacterStyle to make character style

with properties {name:"page_number"} end try set fill color of myCharacterStyle to color "PageNumberRed"

--Create up a pair of paragraph styles for the page footer text.

--These styles have only basic formatting. try

set myParagraphStyle to paragraph style "footer_left" on error

set myParagraphStyle to make paragraph style

with properties {name:"footer_left"} end try

--Create up a pair of paragraph styles for the page footer text. try

set myParagraphStyle to paragraph style "footer_right" on error

set myParagraphStyle to make paragraph style ¬

with properties {name:"footer_right", ¬ based on:paragraph style "footer_left", justification:right align}

end try

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 37

--Create a layer for guides. try

set myLayer to layer "GuideLayer" on error

set myLayer to make layer with properties {name:"GuideLayer"} end try

--Create a layer for the footer items. try

set myLayer to layer "Footer" on error

set myLayer to make layer with properties {name:"Footer"} end try

--Create a layer for the slug items. try

set myLayer to layer "Slug" on error

set myLayer to make layer with properties {name:"Slug"} end try

--Create a layer for the body text. try

set myLayer to layer "BodyText" on error

set myLayer to make layer with properties {name:"BodyText"} end try tell view preferences

set ruler origin to page origin

set horizontal measurement units to points

set vertical measurement units to points end tell

--Document baseline grid and document grid tell grid preferences

set baseline start to 56

set baseline division to 14

set baseline grid shown to false

set horizontal gridline division to 14

set horizontal grid subdivision to 5

set vertical gridline division to 14

set vertical grid subdivision to 5

set document grid shown to false end tell

--Document XMP information. tell metadata preferences

set author to "Adobe"

set copyright info URL to "http:--www.adobe.com"

set copyright notice to "This document is not copyrighted."

set copyright status to no

set description to "Example 7 x 9 book layout"

set document title to "Example"

set job name to "7 x 9 book layout template"

set keywords to {"7 x 9", "book", "template"}

set myNewContainer to create container item

namespace "http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/" path "email"

set property namespace "http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/"

path "email/*[1]" value "someone@adobe.com" end tell

--Set up the master spread. tell master spread 1

tell page 1

set myMarginPreferences to margin preferences set myBottomMargin to (page height of document preferences of

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 38

myDocument - (bottom of myMarginPreferences) set myLeftMargin to right of myMarginPreferences set myRightMargin to (page width of document preferences of myDocument)

- (left of myMarginPreferences) make guide with properties {orientation:vertical, location:myRightMargin,item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument} make guide with properties {orientation:vertical, location:myLeftMargin,item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument} make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, location:top of myMarginPreferences, item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument, fit to page:false} make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, location:myBottomMargin, item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument, fit to page:false} make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, location:myBottomMargin + 14, item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument, fit to page:false} make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, location:myBottomMargin + 28, item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument, fit to page:false} set myLeftFooter to make text frame with properties {item layer:layer "Footer" of myDocument, geometric bounds:{myBottomMargin + 14, right of myMarginPreferences, myBottomMargin + 28, myRightMargin}} set contents of insertion point 1 of parent story of myLeftFooter to section marker set contents of insertion point 1 of parent story of myLeftFooter to Em space set contents of insertion point 1 of parent story of myLeftFooter to auto page number set applied character style of character 1 of parent story of myLeftFooter to character style "page_number" of myDocument set applied paragraph style of paragraph 1 of parent story of myLeftFooter to paragraph style "footer_left" of myDocument

--Slug information. tell metadata preferences of myDocument

set myEmail to get property namespace "http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/" path "email/*[1]" set myDate to current date set myString to "Author:" & tab & author & tab & "Description:" & tab & description & return & "Creation Date:" & tab & myDate

& tab & "Email Contact" & tab & myEmail end tell set myLeftSlug to make text frame with properties {item layer:layer "Slug" of myDocument, geometric bounds:{(page height of document preferences of myDocument) + 36, right of myMarginPreferences, (page height of document preferences of myDocument) + 144, myRightMargin}, contents:myString} tell parent story of myLeftSlug

convert to table text 1 end tell

--Body text master text frame. set myLeftFrame to make text frame with properties ¬ {item layer:layer "BodyText" of myDocument, geometric bounds:{top of myMarginPreferences, right of myMarginPreferences, myBottomMargin, myRightMargin}}

end tell tell page 2

set myMarginPreferences to margin preferences

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 39

set myLeftMargin to left of myMarginPreferences set myRightMargin to (page width of document preferences of myDocument

- (right of myMarginPreferences) make guide with properties {orientation:vertical, location:myLeftMargin,item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument} make guide with properties {orientation:vertical, location:myRightMargin, item layer:layer "GuideLayer" of myDocument} set myRightFooter to make text frame with properties {item layer:layer "Footer" of myDocument, geometric bounds:{myBottomMargin + 14, left of myMarginPreferences, myBottomMargin + 28, myRightMargin}} set contents of insertion point 1 of parent story of myRightFooter to auto page number set contents of insertion point 1 of parent story of myRightFooter to Em space set contents of insertion point 1 of parent story of myRightFooter to section marker set applied character style of character -1 of parent story of myRightFooter to character style "page_number" of myDocument set applied paragraph style of paragraph 1 of parent story of myRightFooter to paragraph style "footer_right" of myDocument

--Slug information. set myRightSlug to make text frame with properties {item layer:layer "Slug" of myDocument, geometric bounds:{(page height of document preferences of myDocument) + 36, left of myMarginPreferences,(page height of document preferences of myDocument) + 144,myRightMargin}, contents:myString} tell parent story of myRightSlug

convert to table text 1 end tell

--Body text master text frame. set myRightFrame to make text frame with properties {item layer:layer "BodyText" of myDocument, geometric bounds:{top of myMarginPreferences,

left of myMarginPreferences, myBottomMargin, myRightMargin}}

end tell

--Add section marker text--this text will appear in the footer. set marker of section 1 of myDocument to "Section 1"

--When you link the master page text frames, one of the frames sometimes

--becomes selected. Deselect it. select nothing

end tell

)

Creating watermarks

You can apply watermarks to documents in InDesign or InDesign Server using scripting. Currently, no user interface component exists in InDesign for managing watermarks.

A document’s watermark preferences can be set in two ways using scripting:

 Application-level watermark preferences, if any are set, are applied to the document watermark

preferences for each new document created by InDesign. This setting has no effect on existing documents.

 Document-level watermark preferences apply only to that document. Setting or changing a

document’s watermark preferences replaces any previous watermark settings for the document.

CHAPTER 3: Documents Basic Page Layout 40

Both the document and application watermark preference settings persist after the document or application is closed until a script changes them.

The same group of watermark preferences exist for both the document and the application objects.

Setting watermark preferences

The following script fragment shows how to set watermarks at the application level. A watermark will be applied to all documents created after this code finishes. (For the complete script for setting application preferences, see ApplicationWatermark.)

tell watermark preferences

set watermark visibility to true set watermark do print to true set watermark draw in back to true set watermark text to "Confidential" set watermark font family to "Arial" set watermark font style to "Bold" set watermark font point size to 72 set watermark font color to red set watermark opacity to 60 set watermark rotation to -45 set watermark horizontal position to watermark h center set watermark horizontal offset to 0 set watermark vertical position to watermark v center set watermark vertical offset to 0

end tell

The same preferences can be applied to a document object by referring to a document, rather than to the application. (For the complete script for setting document preferences, see DocumentWatermark.)

tell watermark preferences of document 1

set watermark visibility to true set watermark do print to true set watermark draw in back to true set watermark text to "Confidential" set watermark font family to "Arial" set watermark font style to "Bold" set watermark font point size to 72 set watermark font color to blue set watermark opacity to 60 set watermark rotation to -45 set watermark horizontal position to watermark h center set watermark horizontal offset to 0 set watermark vertical position to watermark v center set watermark vertical offset to 0

end tell

Disabling watermarks

After turning off the application setting for watermarks, InDesign no longer turns on the watermark settings for new documents by default. However, you can still set watermarks for individual documents. The following script fragment shows how to turn off application-level watermarks.

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set watermark visibility of watermark preferences to false

end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout 41

You can turn off watermarks in an individual document at any time, as shown in the following script fragment.

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell document 1

set watermark visibility of watermark preferences to false

end tell

Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout

InDesign allows different page sizes within a single InDesign document. For information on setting the default page size, see “Defining page size and document length”

You can also apply geometric transformations to individual pages.

Selecting pages

Before changing a page’s size or applying a transformation to the page, you must select the page. In the InDesign user interface, you do this using the Page Tool on the Tools Panel. You can also select a page using scripting. The following script shows how. (For the complete script, see PageSelect.)

--Given a document with four pages (1, 2, 3, 4)... set myPages to pages of active document

--Select page 2 and 3. select item 2 of myPages select item 3 of myPages existing selection add to

--Select last page. select item -1 of myPages existing selection add to

Resizing and reframing pages

You can resize or reframe page items on a page by scripting. You can also apply the resize and reframe operations to pages to change their sizes.

NOTE: Your minimum page size is determined by the page’s margins. See “Setting page margins and

columns” for more information.

The following script shows how to change a page’s size using the resize method. (For the complete script, see PageResize.)

--Given a document with four pages (1, 2, 3, 4)... tell pages of active document

--Resize page to two times bigger resize item 2 in inner coordinates from center anchor by multiplying current

dimensions by values {2, 2}

--Resize page to 400 points width and 600 points height.

resize item 3 in inner coordinates from center anchor by replacing current dimensions with values {400, 600} end tell

Reframing changes the bounding box of a page, so reframing can be used to change a page’s size by making the bounding box larger or smaller. The following script shows how to change a page’s size using the reframe method. (For the complete script, see PageReframe.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout 42

--Given a document with four pages (1, 2, 3, 4)... tell item 2 of pages of active document

--Make the page one inch wider and one inch higher.

set myBounds to bounds

set myY1 to item 1 of myBounds

set myX1 to item 2 of myBounds

set myY2 to (item 3 of myBounds) + 72

set myX2 to (item 4 of myBounds) + 72

reframe in inner coordinates opposing corners {{myX1, myY1}, {myX2, myY2}} end tell

Transforming pages

Operations that change the geometry of objects are called transformations. The transform method can rotate, scale, shear, and move (translate) page items on a page and can also be used on pages. For technical details about transformation architecture, refer to “Transforming Page Items”

To transfor m a page:

1. Create a transformation matrix.

2. Apply the transformation matrix to the page using the transform method.

The following script shows how to transform a page with scripting. (For the complete script, see PageTransform.)

--Given a document with four pages (1, 2, 3, 4)... set myDocument to active document set myPages to pages of myDocument

--Rotate a page around its center point. set myRotateMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {counterclockwise rotation angle:27} my myTransform(item 1 of myPages, myRotateMatrix)

--Scale a page around its center point. set myScaleMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {horizontal scale factor:0.8, vertical scale factor:0.8} my myTransform(item 2 of myPages, myScaleMatrix)

--Shear a page around its center point. set myShearMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {clockwise shear angle:30} my myTransform(item 3 of myPages, myShearMatrix)

on myTransform(myPage, myTransformationMatrix)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

transform myPage in pasteboard coordinates from center anchor with matrix

myTransformationMatrix

end tell end myTransform

Master page overlay

Because pages can have multiple sizes, it is possible for a page and its master page to be different sizes. In addition to tracking which master is applied, pages also maintain a matrix that determines how the master page draws on the page. This is called the Master Page Overlay. When you select a page using the Page

CHAPTER 3: Documents Making an Adaptive Layout 43

Tool on the Tools Panel, you can see how the master page is positioned by checking the Show Master Page Overlay checkbox on the control panel. You can move the overlay around with the mouse. InDesign achieves this by applying a transform to the master overlay matrix. Although the user interface allows only translation (moving x and y), you can do more by scripting. The following script shows how to transform a master page overlay. (For the complete script, see MasterPageTransform.)

--Given a document with four pages (1, 2, 3, 4)... set myDocument to active document set myPages to pages of myDocument

--Rotate master page overlay around its top-left corner. set myRotateMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {counterclockwise rotation angle:27} set master page transform of item 1 of myPages to myRotateMatrix

--Scale master page overlay around its top-left corner. set myScaleMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {horizontal scale factor:0.5, vertical scale factor:0.5} set master page transform of item 2 of myPages to myScaleMatrix

--Shear master page overlay around its top-left corner. set myShearMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {clockwise shear angle:30} set master page transform of item 3 of myPages to myShearMatrix

--Translate master page overlay 1 inch right and 2 inches down. set myTranslateMatrix to make transformation matrix with properties {horizontal translation:72, vertical translation:144} set master page transform of item 4 of myPages to myTranslateMatrix

Making an Adaptive Layout

Using InDesign’s layout adaptation workflow, you create your primary layout the same way that you would create it for a document that will be printed, but then you can quickly adapt that layout to another orientation, to another dimension or aspect ratio, or to a completely different device class. This workflow mainly involves two features: Liquid Layout makes the layout flexible, and Create Alternate Layout creates alternative layouts for different orientations and device classes.

Making a flexible layout

Using layout rules, a designer can create one InDesign file with one set of physical pages that can display their content suitably on different devices with different sizes and orientations. You can optionally control the pages’ appearance for each size and orientation. The following example script shows how to do this. (For the complete script, see LiquidLayout.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Making an Adaptive Layout 44

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set myDocument to make document

set myPage to page 1 of myDocument

-- Set layout rule to object rule

tell myPage

--Reposition and resize objects on the page as it resizes. set layout rule to object based

--Create a text frame on the first page. set myTextFrame to make text frame set geometric bounds of myTextFrame to my myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage) set contents of myTextFrame to "This is object based layoutrule sample doc."

--Create a rectangle set myItem to make rectangle set geometric bounds of myItem to {20, 20, 70, 70} set vertical layout constraints of myItem to {flexible dimension,

flexible dimension, flexible dimension}

set horizontal layout constraints of myItem to {fixed dimension,

flexible dimension, flexible dimension}

end tell

end tell tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set myDocument2 to make document

set myPage2 to page 1 of myDocument2

-- Set layout rule to scale tell myPage2

--Scale objects on the page as it resizes.

set layout rule to scale

--Create a text frame on the first page.

set myTextFrame2 to make text frame

set geometric bounds of myTextFrame2 to my myGetBounds(myDocument2, myPage2)

set contents of myTextFrame2 to "This is scale layoutrule sample doc."

set myItem2 to make rectangle

set geometric bounds of myItem2 to {20, 20, 70, 70}

end tell end tell tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set myDocument3 to make document

set myPage3 to page 1 of myDocument3

-- Set layout rule to recenter

tell myPage3

--Recenter objects on the page as it resizes. set layout policy to recenter

--Create a text frame on the first page. set myTextFrame3 to make text frame set geometric bounds of myTextFrame3 to my myGetBounds(myDocument3, myPage3) set contents of myTextFrame3 to "This is recenter layoutrule sample doc." set myItem3 to make rectangle set geometric bounds of myItem3 to {20, 20, 70, 70}

end tell end tell tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument4 to make document

set myPage4 to page 1 of myDocument4

-- Set layout rule to guide based

tell myPage4

--objects based on the page as it resizes. set layout policy to guide based

--Create a text frame on the first page. set myTextFrame4 to make text frame set geometric bounds of myTextFrame4 to my myGetBounds(myDocument4, myPage4)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Making an Adaptive Layout 45

set contents of myTextFrame4 to "This is guide based layoutrule sample doc." set myItem4 to make rectangle set geometric bounds of myItem4 to {20, 20, 70, 70} make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, location:"20p", guide

type:liquid}

end tell end tell tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument5 to make document

set myPage5 to page 1 of myDocument5

-- Set layout rule to use master

tell myPage5

--Use master on the page as it resizes. set layout rule to use master

--Create a text frame on the first page. set myTextFrame5 to make text frame set geometric bounds of myTextFrame5 to my myGetBounds(myDocument5, myPage5) set contents of myTextFrame5 to "This is master page layoutrule sample doc." set myItem5 to make rectangle set geometric bounds of myItem5 to {20, 20, 70, 70}

end tell end tell

Adding guides for a guide-based layout

The following example script shows how to add guide slices for guide-based layout rules. (For the complete script, see AddGuides.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document

set myPage to page 1 of myDocument

tell myPage

set layout rule to guide based

set myTextFrame to make text frame

--Set the bounds of the text frame. set geometric bounds of myTextFrame to my myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage)

--Enter text in the text frame. set contents of myTextFrame to "This is guide-based layoutrule sample doc." set myItem to make rectangle

set geometric bounds of myItem to {20, 20, 70, 70} end tell tell myPage

make guide with properties {orientation:horizontal, location:"20p", guide

type:liquid}

end tell

Setting constraints for an object-based layout

The following example script shows how to set constraints for object-based layout rules. (For the complete script, see SetConstraints.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Collecting and Dropping Content 46

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set layout rule to object based

set myTextFrame to make text frame

--Set the bounds of the text frame.

set geometric bounds of myTextFrame to my myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage)

--Enter text in the text frame.

set contents of myTextFrame to "This is object-based layoutrule sample doc."

set myItem to make rectangle

set geometric bounds of myItem to {20, 20, 70, 70}

set vertical layout constraints of myItem to

{flexible dimension, flexible dimension, flexible dimension}

set horizontal layout constraints of myItem to

{fixed dimension, flexible dimension, flexible dimension}

end tell

Creating alternative layouts

Create Alternate Layout takes a range of existing pages with content and automatically creates linked copies of the content on a set of new pages within the same document. Use this when you need to create unique layouts for different orientations and device classes. (For the complete script, see CreateAlternateLayout.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to make document tell document preferences of myDocument

set facing pages to false

set pages per document to 1

set page width to 1024

set page height to 768 end tell set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set layout rule to object based

set myItem to make rectangle

set geometric bounds of myItem to {50, 50, 100, 100} end tell tell myDocument

create alternate layout spread items spreads

name "new layout" width page height of document preferences height page width of document preferences ppi 1 layout rule preserve existing with create text styles and link text stories

end tell

Collecting and Dropping Content

With Content Dropper, you can copy the content from a file designed for printing and paste it into another document.

CHAPTER 3: Documents Printing a Document 47

The following script shows how to collect content in a document using scripting. (For the complete script, see ContentCollectorAndPlacer.)

--Invoke load with full parameters tell content placer object 1 load page items myRectangle with link page items, link stories, map styles and showing options end tell

The following script shows how to place collected content into another document. (For the complete script, see ContentCollectorAndPlacer.)

--Invoke Page.contentPlace with full parameters tell myPage1 content place page items rectangles of myPage with link page items, link stories, map styles and showing options end tell

Printing a Document

The following script prints the active document using the current print preferences. (For the complete script, see PrintDocument.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

print active document

end tell

Printing using page ranges

To specify a page range to print, set the page range property of the document’s print preferences object before printing, as shown in the following script fragment (from the PrintPageRange tutorial script):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set page range of print preferences to "1-3, 10" print

end tell

Setting print preferences

The print preferences object contains properties corresponding to the options in the panels of the Print dialog. The following script shows how to set print preferences using scripting. (For the complete script, see PrintPreferences.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Printing a Document 48

--PrintPreferences.as

--An InDesign CS6 AppleScript

--Sets the print preferences of the active document. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Get the bleed amounts from the document's bleed and add a bit. tell document preferences of active document

set myX1Offset to document bleed inside or left offset + 3

set myY1Offset to document bleed top offset + 3

set myX2Offset to document bleed outside or right offset + 3

set myY2Offset to document bleed bottom offset + 3 end tell tell print preferences of active document

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the General panel

--of the Print dialog box.

--activePrinterPreset is ignored in this example--we'll set our

--own print preferences.

--printer can be either a string (the name of the printer) or

--postscript file.

set printer to postscript file

--Here's an example of setting the printer to a specific printer.

--set printer to "AGFA-SelectSet 5000SF v2013.108"

--If the printer property is the name of a printer, then the ppd property

--is locked (and will return an error if you try to set it).

try

--set PPD to "Device Independent"

end try

--If the printer property is set to postscript file, the copies

--property is unavailable. Attempting to set it will generate an error.

--set copies to 1

--If the printer property is set to Printer.postscript file, or if the

--selected printer does not support collation, then the collating

--property is unavailable. Attempting to set it will generate an error.

--set collating to false

set reverse order to false

--The setting of color output determines the settings available

--to almost all other properties in the print preferences.

try

set color output to separations

end try

--pageRange can be either PageRange.allPages or a page range string.

set page range to all pages

set print spreads to false

set print master pages to false

--If the printer property is set to postScript file, then

--the print file property contains the file path to the output file.

--set printFile to "yukino:test.ps"

set sequence to all

--If trapping is on, setting the following properties

--will produce an error.

try

if trapping is off then

set print blank pages to false set print guides grids to false set print nonprinting to false

end if

end try

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the Setup panel of

--the Print dialog.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER 3: Documents Printing a Document 49

set paper size to custom

--Page width and height are ignored if paper Size is not custom.

--set paper height to 1200

--set paper width to 1200

set print page orientation to portrait

set page position to centered

set paper gap to 0

set paper offset to 0

set paper transverse to false

set scale height to 100

set scale width to 100

set scale mode to scale width height

set scale proportional to true

--If trapping is on (application built in or Adobe inRip),

--attempting to set the following properties will produce an error.

if trapping is off then

set thumbnails to false

--The following properties are not needed because thumbnails is set to false.

--set thumbnails per page to 4 set tile to false

--The following properties are not needed because tile is set to false.

--set tiling overlap to 12

--set tiling type to auto

end if

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the Marks and Bleed

--panel of the Print dialog.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--Set the following property to true to print all printer's marks.

--set all Printer Marks to true;

set use document bleed to print to false

--If use document bleed to print is true then setting any of the

-- bleed properties

--will result in an error.

set bleed bottom to myY2Offset

set bleed top to myY1Offset

set bleed inside to myX1Offset

set bleed outside to myX2Offset

--If any bleed area is greater than zero, then export the bleed marks.

if bleed bottom is equal to 0 and bleed top is equal to 0 and

bleed inside

set bleed marks to true

else

set bleed marks to false end if set color bars to true set crop marks to true set include slug to print to false set mark line weight to p125pt set mark offset to 6

--set mark Type to default set page information marks to true set registration marks to true

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the Output panel

--of the Print dialog.

----------------------------------------------------------------------set negative to true set color output to separations

--Note the lowercase "i" in "Builtin"

is equal to 0 and bleed outside is equal to 0 then

CHAPTER 3: Documents Printing a Document 50

set trapping to application builtin set screening to "175 lpi/2400 dpi" set flip to none

--If trapping is on, attempting to set the following properties

--will generate an error. if trapping is off then

set print black to true

set print cyan to true

set print magenta to true

set print yellow to true end if

--Only change the ink angle and frequency when you want to override the

--screening set by the screening specified by the screening property.

--set black angle to 45

--set black frequency to 175

--set cyan angle to 15

--set cyan frequency to 175

--set magenta angle to 75

--set magenta frequency to 175

--set yellow angle to 0

--set yellow frequency to 175

--The following properties are not needed (because colorOutput

--is set to separations).

--set composite angle to 45

--set composite frequency to 175

--set simulate overprint to false

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the Graphics panel

--of the Print dialog.

----------------------------------------------------------------------set send image data to all image data set font downloading to complete try

set download PPD fonts to true end try try

set data format to binary end try try

set PostScript level to level 3 end try

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the Color Management panel

--of the Print dialog.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--If the use color management property of color settings is false,

--attempting to set the following properties will return an error. try

set source space to use document

set intent to use color settings

set CRD to use document

set profile to PostScript CMS end try

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 51

--Properties corresponding to the controls in the Advanced panel

--of the Print dialog.

----------------------------------------------------------------------set OPI image replacement to false set omit bitmaps to false set omit EPS to false set omit PDF to false

--The following line assumes that you have a flattener preset

--named "high quality flattener". try

set flattener preset name to "high quality flattener" end try set ignore spread overrides to false

end tell

Printing with printer presets

To print a document using a printer preset, include the printer preset in the print command.

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--The following line assumes that you have defined a print preset

--named "myPrintPreset". print active document using "myPrintPreset"

end tell

Exporting a Document as PDF

InDesign scripting offers full control over the creation of PDF files from your page-layout documents.

Exporting to PDF

The following script exports the current document as PDF, using the current PDF export options. (For the complete script, see ExportPDF.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell active document

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path for your system. export format PDF type to "yukino:test.pdf" without showing options

end tell

The following script fragment shows how to export to PDF using a PDF export preset. (For the complete script, see ExportPDFWithPreset.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell active document

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path for your system and

--a valid PDF export preset name. export format PDF type to "yukino:test.pdf" using PDF export preset "myTestPreset" without showing options

end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 52

Setting PDF export options

The following script sets the PDF export options before exporting. (For the complete script, see ExportPDFWithOptions.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Get the bleed amounts from the document's bleed. tell document preferences of active document

set myX1Offset to document bleed inside or left offset set myY1Offset to document bleed top offset set myX2Offset to document bleed outside or right offset set myY2Offset to document bleed bottom offset

end tell tell PDF export preferences

--Basic PDF output options. set page range to all pages set acrobat compatibility to acrobat 6 set export guides and grids to false set export layers to false set export nonprinting objects to false set export reader spreads to false set generate thumbnails to false try

set ignore spread overrides to false end try set include bookmarks to true set include hyperlinks to true try

set include ICC profiles to true end try set include slug with PDF to false set include structure to false set interactive elements option to do not include

--Setting subset fonts below to zero disallows font subsetting

--set subset fonts below to some other value to use font subsetting. set subset fonts below to 0

--Bitmap compression/sampling/quality options. set color bitmap compression to zip set color bitmap quality to eight bit set color bitmap sampling to none

--threshold to compress color is not needed in this example.

--color bitmap sampling dpi is not needed when color bitmap sampling

--is set to none. set grayscale bitmap compression to zip set grayscale bitmap quality to eight bit set grayscale bitmap sampling to none

--threshold to compress gray is not needed in this example.

--grayscale bitmap sampling dpi is not needed when grayscale bitmap

--sampling is set to none. set monochrome bitmap compression to zip set monochrome bitmap sampling to none

--threshold to compress monochrome is not needed in this example.

--monochrome bitmap sampling dpi is not needed when monochrome bitmap

--sampling is set to none.

--Other compression options. set compression type to Compress None set compress text and line art to true set crop images to frames to true set optimize PDF to true

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 53

--Printers marks and prepress options. set bleed bottom to myY2Offset set bleed top to myY1Offset set bleed inside to myX1Offset set bleed outside to myX2Offset

--If any bleed area is greater than zero, then export the bleed marks. if bleed bottom is 0 and bleed top is 0 and bleed inside is 0 and bleed outside is 0 then

set bleed marks to true else

set bleed marks to false end if set color bars to true

--Color tile size and gray tile size are not used

--unless the compression method chosen is JPEG 2000.

--set color tile size to 256

--set Gray tile size to 256 set crop marks to true set omit bitmaps to false set omit EPS to false set omit PDF to false set page information marks to true set page marks offset to "12 pt" set PDF color space to unchanged color space set PDF mark type to default set printer mark weight to p125pt set registration marks to true

--simulate overprint is only available when the export standard

--is PDF/X-1a or PDF/X-3

--set simulate overprint to false set use document bleed with PDF to true

--Set viewPDF to true to open the PDF in Acrobat or Adobe Reader. set view PDF to false

end tell

--Now export the document. tell active document

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path for your system. export format PDF type to "yukino:test.pdf" without showing options

end tell

Exporting to grayscale PDF

An InDesign document that contains colors can be exported to a color PDF or to a grayscale PDF. You can modify the script in the preceding “Setting PDF export options” on page 52 by changing the

tell PDF export preferences

set PDF color space to gray

end tell

(For a different script that creates a small document containing color and exports it to PDF in grayscale, see GreyscalePDFforIDS.)

PDF color space option from unchanged color space to gray. For example:

section to export in grayscale

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 54

Exporting a range of pages to PDF

The following script shows how to export a specified page range as PDF. (For the complete script, see ExportPageRangeAsPDF.)

--Assumes you have a document open, and that that document

--contains at least 12 pages. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell PDF export preferences

--page range can be either all pages or a page range string

--(just as you would enter it in the Print or Export PDF dialog box). set page range to "1, 3-6, 7, 9-11, 12"

end tell tell active document

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path for your system and

--a valid PDF export preset name. export format PDF type to "yukino:test.pdf" using PDF export preset "myTestPreset" without showing options

end tell

Exporting individual pages to PDF

The following script exports each page from a document as an individual PDF file. (For the complete script, see ExportEachPageAsPDF.)

--Display a "choose folder" dialog box. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if (count documents) is not equal to 0 then

my myChooseFolder()

else

display dialog "Please open a document and try again."

end if end tell on myChooseFolder()

set myFolder to choose folder with prompt "Choose a Folder"

--Get the folder name (it'll be returned as a Unicode string)

set myFolder to myFolder as string

--Unofficial technique for changing Unicode folder name to plain text string.

set myFolder to «class ktxt» of (myFolder as record)

if myFolder is not equal to "" then

my myExportPages(myFolder)

end if end myChooseFolder on myExportPages(myFolder)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document set myDocumentName to name of myDocument set myDialog to make dialog with properties {name:"File Naming Options"} tell myDialog

tell (make dialog column)

tell (make dialog row)

make static text with properties {static label:"Base name:"} set myBaseNameField to make text editbox with properties {edit contents:myDocumentName, min width:160}

end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 55

set myResult to show myDialog if myResult is true then

--The name of the exported files will be the base name + the value

--of the counter + ".pdf". set myBaseName to edit contents of myBaseNameField

--Remove the dialog box from memory. destroy myDialog repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count pages in myDocument)

set myPageName to name of page myCounter of myDocument set page range of PDF export preferences to name of page myCounter of myDocument

--Generate a file path from the folder name, the base document

--name, and the page name.

--Replace any colons in the page name (e.g., "Sec1:1") so that

--they don't cause problems with file naming. set myPageName to my myReplace(myPageName, ":", "_") set myFilePath to myFolder & myBaseName & "_" & myPageName & ".pdf" tell myDocument

--The export command will fail if you provide the file path

--as Unicode text--that's why we had to convert the folder name

--to plain text. export format PDF type to myFilePath

end tell

end repeat

else

destroy myDialog

end if

end tell end myExportPages on myReplace(myString, myFindString, myChangeString)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to myFindString

set myTextList to every text item of (myString as text)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to myChangeString

set myString to myTextList as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""

return myString end myReplace

Exporting PDF with interactive features

The following script exports a document with interactive features as a PDF. (For the complete script, see ExportInteractivePDF.)

--Given a document "myDocument" containing at least two spreads... repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count spreads of myDocument)

set page transition type of spread myCounter of myDocument to wipe transition

set page transition direction of spread myCounter of myDocument to left to right

set page transition duration of spread myCounter of myDocument to medium end repeat set myDesktopFolder to path to desktop as string set myFile to myDesktopFolder & "InteractivePDF.pdf" tell myDocument

export format interactive PDF to myFile without showing options end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 56

Exporting as a PDF form

To create a PDF that contains form fields, you can either save the InDesign document as PDF, then open it in Acrobat and apply form fields, or apply text fields, radio buttons, signature fields, and so on directly in InDesign and export the document to PDF as a form with no additional Acrobat editing required.

The following script applies form elements to an InDesign document and exports the document as a PDF form. (For the complete script, see ExportInteractivePDFForm.)

tell page 1 of myDocument

--Create a textframe as firstname label set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 15, 20, 35}, contents:"FirstName: "}

--Create a textbox as firstname input box set myTextBox to make text box with properties {geometric bounds:{15, 40, 20, 75}}

--Create another textframe as lastname label set myTextFrame1 to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{30, 15, 25, 35}, contents:"LastName: "}

--Create another textbox as lastname input box set myTextBox to make text box with properties {geometric bounds:{30, 40, 25, 75}}

--Create a TextFrame to introduce the following checkbox set myTextFrame2 to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 80, 20, 95}, contents:"Hobby:"}

--Create some CheckBoxes set myCheckBox to make check box with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 100, 20, 105}, name:"Football"}

set myTextFrame3 to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 107, 20, 125}, contents:"Football"}

set myCheckBox1 to make check box with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 130, 20, 135}, name:"Basketball"}

set myTextFrame4 to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 137, 20, 160}, contents:"Basketball"}

set myCheckBox2 to make check box with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 165, 20, 170}, name:"Pingpong"}

set myTextFrame5 to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{15, 172, 20, 193}, contents:"Pingpong"}

--Create a button for submit set submitButton to make button with properties

{geometric:{45, 15, 35, 35}, name:"Submit"} end tell tell state 1 of submitButton set myRightArrow1 to make polygon with properties {fill color:color "Green" of myDocument, stroke color:"None"} set entire path of path 1 of myRightArrow1 to {{15, 35}, {35, 40}, {15, 45}} end tell

--Add the Rollover state. tell submitButton set myRolloverState1 to make state end tell tell myRolloverState1 set myRolloverArrow1 to make polygon with properties {fill color:color "Green" of myDocument, stroke color:"None"} set entire path of path 1 of myRolloverArrow1 to {{15, 35}, {35, 40}, {15, 45}}

--Add a shadow to the polygon in the Rollover state. end tell tell drop shadow settings of fill transparency settings of myRolloverArrow1 set mode to drop set angle to 90 set x offset to 0

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting a Document as PDF 57

set y offset to 0 set size to 6 end tell tell submitButton set myClickState1 to make state end tell tell myClickState1 set myClickArrow1 to make polygon with properties {fill color:color "Blue" of myDocument, stroke color:"None"} set entire path of path 1 of myClickArrow1 to {{15, 35}, {35, 40}, {15, 45}} end tell

--Set the behavior for the button. tell submitButton set submitForm to make submit form behaviors with properties {behavior event:mouse up} end tell

tell page 1 of myDocument

--Create a button for print set printButton to make button with properties {geometric:{45, 15, 35, 35}, name:"Submit"} end tell tell state 1 of printButton set myRightArrow2 to make polygon with properties {fill color:color "Red" of myDocument, stroke color:"None"} set entire path of path 1 of myRightArrow2 to {{40, 35}, {60, 40}, {40, 45}} end tell

--Add the Rollover state. tell printButton set myRolloverState2 to make state end tell tell myRolloverState2 set myRolloverArrow2 to make polygon with properties {fill color:color "Red" of myDocument, stroke color:"None"} set entire path of path 1 of myRolloverArrow2 to {{40, 35}, {60, 40}, {40, 45}}

--Add a shadow to the polygon in the Rollover state. end tell tell drop shadow settings of fill transparency settings of myRolloverArrow2 set mode to drop set angle to 90 set x offset to 0 set y offset to 0 set size to 6 end tell tell printButton set myClickState2 to make state end tell

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting Pages as EPS 58

tell myClickState2 set myClickArrow2 to make polygon with properties {fill color:color "Blue" of myDocument, stroke color:"None"} set entire path of path 1 of myClickArrow2 to {{40, 35}, {60, 40}, {40, 45}} end tell

--Set the behavior for the button. tell printButton set PrintForm to make print form behaviors with properties {behavior event:mouse up} end tell

--Export the document to PDF. set myDesktopFolder to path to desktop as string set myFile to myDesktopFolder & "SubmitForm.pdf" tell myDocument export format interactive PDF to myFile without showing options end tell

Exporting Pages as EPS

When you export a document as EPS, InDesign saves each page of the file as a separate EPS graphic (an EPS, by definition, can contain only a single page). If you export more than a single page, InDesign appends the index of the page to the filename. The index of the page in the document is not necessarily the name of the page (as defined by the section options for the section containing the page).

Exporting all pages to EPS

The following script exports the pages of the active document to one or more EPS files. (For the complete script, see ExportAsEPS.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set page range of EPS export preferences to all pages tell active document

--You'll have to fill in a valid file name for your system.

--Files will be named "myFile_01.eps", "myFile_02.eps", and so on.

set myFileName to "yukino:myFile.eps"

export format EPS type to myFileName without showing options

end tell

Exporting a range of pages to EPS

To control which pages are exported as EPS, set the page range property of the EPS export preferences to a page-range string containing the page or pages you want to export, before exporting. (For the complete script, see ExportPageRangeAsEPS.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting Pages as EPS 59

--Assumes you have a document open, and that that document

--contains at least 12 pages. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell EPS export preferences

--page range can be either all pages or a page range string

--(just as you would enter it in the Print or Export EPS dialog box).

set page range to "1, 3-6, 7, 9-11, 12"

end tell tell active document

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path for your system.

export format EPS type to "yukino:test.eps" without showing options

end tell

Exporting as EPS with file naming

The following script exports each page as an EPS, but it offers more control over file naming than the earlier example. (For the complete script, see ExportEachPageAsEPS.)

--Display a "choose folder" dialog box. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if (count documents) is not equal to 0 then

my myChooseFolder()

else

display dialog "Please open a document and try again."

end if end tell on myChooseFolder()

set myFolder to choose folder with prompt "Choose a Folder"

--Get the folder name (it'll be returned as a Unicode string)

set myFolder to myFolder as string

--Unofficial technique for changing Unicode folder name to plain text string.

set myFolder to «class ktxt» of (myFolder as record)

if myFolder is not equal to "" then

my myExportPages(myFolder)

end if end myChooseFolder on myExportPages(myFolder)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document set myDocumentName to name of myDocument set myDialog to make dialog with properties {name:"ExportPages"} tell myDialog

tell (make dialog column)

tell (make dialog row)

make static text with properties {static label:"Base Name:"} set myBaseNameField to make text editbox with properties {edit contents:myDocumentName, min width:160}

end tell

end tell end tell set myResult to show myDialog if myResult is true then

--The name of the exported files will be the base name + the

--value of the counter + ".pdf".

set myBaseName to edit contents of myBaseNameField

--Remove the dialog box from memory.

destroy myDialog

repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count pages in myDocument)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting to EPub 60

--Get the name of the page and assign it to the variable "myPageName" set myPageName to name of page myCounter of myDocument

--Set the page range to the name of the specific page. set page range of EPS export preferences to myPageName

--Generate a file path from the folder name, the base document

--name, and the page name.

--Replace any colons in the page name (e.g., "Sec1:1") so that

--they don't cause problems with file naming. set myPageName to my myReplace(myPageName, ":", "_") set myFilePath to myFolder & myBaseName & "_" & myPageName & ".eps" tell myDocument

export format EPS type to myFilePath without showing options

end tell

end repeat else

destroy myDialog end if

end tell end myExportPages on myReplace(myString, myFindString, myChangeString)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to myFindString

set myTextList to every text item of (myString as text)

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to myChangeString

set myString to myTextList as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""

return myString end myReplace

Exporting to EPub

InDesign scripting offers full control over the creation of EPub files from your page-layout documents.

Exporting the current document

The following script exports the current document as EPub, using default options. (For the complete script, see ExportEPub.)

set myDocument to document 1 tell myDocument

export format EPUB to myFile without showing options end tell

To give the user more control over the the creation of EPub files, specify true for the third parameter. This opens the EPub export options dialog.

Setting EPub export options

The following script sets the EPub export options before exporting. (For the complete script, see ExportEPubWithOptions.)

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting to EPub 61

tell myDocument

tell EPub export preferences

--Apply image alignment to anchored object settings. set apply image alignment to anchored object settings to false

--The unit of space. set space unit to css em

--The unit of margin. set margin unit to css em

--Bottom margin of the epub. set bottom margin to 5

--Left margin of the epub. set left margin to 5

--Right margin of the epub. set right margin to 5

--Top margin of the epub. set top margin to 5

--If true, break InDesign document into smaller pieces when generating epub. set break document to true

-- The name of paragraph style to break InDesign document. set paragraph style name to ""

--The buttet export option. set bullet export option to as text

set CSS export option to embedded CSS set custom image size option to size relative to page width

set embed font to true

set epub cover to first page

--This will take effect only when epub cover is set to external image.

--set cover image file to "cover.jpg"

set epub publisher to "Adobe Devtech"

--The export order. set export order to layout order

--If true, output footnote immediately after its paragraph. set footnote follow paragraph to false

--If true, export epub in XHTML format. Otherwise, in DTBook format. set format to true

set GIF options interlaced to true set GIF options palette to windows palette

--The epub unique identifier, like ISBN. set id to "123"

--Ignore object level image conversion settings. set ignore object conversion settings to true

--Alignment applied to images. set image alignment to align center

--The file format to use for converted images. set image conversion to automatic

CHAPTER 3: Documents Exporting to EPub 62

set image export resolution to ppi 150

--Image page break settings to be used with objects. set image page break to page break after

--Space After applied to images. set image space after to 2

--Space Before applied to images. set image space before to 2

--If true, include CSS definition. set include CSS definition to true

--If true, output document metadata into epub. set include document metadata to true

set JPEG options format to baseline encoding set JPEG options quality to high

--The PNG compression level. set level to 5

set numbered list export option to as text

--If true, format image based on layout appearence. set preserve layout appearence to true

--If true, output local style override. set preserve local override to true

set strip soft return to true

--If true, image page break settings will be used in objects. set use image page break to true

--Use InDesign TOC style to generate epub TOC. set use toc style to true

set view document after export to false

end tell

export format EPUB to myFile without showing options end tell

Chapter Update Status

CS6 Unchanged

Working with Layers

InDesign’s layers are the key to controlling the stacking order of objects in your layout. You can think of layers as transparent planes stacked on top of each other. You also can use layers as an organizational tool, putting one type of content on a given layer or set of layers.

A document can contain one or more layers, and each document includes at least one layer. Layers are document wide, not bound to specific pages or spreads.

This chapter covers scripting techniques related to layers in an InDesign layout and discusses common operations involving layers.

Understanding the Layer Object Model

The following figure shows the layer object model. Note the following about the diagram:

 It focuses on the location of a layer and its contents in the context of the object hierarchy of a

document; it does not attempt to show all the other ways a script might work with the content of a layer (e.g., you can get a reference to a text-frame object from a story, text object, page, or spread, in addition to finding it inside a layer object).

 It uses the JavaScript form of the object names; however, the object hierarchy is the same in all

scripting languages.

 The basic properties of a layer are shown in the column at the left of the figure; the objects that may

be contained by the layer object, at the right.

It is important to note the distinction between the page-items collection and the all page items collection. The former is a collection containing only the top-level page items in a layer. If a page item is inside a group, for example, it will not appear in the

collection is a flattened collection of all page items assigned to the layer, regardless of their location

items

in the object hierarchy. A page item inside a group on the layer would appear in the collection.

Similarly, the regardless of their location in the object hierarchy.

all graphics property contains all graphics stored in page items assigned to the layer,

page items collection. In contrast, the all page

all page items

CHAPTER 4: Working with Layers Scripting Layers 64

Scripting Layers

In InDesign’s user interface, you add, delete, rearrange, duplicate, and merge layers using the Layers panel. You also can change the layer to which a selected page item is assigned by dragging and dropping the layer proxy in the Layers panel. (For more on assigning objects to a layer, see the InDesign online help.) This section shows how to accomplish these tasks using InDesign scripting.

Creating layers

The following script fragment shows how to create a new layer. (For the complete script, see AddLayer.)

--Given a document "myDocument"... tell myDocument

set myLayer to make layer end tell

When you create a new layer, the layer appears above all other layers in the document.

CHAPTER 4: Working with Layers Scripting Layers 65

Referring to layers

InDesign scripting offers several ways to refer to a layer object. This section describes the most common ways to refer to layers.

Getting the active layer

The active layer is the layer on which new objects are created. You can get the active layer using scripting, as shown in the following script fragment. (For the complete script, see ActiveLayer.)

--Given a document "myDocument"... tell myDocument

set myLayer to active layer end tell

Referring to layers by layer index

You can get a reference to a layer using the index of the layer in the layers collection of a document. The script fragment below uses the layer index to iterate through layers. (For the complete script, see HideOtherLayers.)

--Given a document "myDocument"... tell myDocument

set myTargetLayer to active layer

set myLayerName to name of myTargetLayer

repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count layers)

--If the layer is not the target layer, hide it.

set myName to name of layer myCounter

if myName is not equal to myLayerName then

set visible of layer myCounter of myDocument to false

end if

end repeat end tell

Note that you can use negative numbers to refer to the layers in the layers collection of a document. Layer

-1 refers to the last (bottom) layer in the collection.

Referring to layers by layer name

You also can get a reference to a layer using the name of the layer, as shown in the following script fragment. (For the complete script, see LayerName.)

set myLayer to layer "Text Layer" of document 1

CHAPTER 4: Working with Layers Scripting Layers 66

Deleting layers

Use the delete method to delete a layer from a specific document, as shown in the following script fragment. (For the complete script, see DeleteLayer.) You cannot delete the last remaining layer in a document.

--Given a document "myDocument" containing a layer named "Delete This Layer"... set myLayer to layer "Delete This Layer" of myDocument tell myLayer

delete end tell

Moving layers

Use the move method to change the stacking order of layers in a document, as shown in the following script fragment. (For the complete script, see MoveLayer.)

--Given a document "myDocument" containing at least two layers... set myLayerA to layer 1 of myDocument set myLayerB to layer 2 of myDocument tell myLayer1

move to after myLayer2 end tell

Duplicating layers

Use the duplicate method to create a copy of a layer, as shown in the following script fragment. (For the complete script, see DuplicateLayer.)

-Given a layer "myLayer"... tell myLayer

set myNewLayer to duplicate end tell

Merging layers

The following script fragment shows how to merge two or more layers, including the page items assigned to them, into a single layer. (For the complete script, see MergeLayers.)

--Given the layers "myLayer1" and "myLayer2"... tell myLayer1

merge with myLayer2 end tell

Assigning page items to layers

You can assign a page item to a layer by either referring to the layer when you create the page item or setting the assign a page item to a layer using both techniques. (For the complete script, see AssignPageItemsToLayers.)

item layer property of an existing page item. The following script fragment shows how to

CHAPTER 4: Working with Layers Scripting Layers 67

--Given a reference to a page "myPage," and a document "myDocument"... tell myPage

--Create a text frame on a layer named "TextFrames"

set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties

{item layer:layer "TextFrames", geometric bounds:{72, 72, 144, 144}}

--Create a rectangle on the current target layer.

set myRectangle to make rectangle with properties

{geometric bounds:{72, 144, 144, 216}}

--Move the rectangle to a specific layer.

set item layer of myRectangle to layer "Rectangles" of myDocument

--Create a series of ovals.

repeat with myCounter from 72 to 172 by 10

make oval with properties {geometric bounds:{216, myCounter, 226, myCounter + 10}}

end repeat

--Move all of the ovals on the page to a specific layer.

repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count ovals)

set item layer of oval myCounter to layer "Ovals" of myDocument

end repeat end tell

Setting layer properties

Layer properties control the layer name, color, visibility, and other attributes of a layer. This section shows how to work with layer properties.

Setting basic layer properties

Basic layer properties include the name of the layer, the highlight color of the layer, the visibility of the layer, and whether text objects on the layer ignore text-wrap settings. The following script fragment shows how to set these basic properties of a layer. (For the complete script, see BasicLayerProperties.)

--Given a document "myDocument"... tell myDocument

set myLayer to make layer

set name of myLayer to "myLayer"

set layer color of myLayer to charcoal

set ignore wrap of myLayer to false

set visible of myLayer to true end tell

CHAPTER 4: Working with Layers Scripting Layers 68

Working with layer guides

Guides can be assigned to a specific layer, just like page items. You can choose to show or hide the guides for a layer, and you can lock or unlock the guides on a layer. The following script fragment shows how to work with the guides on a layer. (For the complete script, see LayerGuides.)

--Given a document "myDocument" and a page "myPage" containing at least one guide... tell myDocument

set myLayer to make layer

--Move all of the guides on the page to the new layer.

tell myPage

repeat with myCounter from (count guides) to 1 by -1

set item layer of guide myCounter to myLayer

end repeat end tell set lock guides of myLayer to true set show guides of myLayer to true

end tell

Controlling layer printing and visibility

You can control the printing and visibility of objects on a layer, as shown in the following script fragment. (For the complete script, see LayerControl.)

--Given a document "myDocument" containing layers named "Background,"

--"Language A,", "Language B," and "Language C," export the "Background"

--layer and each "Language" layer to PDF as separate PDF files... set myList to {"A", "B", "C"} set myPath to path to desktop as string tell myDocument

repeat with myCounter from 1 to 3

set myVersion to "Language " & item myCounter of myList

repeat with myLayerCounter from 1 to (count layers)

if name of layer myLayerCounter is equal to myVersion or name of layer myLayerCounter is equal to "Background" then

set visible of layer myLayerCounter to true set printable of layer myLayerCounter to true

else

set visible of layer myLayerCounter to false set printable of layer myLayerCounter to false

end if end repeat set myFilePath to myPath & myVersion & ".pdf" export to myFilePath format PDF type

end repeat

end tell

CHAPTER 4: Working with Layers Scripting Layers 69

Locking layers

Layers can be locked, which means the page items on the layers cannot be edited. The following script fragment shows how to lock and unlock layers. (For the complete script, see LockLayersBelow.)

--Given a document "myDocument"... tell myDocument

set myLayer to active layer repeat with myCounter from ((index of myLayer) + 1) to (count layers)

set locked of layer myCounter to true

end repeat

end tell

Chapter Update Status

CS6 Updated Added section “Fitting text frames to content” on page 89.

Tex t a nd Type

Entering, editing, and formatting text are the tasks that make up the bulk of the time spent working on most InDesign documents. Because of this, automating text and type operations can result in large productivity gains.

This chapter shows how to script the most common operations involving text and type. The sample scripts in this chapter are presented in order of complexity, starting with very simple scripts and building toward more complex operations.

We assume that you have already read Adobe InDesign Scripting Tutorial and know how to create, install, and run a script. We also assume that you have some knowledge of working with text in InDesign and understand basic typesetting terms.

Entering and Importing Text

This section covers the process of getting text into your InDesign documents. Just as you can type text into text frames and place text files using the InDesign user interface, you can create text frames, insert text into a story, or place text files on pages using scripting.

Creating a text frame

The following script creates a text frame, sets the bounds (size) of the frame, then enters text in the frame (for the complete script, see the MakeTextFrame tutorial script):

--Given a document "myDocument"... set myDocument to document 1 set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame to make text frame

--Set the bounds of the text frame. set geometric bounds of myTextFrame to {72, 72, 288, 288}

--Enter text in the text frame. set contents of myTextFrame to "This is some example text."

--Note that you could also use a properties record

--to set the bounds and contents of the text in a

--single line:

--set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties{geometric bounds:{72, 72, 288, 288}, contents:"This is some example text."} end tell

The following script shows how to create a text frame that is the size of the area defined by the page margins. other examples in this chapter. (For the complete script, see MakeTextFrameWithinMargins.)

myGetBounds is a useful function that you can add to your own scripts, and it appears in many

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Entering and Importing Text 71

--Given a document "myDocument" set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame to make text frame

--Set the bounds of the text frame.

set geometric bounds of myTextFrame to my myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage)

end tell

The following script fragment shows the myGetBounds handler.

on myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell document preferences of myDocument

set myPageWidth to page width

set myPageHeight to page height end tell tell margin preferences of myPage

if side of myPage is left hand then

set myX2 to left set myX1 to right

else

set myX1 to left

set myX2 to right end if set myY1 to top set myY2 to bottom

end tell set myX2 to myPageWidth - myX2 set myY2 to myPageHeight - myY2 return {myY1, myX1, myY2, myX2}

end tell

end myGetBounds

Adding text

To add text to a story, use the contents property of the insertion point at the location where you want to insert the text. The following sample script uses this technique to add text at the end of a story (for the complete script, see AddText):

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1 set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocument

--Add text to the end of the text frame. To do this,

--We'll use the last insertion point in the story. set myNewText to "This is a new paragraph of example text." tell parent story of myTextFrame

set contents of insertion point -1 to return & myNewText

end tell

Stories and text frames

All text in an InDesign layout is part of a story, and every story can contain one or more text frames. Creating a text frame creates a story, and stories can contain multiple text frames.

In the preceding script, we added text at the end of the parent story rather than at the end of the text frame. This is because the end of the text frame might not be the end of the story; that depends on the length and formatting of the text. By adding the text to the end of the parent story, we can guarantee that the text is added, regardless of the composition of the text in the text frame.

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Entering and Importing Text 72

You always can get a reference to the story using the parent text frame property of a text frame. It can be useful to work with the text of a story instead of the text of a text frame; the following script demonstrates the difference. The alerts shows that the text frame does not contain the overset text, but the story does (for the complete script, see StoryAndTextFrame).

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1... set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of myDocument

--Now add text beyond the end of the text frame. set myString to return & "This is some overset text" tell insertion point -1 of myTextFrame to set contents to myString set myString to contents of text 1 of myTextFrame display dialog ("The last paragraph in this dialog should be \"This is some overset text\". Is it?" & return & myString) set myString to contents of parent story of myTextFrame display dialog ("The last paragraph in this alert should be \"This is some overset text\". Is it?" & return & myString)

For more on understanding the relationships between text objects in an InDesign document, see

“Understanding Text Objects” on page 80

Replacing text

The following script replaces a word with a phrase by changing the contents of the appropriate object (for the complete script, see ReplaceWord):

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1... set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocument

--Replace the third word with the phrase "a little bit of". tell word 3 of parent story of myTextFrame

set contents to "a little bit of"

end tell

The following script replaces the text in a paragraph (for the complete script, see ReplaceText):

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1... set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocument

--Replace the text in the second paragraph without

--replacing the return character at the end of the paragraph

--(character -2 is the character before the return). tell parent story of myTextFrame

set myText to object reference of text from character 1 to character -2 of paragraph

set contents of myText to "This text replaces the text in paragraph 2."

end tell

In the preceding script, we excluded the return character because deleting the return might change the paragraph style applied to the paragraph. To do this, we supplied a character range—from the first character of the paragraph to the last character before the return character that ends the paragraph.

Inserting special characters

Because the Script Editor supports Unicode, you can simply enter Unicode characters in text strings that you send to InDesign. The following script shows several ways to enter special characters. (We omitted the

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70” or in the

SpecialCharacters tutorial script.)

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Placing Text and Setting Text-Import Preferences 73

--Given a document "myDocument" containing a story... set myStory to story 1 of myDocument

--Entering special characters directly: set contents of myStory to "Registered trademark: ?" & return & "Copyright: ©" & return & "Trademark: Ÿ" & return

--Entering special characters by their Unicode glyph ID value: set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to "Not equal to: <2260>" & return set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to "Square root: <221A>" & return set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to "Square root: <00B6>" & return

--Entering special characters by their enumerations: set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to "Automatic page number marker: " set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to auto page number set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to return & "Section symbol: " set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to section symbol set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to return & "En dash: " set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to En dash set contents of insertion point -1 of myStory to return

The easiest way to find the Unicode ID for a character is to use InDesign’s Glyphs palette: move the cursor over a character in the palette, and InDesign displays its Unicode value. To learn more about Unicode, visit

http://www.unicode.org

Placing Text and Setting Text-Import Preferences

In addition to entering text strings, you can place text files created using word processors and text editors. The following script shows how to place a text file on a document page (for the complete script, see PlaceTextFile):

--Given a document "myDocument" set myPage to page 1 of myDocument

--Get the top and left margins to use as a place point. tell margin preferences of myPage

set myX to left set myY to right

end tell

--Autoflow a text file on the current page.

--Parameters for the place command of a page:

--file as file or string

--[place point as list {x, y}

--[destination layer as layer object or string]

--[showing options as Boolean (default is false)]

--[autoflowing as Boolean (default is false)]

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path on your system. tell myPage

--Note that if the PlacePoint parameter is inside a column, only the vertical (y)

--coordinate will be honored--the text frame will expand horizontally to fit the

column.

set myStory to place alias "Macintosh HD:scripting:test.txt" place point {myX, myY} autoflowing yes without showing options end tell

The following script shows how to place a text file in an existing text frame. (We omitted the myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70

,” or see the

PlaceTextFileInFrame tutorial script.)

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Placing Text and Setting Text-Import Preferences 74

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1... set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocument tell insertion point -1 of myTextFrame

--You'll need to fill in a valid file path for your system.

place "yukino:test.txt" without showing options end tell

The following script shows how to insert a text file at a specific location in text. (We omitted the

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70,” o r s ee t he

InsertTextFile tutorial script.)

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1...

--Place a text file at the end of the text. set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocument tell insertion point -1 of parent story of myTextFrame

--You'll need to fill in a valid file path for your system.

place "yukino:test.txt" without showing options end tell

To specify the import options for the specific type of text file you are placing, use the corresponding import-preferences object. The following script shows how to set text-import preferences (for the complete script, see TextImportPreferences). The comments in the script show the possible values for each property.

tell text import preferences

--Options for character set:

set character set to UTF8

set convert spaces into tabs to true

set spaces into tabs count to 3

--The dictionary property can take many values, such as French, Italian.

set dictionary to "English: USA"

--platform options:

--macintosh

--pc

set platform to macintosh

set strip returns between lines to true

set strip returns between paragraphs to true

set use typographers quotes to true end tell

The following script shows how to set tagged text import preferences (for the complete script, see TaggedTextImportPreferences):

tell tagged text import preferences

set remove text formatting to false

--Options for style conflict are:

--publication definition

--tag file definition

set style conflict to publication definition

set use typographers quotes to true end tell

The following script shows how to set Word and RTF import preferences (for the complete script, see WordRTFImportPreferences):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Placing Text and Setting Text-Import Preferences 75

tell word RTF import preferences

--convert page breaks property can be:

--column break

--none

--page break

set convert page breaks to none

--convert tables to property can be:

--unformatted tabbed text

--unformatted table

set convert tables to to Unformatted Table

set import endnotes to true

set import footnotes to true

set import index to true

set import TOC to true

set import unused styles to false

set preserve graphics to false

set preserve local overrides to false

set preserve track changes to false

set remove formatting to false

--resolve character style clash and resolve paragraph style clash properties can be:

--resolve clash auto rename

--resolve clash use existing

--resolve clash use new

set resolve character style clash to resolve clash use existing

set resolve paragraph style clash to resolve clash use existing

set use typographers quotes to true end tell

The following script shows how to set Excel import preferences (for the complete script, see ExcelImportPreferences):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell excel import preferences

--alignment Style property can be:

--center align

--left align

--right align

--spreadsheet set alignment style to spreadsheet set decimal places to 4 set preserve graphics to false

--Enter the range you want to import as "start cell:end cell". set range name to "A1:B16" set sheet index to 1 set sheet name to "pathpoints" set show hidden cells to false

--table formatting property can be:

--excel formatted table

--excel unformatted tabbed text

--excel unformatted table set table formatting to excel formatted table set use typographers quotes to true set view name to ""

end tell end tell

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Exporting Text and Setting Text-Export Preferences 76

Exporting Text and Setting Text-Export Preferences

The following script shows how to export text from an InDesign document. Note that you must use text or story objects to export into text file formats; you cannot export all text in a document in one operation. (We omitted the

page 70,” or see the ExportTextFile tutorial script.)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to active document

set myPage to page 1 of myDocument

tell myPage

set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds: my myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage), contents:placeholder text}

end tell

--Text export method parameters:

--format as enumeration

--to alias as string

--showing options boolean

--version comments string

--force save boolean

--Format parameter can be:

--InCopy CS Document

--InCopy Document

--rtf

--tagged text

--text type

--Export the story as text. You'll have to fill in a valid file path on your system.

tell parent story of myTextFrame

export to "yukino:test.txt" format text type

end tell end tell

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on

The following example shows how to export a specific range of text. (We omitted the myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70

,” or see the ExportTextRange

tutorial script.)

--Given a document with a text frame on page 1... set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of page 1 of active document set myStory to parent story of myTextFrame set myStartCharacter to index of character 1 of paragraph 1 of myStory set myEndCharacter to the index of last character of paragraph 1 of myStory set myText to object reference of text from character myStartCharacter to character myEndCharacter of myStory

--Export the text range. You'll have to fill in a valid file path on your system. tell myText to export to "Macintosh HD:scripting:test.txt" format text type

To specify the export options for the specific type of text file you’re exporting, use the corresponding export preferences object. The following script sets text-export preferences (for the complete script, see TextExportPreferences):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Exporting Text and Setting Text-Export Preferences 77

tell text export preferences

--Options for character set:

--UTF8

--UTF16

--platform

set character set to UTF8

--platform options:

--macintosh

--pc

set platform to macintosh end tell

The following script sets tagged text export preferences (for the complete script, see TaggedTextExportPreferences):

tell tagged text export preferences

--Options for character set:

--ansi

--ascii

--gb18030

--ksc5601

--shiftJIS

--unicode

set character set to unicode

--tag form options:

--abbreviated

--verbose

set tag form to verbose end tell

You cannot export all text in a document in one step. Instead, you need to either combine the text in the document into a single story and then export that story, or combine the text files by reading and writing files via scripting. The following script demonstrates the former approach. (We omitted the function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70

,” or see the ExportAllText

myGetBounds

tutorial script.) For any format other than text only, the latter method can become quite complex.

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if (count documents) > 0 then

set myDocument to active document if (count stories of myDocument) > 0 then

my myExportAllText(name of myDocument)

end if

end if end tell

Here is the ExportAllText handler referred to in the preceding fragment:

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Exporting Text and Setting Text-Export Preferences 78

on myExportAllText(myDocumentName)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--File name for the exported text. Fill in a valid file path on your system. set myFileName to "Adobe:test.txt"

--If you want to add a separator line between stories,

--set myAddSeparator to true. set myAddSeparator to true set myNewDocument to make document set myDocument to document myDocumentName tell page 1 of myNewDocument

set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds:my myGetBounds(myNewDocument, page 1 of myNewDocument)} set myNewStory to parent story of myTextFrame repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count stories in myDocument)

set myStory to story myCounter of myDocument

--Duplicate the text of the story to the end of the temporary story. tell text 1 of myStory

duplicate to after insertion point -1 of story 1 of myNewDocument

end tell

--If the imported text did not end with a return, enter a return

--to keep the stories from running together. if myCounter is not equal to (count stories of myDocument) then

if contents of character -1 of myNewStory is not return then

set contents of insertion point -1 of myNewStory to return if myAddSeparator is true then

set contents of insertion point -1 of myNewStory to "----------------------------------------" & return

end if

end if end repeat tell myNewStory

export to myFileName format text type end tell close myNewDocument saving no

end tell

end myExportAllText

Do not assume that you are limited to exporting text using existing export filters. Because AppleScript can write text files to disk, you can have your script traverse the text in a document and export it in any order you like, using whatever text mark-up scheme you prefer. Here is a very simple example that shows how to export InDesign text as HTML. (We omitted the

“Creating a text frame” on page 70

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

--Use the myStyleToTagMapping array to set up your paragraph style to tag mapping. set myStyleToTagMapping to {}

--For each style to tag mapping, add a new item to the array. copy {"body_text", "p"} to end of myStyleToTagMapping copy {"heading1", "h1"} to end of myStyleToTagMapping copy {"heading2", "h3"} to end of myStyleToTagMapping copy {"heading3", "h3"} to end of myStyleToTagMapping

--End of style to tag mapping. if (count documents) is not equal to 0 then

set myDocument to document 1 if (count stories of myDocument) is not equal to 0 then

--Open a new text file. set myTextFile to choose file name with prompt "Save HTML As"

--Iterate through the stories.

,” or see the ExportHTML tutorial script.)

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Exporting Text and Setting Text-Export Preferences 79

repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count stories of myDocument)

set myStory to story myCounter of myDocument

repeat with myParagraphCounter from 1 to (count paragraphs of myStory)

set myParagraph to object reference of paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory if (count tables of myParagraph) is 0 then

--If the paragraph is a simple paragraph--no tables,

--no local formatting--then simply export the text of the

--pararaph with the appropriate tag. if (count text style ranges of myParagraph) is 1 then

set myTag to my myFindTag(name of applied paragraph style of myParagraph, myStyleToTagMapping)

--If the tag comes back empty, map it to the

--basic paragraph tag. if myTag = "" then

set myTag to "p" end if set myStartTag to "<" & myTag & ">" set myEndTag to "</" & myTag & ">"

--If the paragraph is not the last paragraph in the story,

--omit the return character. if the contents of character -1 of myParagraph is return then

set myText to object reference of text from character 1

to character -2 of myParagraph

set myString to contents of myText else

set myString to contents of myParagraph end if

--Write the text of the paragraph to the text file. if myParagraphCounter = 1 then

set myAppendData to false else

set myAppendData to true end if my myWriteToFile(myStartTag & myString & myEndTag & return, myTextFile, myAppendData)

else

--Handle text style range export by iterating through

--the text style ranges in the paragraph. set myTextStyleRanges to text style ranges of myParagraph repeat with myRangeCounter from 1 to (count text style ranges of myParagraph)

set myTextStyleRange to object reference of text style

range myRangeCounter of myParagraph

if character -1 of myTextStyleRange is return then

set myStartCharacter to index of character 1 of myTextStyleRange set myEndCharacter to index of character -2 of myTextStyleRange set myText to object reference of text from character myStartCharacter to character myEndCharacter of myStory set myString to contents of myText

else

set myString to contents of myTextStyleRange end if if font style of myTextStyleRange is "Bold" then

set myString to "<b>" & myString & "</b>" else if font style of myTextStyleRange is "Italic" then

set myString to "<i>" & myString & "</i>" end if

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Understanding Text Objects 80

my myWriteToFile(myString, myTextFile, true)

end repeat my myWriteToFile(return, myTextFile, true)

end if

else

--Handle table export (assumes that there is only

--one table per paragraph,

--and that the table is in the paragraph by itself). set myTable to table 1 of myParagraph my myWriteToFile("<table border = 1>", myTextFile, true) repeat with myRowCounter from 1 to (count rows of myTable)

my myWriteToFile("<tr>", myTextFile, true) repeat with myColumnCounter from 1 to (count columns of myTable)

if myRowCounter = 1 then

set myString to "<th>"

set myString to myString & text 1 of cell myColumnCounter

of row myRowCounter of myTable

set myString to myString & "</th>" else

set myString to "<td>"

set myString to myString & text 1 of cell myColumnCounter

of row myRowCounter of myTable

set myString to myString & "</td>" end if my myWriteToFile(myString, myTextFile, true)

end repeat

my myWriteToFile("</tr>" & return, myTextFile, true) end repeat my myWriteToFile("</table>" & return, myTextFile, true)

end if

end repeat

end if

end tell

Understanding Text Objects

The following diagram shows a view of InDesign’s text object model. As you can see, there are two main types of text object: layout objects (text frames) and text-stream objects (for example, stories, insertion points, characters, and words):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Understanding Text Objects 81

story

insertion points

characters

words

lines

paragraphs

text columns

text style ranges

texts

text frame

insertion points

characters

words

lines

paragraphs

text columns

text style ranges

texts

text containers

document

spread, page, layer

notes

document

pages.item(0)

textFrames.item(0)

characters.item(0)

stories.item(0)

characters.item(0)

textFrames.item(0)

paragraphs.item(0)

characters.item(0)

stories.item(0)

paragraphs.item(0)

characters.item(0)

There are many ways to get a reference to a given text object. The following diagram shows a few ways to refer to the first character in the first text frame of the first page of a new document:

For any text stream object, the the text frame (or text frames) containing the text object, use the

parent of the object is the story containing the object. To get a reference to

parent text frames property.

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Understanding Text Objects 82

For a text frame, the parent of the text frame usually is the page or spread containing the text frame. If the text frame is inside a group or was pasted inside another page item, the containing page item. If the text frame was converted to an anchored frame, the

parent of the text frame is the

parent of the text frame

is the character containing the anchored frame.

Working with text selections

Text-related scripts often act on a text selection. The following script demonstrates a way to determine whether the current selection is a text selection. Unlike many of the other sample scripts, this script does not actually do anything; it simply presents a selection-filtering routine that you can use in your own scripts (for the complete script, see TextSelection).

if (count documents) is not equal to 0 then

--If the selection contains more than one item, the selection

--is not text selected with the Type tool. set mySelection to selection if (count mySelection) is not equal to 0 then

--Evaluate the selection based on its type. set myTextClasses to {insertion point, word, text style range, line, paragraph, text column, text, story} if class of item 1 of selection is in myTextClasses then

--The object is a text object; display the text object type.

--A practical script would do something with the selection,

--or pass the selection on to a function. display dialog ("Selection is a text object.")

--If the selection is inside a note, the parent of the selection

--will be a note object. if class of parent of item 1 of selection is note then

display dialog ("Selection is inside a note.")

end if

else if class of item 1 of selection is text frame then

display dialog ("Selection is a text frame")

else

display dialog ("Selected item is not a text object.")

end if

else

display dialog ("Please select some text and try again.")

end if

else

display dialog ("No documents are open.")

end if

Moving and copying text

You can move a text object to another location in text using the move method. To copy the text, use the

duplicate method (whose arguments are identical to the move method). The following script fragment

shows how it works (for the complete script, see MoveText):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Understanding Text Objects 83

--Given a document myDocument" with four text frams on page 1... set myTextFrameA to text frame 4 of page 1 of myDocument set myTextFrameB to text frame 3 of page 1 of myDocument set myTextFrameC to text frame 2 of page 1 of myDocument set myTextFrameD to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocument

--Note that moving text removes it from its original location. tell parent story of myTextFrameD

--Move WordC between the words in TextFrameC. move paragraph 4 to before word -1 of paragraph 1 of parent story of myTextFrameC

--Move WordB after the word in TextFrameB. move paragraph 3 to after insertion point -1 of myTextFrameB

--Move WordA to before the word in TextFrameA. move paragraph 2 to before word 1 in myTextFrameA

end tell

When you want to transfer formatted text from one document to another, you also can use the move method. Using the you must make the document visible and select the text you want to copy. Using

move or duplicate method is better than using copy and paste; to use copy and paste,

move or duplicate is

much faster and more robust. The following script shows how to move text from one document to another

move and duplicate. (We omitted the myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in

using

“Creating a text frame” on page 70

--Given a document "mySourceDocument"... set mySourceStory to story 1 of mySourceDocument

--Create a new document to move the text to. set myTargetDocument to make document set myPage to page 1 of myTargetDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:my myGetBounds(myTargetDocument, myPage)} end tell set myTargetStory to story 1 of myTargetDocument set contents of myTargetStory to "This is the target text. Insert the source text after this paragraph." & return duplicate paragraph 1 of mySourceStory to after insertion point -1 of myTargetStory

,” or see the MoveTextBetweenDocuments tutorial script.)

When you need to copy and paste text, you can use the copy method of the application. You will need to select the text before you copy. Again, you should use copy and paste only as a last resort; other approaches are faster, less fragile, and do not depend on the document being visible. (We omitted the

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70,” o r s ee t he

CopyPasteText tutorial script.)

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Understanding Text Objects 84

--Given an open document with a text frame on page 1 set myDocumentA to document 1 set myTextFrameA to text frame 1 of page 1 of myDocumentA

--Create another example document. set myDocumentB to make document set myPageB to page 1 of myDocumentB tell myPageB

set myTextFrameB to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds:my myGetBounds(myDocumentB, myPageB)} end tell

--Make document A the active document. set active document to myDocumentA

--Select the text. select text 1 of parent story of myTextFrameA copy

--Make document B the active document. set active document to myDocumentB

--Select the insertion point at which you want to paste the text. select insertion point -1 of myTextFrameB paste

One way to copy unformatted text from one text object to another is to get the contents property of a text object, then use that string to set the

contents property of another text object. The following script

shows how to do this (for the complete script, see CopyUnformattedText):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

set myDocument to document 1

set myPage to page 1 of myDocument

tell myPage

set myTextFrameA to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds:{72, 72, 144, 288}} set contents of myTextFrameA to "This is a formatted string." set font style of text 1 of parent story of myTextFrameA to "Bold" set myTextFrameB to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds:{228, 72, 300, 288}} set contents of myTextFrameB to "This is the destination text frame. Text pasted here will retain its formatting." set font style of text 1 of myTextFrameB to "Italic"

end tell

--Copy from one frame to another using a simple copy.

select text 1 of myTextFrameA

copy

select insertion point -1 of myTextFrameB

paste

--Create another text frame on the active page.

tell myPage

set myTextFrameC to make text frame with properties

{geometric bounds:{312, 72, 444, 288}} end tell set contents of myTextFrameC to "Text copied here will take on the formatting of the existing text." set font style of text 1 of parent story of myTextFrameC to "Italic"

--Copy the unformatted string from text frame A to the end of text frame C (note

--that this doesn't really copy the text it replicates the text string from one

--text frame in another text frame): set contents of insertion point -1 of myTextFrameC to contents of text 1 of parent

story of myTextFrameA end tell

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Working with Text Frames 85

Text objects and iteration

When your script moves, deletes, or adds text while iterating through a series of text objects, you can easily end up with invalid text references. The following script demonstrates this problem. (We omitted the

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70,” o r s ee t he

TextIterationWrong tutorial script.)

--The following for loop will fail to format all of the paragraphs

--and then generate an error. repeat with myParagraphCounter from 1 to (count paragraphs of myStory)

if contents of word 1 of paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory is "Delete" then

tell paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory to delete else

set point size of paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory to 24 end if

end repeat

In the preceding example, some of the paragraphs are left unformatted. How does this happen? The loop in the script iterates through the paragraphs from the first paragraph in the story to the last. As it does so, it deletes paragraphs that begin with the word “Delete.” When the script deletes the second paragraph, the third paragraph moves up to take its place. When the loop counter reaches 3, the script processes the paragraph that had been the fourth paragraph in the story; the original third paragraph is now the second paragraph and is skipped.

To avoid this problem, iterate backward through the text objects, as shown in the following script. (We omitted the

myGetBounds function from this listing; you can find it in “Creating a text frame” on page 70,”

or see the TextIterationRight tutorial script.)

--By iterating backwards we can avoid the error. repeat with myParagraphCounter from (count paragraphs of myStory) to 1 by -1

if contents of word 1 of paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory is "Delete" then

tell paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory to delete else

set point size of paragraph myParagraphCounter of myStory to 24 end if

end repeat

Working with Text Frames

In the previous sections of this chapter, we concentrated on working with text stream objects; in this section, we focus on text frames, the page-layout items that contain text in an InDesign document.

Linking text frames

The nextTextFrame and previousTextFrame properties of a text frame are the keys to linking (or “threading”) text frames in InDesign scripting. These properties correspond to the in port and out port on InDesign text frames, as shown in the following script fragment (for the complete script, see LinkTextFrames):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Working with Text Frames 86

--Given a document "myDocument" with two unlinked text frames on page 1... set myTextFrameA to text frame 2 of page 1 of document 1 set myTextFrameB to text frame 1 of page 1 of document 1

--Link TextFrameA to TextFrameB using the next text frame property. set next text frame of myTextFrameA to myTextFrameB

--Add a page. tell myDocument

set myNewPage to make page

end tell

--Create another text frame on the new page. tell myNewPage

set myTextFrameC to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds:{72, 72, 144, 144}}

--Link TextFrameC to TextFrameB using the previousTextFrame property. set previous text frame of myTextFrameC to myTextFrameB

--Fill the text frames with placeholder text. set contents of myTextFrameA to placeholder text

end tell

Unlinking text frames

The following example script shows how to unlink text frames (for the complete script, see UnlinkTextFrames):

--Unlink the two text frames. set next text frame of myTextFrameA to nothing

Removing a frame from a story

In InDesign, deleting a frame from a story does not delete the text in the frame, unless the frame is the only frame in the story. The following script fragment shows how to delete a frame and the text it contains from a story without disturbing the other frames in the story (for the complete script, see BreakFrame):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Working with Text Frames 87

set myObjectList to {}

--Script does nothing if no documents are open or if no objects are selected. tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if (count documents) is not equal to 0 then

set mySelection to selection

if (count mySelection) is not equal to 0 then

--Process the objects in the selection to create a list of

--qualifying objects (text frames). repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count mySelection)

if class of item myCounter of mySelection is text frame then

set myObjectList to myObjectList & item myCounter of mySelection else if class of item myCounter of mySelection is in {text, insertion point, character, word, line, text style range, paragraph, text column} then

set myObject to item 1 of parent text frames of item myCounter

of mySelection

set myObjectList to myObjectList & myObject end if

end repeat

--If the object list is not empty, pass it on to the handler

--that does the real work. if (count myObjectList) is not equal to 0 then

my myBreakFrames(myObjectList)

end if

end tell

Here is the myBreakFrames handler referred to in the preceding script.

on myBreakFrames(myObjectList)

repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count myObjectList)

my myBreakFrame(item myCounter of myObjectList)

end repeat end myBreakFrames on myBreakFrame(myTextFrame)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

if next text frame of myTextFrame is not equal to nothing and previous text frame

of myTextFrame is not equal to nothing then

set myNewFrame to duplicate myTextFrame if contents of myTextFrame is not equal to "" then

tell text 1 of myTextFrame to delete end if delete myTextFrame

end if

end tell

end myBreakFrame

Splitting all frames in a story

The following script fragment shows how to split all frames in a story into separate, independent stories, each containing one unlinked text frame (for the complete script, see SplitStory):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Working with Text Frames 88

on mySplitStory(myStory)

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"

tell document 1

local myTextContainers set myTextContainers to text containers in myStory if (count myTextContainers) is greater than 1 then

repeat with myCounter from (count myTextContainers) to 1 by -1

set myTextFrame to item myCounter of myTextContainers tell myTextFrame

duplicate if text 1 of myTextFrame is not equal to "" then

tell text 1 of myTextFrame

delete

end tell end if delete

end tell

end repeat

end if

end tell

end mySplitStory

Creating an anchored frame

To create an anchored frame (also known as an inline frame), you can create a text frame (or rectangle, oval, polygon, or graphic line) at a specific location in text (usually an insertion point). The following script fragment shows an example (for the complete script, see AnchoredFrame):

--Given a document "myDocument" with a text frame on page 1... set myPage to page 1 of myDocument set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of myPage tell insertion point 1 of paragraph 1 of myTextFrame

set myInlineFrame to make text frame

end tell

--Recompose the text to make sure that getting the

--geometric bounds of the inline graphic will work. tell text 1 of myTextFrame to recompose

--Get the geometric bounds of the inline frame. set myBounds to geometric bounds of myInlineFrame

--Set the width and height of the inline frame. In this example, we'll

--make the frame 24 points tall by 72 points wide. set e1 to item 1 of myBounds set e2 to item 2 of myBounds set e3 to (item 1 of myBounds) + 24 set e4 to (item 2 of myBounds) + 72 set geometric bounds of myInlineFrame to {e1, e2, e3, e4} set contents of myInlineFrame to "This is an inline frame." tell insertion point 1 of paragraph 2 of myTextFrame

set myAnchoredFrame to make text frame

end tell

--Recompose the text to make sure that getting the

--geometric bounds of the inline graphic will work. tell text 1 of myTextFrame to recompose

--Get the geometric bounds of the inline frame. set myBounds to geometric bounds of myAnchoredFrame

--Set the width and height of the inline frame. In this example, we'll

--make the frame 24 points tall by 72 points wide. set e1 to item 1 of myBounds

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Working with Text Frames 89

set e2 to item 2 of myBounds set e3 to (item 1 of myBounds) + 24 set e4 to (item 2 of myBounds) + 72 set geometric bounds of myAnchoredFrame to {e1, e2, e3, e4} set contents of myAnchoredFrame to "This is an anchored frame." tell anchored object settings of myAnchoredFrame

set anchored position to anchored set anchor point to top left anchor set horizontal reference point to anchor location set horizontal alignment to left align set anchor xoffset to 72 set vertical reference point to line baseline set anchor yoffset to 24 set anchor space above to 24

end tell

Fitting text frames to content

The following example script shows how to set rules on a text frame to determine how it grows when the user inputs text (for the complete script, see PersistedTextFrameFill):

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set myDocument to document 1 set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame to text frame 4 of myPage

--Now add text at the end of the text frame. set myString to return & "this is some overset text" tell insertion point -1 of myTextFrame to set contents to myString set myString to contents of text 1 of myTextFrame display dialog ("The last paragraph in this alert should be \"This is some overset text\". Is it?"

& return & myString) set myString to contents of parent story of myTextFrame display dialog ("The last paragraph in this alert should be \"This is some overset text\". Is it?"

& return & myString)

end tell set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame2 to text frame 3 of myPage

--Set auto sizing dimension of the text frame tell text frame preferences of myTextFrame2

set auto sizing dimension to height and width proportionally end tell

--Now add text at the end of the text frame. set myString to return & "this is some overset text" tell insertion point -1 of myTextFrame2 to set contents to myString

end tell set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame3 to text frame 2 of myPage

--Set auto sizing dimension of the text frame

--useMinimumHeightForAutoSizing and useNoLineBreaksForAutoSizing tell text frame preferences of myTextFrame3

set auto sizing dimension to height only

set use minimum height for auto sizing to true

set use no line breaks for auto sizing to true end tell

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 90

--Now add text at the end of the text frame. set myString to return & "this is some overset text" tell insertion point -1 of myTextFrame3 to set contents to myString

end tell set myPage to page 1 of myDocument tell myPage

set myTextFrame4 to text frame 1 of myPage

--Set auto size dimension of the text frame and auto sizing reference point tell text frame preferences of myTextFrame4

set auto sizing dimension to width only

set auto sizing reference point to top left position end tell

--Now add text at the end of the text frame. set myString to return & "this is some overset text" tell insertion point -1 of myTextFrame4 to set contents to myString

end tell

Formatting Text

In the previous sections of this chapter, we added text to a document, linked text frames, and worked with stories and text objects. In this section, we apply formatting to text. All the typesetting capabilities of InDesign are available to scripting.

Setting text defaults

You can set text defaults for both the application and each document. Text defaults for the application determine the text defaults in all new documents; text defaults for a document set the formatting of all new text objects in that document. (For the complete script, see TextDefaults.)

set horizontal measurement units of view preferences to points set vertical measurement units of view preferences to points

--To set the text formatting defaults for a document, replace "app"

--in the following lines with a reference to a document. tell text defaults

set alignToBaseline to true

--Because the font might not be available, it's usually best

--to apply the font within a try...catch structure. Fill in the

--name of a font on your system. try

set appliedFont to font "Minion Pro" end try

--Because the font style might not be available, it's usually best

--to apply the font style within a try...catch structure. try

set font style to "Regular" end try

--Because the language might not be available, it's usually best

--to apply the language within a try...catch structure. try

set applied language to "English: USA" end try set autoLeading to 100 set balsanceRaggedLines to false set baselineShift to 0 set capitalization to normal set composer to "Adobe Paragraph Composer" set desiredGlyphScaling to 100

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 91

set desiredLetterSpacing to 0 set desiredWordSpacing to 100 set drop cap characters to 0 if drop cap characters is not equal to 0 then

dropCapLines to 3

--Assumes that the application has a default character style named "myDropCap"

set drop cap style to character style "myDropCap" end if set fill color to "Black" set fill tint to 100 set first line indent to 14 set grid align first line only to false set horizontal scale to 100 set hyphenate after first to 3 set hyphenate before last to 4 set hyphenate capitalized words to false set hyphenate ladder limit to 1 set hyphenate words longer than to 5 set hyphenation to true set hyphenation zone to 36 set hyphen weight to 9 set justification to left align set keep all lines together to false set keep lines together to true set keep first lines to 2 set keep last lines to 2 set keep with next to 0 set kerning method to "Optical" set leading to 14 set left indent to 0 set ligatures to true set maximum glyph scaling to 100 set maximum letter spacing to 0 set maximum word spacing to 160 set minimum glyph scaling to 100 set minimum letter spacing to 0 set minimum word spacing to 80 set no break to false set OTF contextual alternate to true set OTF discretionary ligature to false set OTF figure style to proportional oldstyle set OTF fraction to true set OTF historical to false set OTF ordinal to false set OTF slashed zero to false set OTF swash to false set OTF titling to false set overprint fill to false set overprint stroke to false set pointSize to 11 set position to normal set right indent to 0 set rule above to false if rule above = true then

set rule above color to color "Black"

set rule above gap color to swatch "None"

set rule above gap overprint to false

set rule above gap tint to 100

set rule above left indent to 0

set rule above line weight to 0.25

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 92

set rule above offset to 14

set rule above overprint to false

set rule above right indent to 0

set rule above tint to 100

set rule above type to stroke style "Solid"

set rule above width to column width end if set rule below to false if rule below = true then

set rule below color to color "Black"

set rule below gap color to swatch "None"

set rule below gap overprint to false

set rule below gap tint to 100

set rule below left indent to 0

set rule below line weight to 0.25

set rule below offset to 14

set rule below overprint to false

set rule below right indent to 0

set rule below tint to 100

set rule below type to stroke style "Solid"

set rule below width to column width end if set single word justification to left align set skew to 0 set space after to 0 set space before to 0 set start paragraph to anywhere set strike thru to false if strike thru = true then

set strike through color to color "Black"

set strike through gap color to swatch "None"

set strike through gap overprint to false

set strike through gap tint to 100

set strike through offset to 3

set strike through overprint to false

set strike through tint to 100

set strike through type to stroke style "Solid"

set strike through weight to 0.25 end if set stroke color to "None" set stroke tint to 100 set stroke weight to 0 set tracking to 0 set underline to false if underline = true then

set underline color to color "Black"

set underline gap color to swatch "None"

set underline gap overprint to false

set underline gap tint to 100

set underline offset to 3

set underline overprint to false

set underline tint to 100

set underline type to stroke style "Solid"

set underline weight to 0.25 end if set vertical scale to 100

end tell

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 93

Working with fonts

The fonts collection of the InDesign application object contains all fonts accessible to InDesign. The fonts collection of a document, by contrast, contains only those fonts used in the document. The fonts collection of a document also contains any missing fonts—fonts used in the document that are not accessible to InDesign. The following script shows the difference between application fonts and document fonts. (We omitted the

set myApplicationFonts to the name of every font set myDocument to active document tell myDocument

set myPage to page 1 tell myPage

set myTextFrame to make text frame with properties {geometric bounds:my

myGetBounds(myDocument, myPage)}

end tell set myStory to parent story of myTextFrame set myDocumentFonts to name of every font

end tell set myString to "Document Fonts:" & return repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count myDocumentFonts)

set myString to myString & (item myCounter) of myDocumentFonts & return

end repeat set myString to myString & return & "Application Fonts:" & return repeat with myCounter from 1 to (count myApplicationFonts)

set myString to myString & (item myCounter) of myApplicationFonts & return

end repeat set contents of myStory to myString

myGetBounds function here; for the complete script, see FontCollections.)

NOTE: Font names typically are of the form familyName<tab>fontStyle, where familyName is the name of the font family,

"Adobe Caslon Pro<tab>Semibold Italic"

<tab> is a tab character, and fontStyle is the name of the font style. For example:

Applying a font

To apply a local font change to a range of text, use the appliedFont property, as shown in the following script fragment (from the ApplyFont tutorial script):

--Given a font name "myFontName" and a text object "myText"... set applied font of myText to myFontName

You also can apply a font by specifying the font family name and font style, as shown in the following script fragment:

tell myText set applied font to "Adobe Caslon Pro" set font style to "Semibold Italic" end tell

Changing text properties

Text objects in InDesign have literally dozens of properties corresponding to their formatting attributes. Even one insertion point features properties that affect the formatting of text—up to and including properties of the paragraph containing the insertion point. The SetTextProperties tutorial script shows how to set every property of a text object. A fragment of the script is shown below:

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 94

--Given a document "myDocument" containing a story... set myStory to story 1 of myDocument tell character 1 of myStory

set align to baseline to false set applied character style to character style "[None]" of myDocument set applied font to "Minion ProRegular" set applied language to "English: USA" set applied numbering list to "[Default]" set applied paragraph style to paragraph style "[No Paragraph Style]" of myDocument set auto leading to 120 set balance ragged lines to no balancing set baseline shift to 0 set bullets alignment to left align set bullets and numbering list type to no list set bullets character style to character style "[None]" of myDocument set bullets text after to "^t" set capitalization to normal set composer to "Adobe Paragraph Composer" set desired glyph scaling to 100 set desired letter spacing to 0 set desired word spacing to 100 set drop cap characters to 0 set drop cap lines to 0 set drop cap style to character style "[None]" of myDocument set dropcap detail to 0 set fill color to color "Black" of myDocument set fill tint to -1 set first line indent to 0 set font style to "Regular" set gradient fill angle to 0 set gradient fill length to -1 set gradient fill start to [0, 0] set gradient stroke angle to 0 set gradient stroke length to -1 set gradient stroke start to [0, 0] set grid align first line only to false set horizontal scale to 100 set hyphen weight to 5 set hyphenate across columns to true set hyphenate after first to 2 set hyphenate before last to 2 set hyphenate capitalized words to true set hyphenate ladder limit to 3 set hyphenate last word to true set hyphenate words longer than to 5 set hyphenation to true set hyphenation zone to 3 set ignore edge alignment to false set justification to left align set keep all lines together to false set keep first lines to 2 set keep last lines to 2 set keep lines together to false set keep rule above in frame to false set keep with next to 0 set kerning method to "Optical" set last line indent to 0 set leading to 12 set left indent to 0 set ligatures to true

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 95

set maximum glyph scaling to 100 set maximum letter spacing to 0 set maximum word spacing to 133 set minimum glyph scaling to 100 set minimum letter spacing to 0 set minimum word spacing to 80 set no break to false set numbering alignment to left align set numbering apply restart policy to true set numbering character style to character style "[None]" of myDocument set numbering continue to true set numbering expression to "^#.^t" set numbering format to "1, 2, 3, 4..." set numbering level to 1 set numbering start at to 1 set OTF contextual alternate to true set OTF discretionary ligature to false set OTF figure style to proportional lining set OTF fraction to false set OTF historical to false set OTF locale to true set OTF mark to true set OTF ordinal to false set OTF slashed zero to false set OTF stylistic sets to 0 set OTF swash to false set OTF titling to false set overprint fill to false set overprint stroke to false set point size to 72 set position to normal set positional form to none set right indent to 0 set rule above to false set rule above color to "Text Color" set rule above gap color to swatch "None" of myDocument set rule above gap overprint to false set rule above gap tint to 100 set rule above left indent to 0 set rule above line weight to 0.25 set rule above offset to 14 set rule above overprint to false set rule above right indent to 0 set rule above tint to 100 set rule above type to stroke style "Solid" of myDocument set rule above width to column width set rule below to false set rule below color to "Text Color" set rule below gap color to swatch "None" of myDocument set rule below gap overprint to false set rule below gap tint to 100 set rule below left indent to 0 set rule below line weight to 0.25 set rule below offset to 14 set rule below overprint to false set rule below right indent to 0 set rule below tint to 100 set rule below type to stroke style "Solid" of myDocument set rule below width to column width set single word justification to left align

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 96

set skew to 0 set space after to 0 set space before to 0 set start paragraph to anywhere set strike thru to false set strike through color to color "Black" of myDocument set strike through gap color to swatch "None" of myDocument set strike through gap overprint to false set strike through gap tint to 100 set strike through offset to 3 set strike through overprint to false set strike through tint to 100 set strike through type to stroke style "Solid" of myDocument set strike through weight to 0.25 set stroke color to swatch "None" of myDocument set stroke tint to -1 set stroke weight to 1 set tracking to 0 set tracking to 0 set underline to false set underline color to color "Black" of myDocument set underline gap color to swatch "None" of myDocument set underline gap overprint to false set underline gap tint to 100 set underline offset to 3 set underline overprint to false set underline tint to 100 set underline type to stroke style "Solid" of myDocument set underline weight to 0.25 set vertical scale to 100

end tell

Changing text color

You can apply colors to the fill and stroke of text characters, as shown in the following script fragment (from the TextColors tutorial script):

set myStory to story 1 of myDocument set myColorA to color "DGC1_664a" of myDocument set myColorB to color "DGC1_664b" of myDocument tell paragraph 1 of myStory

set point size to 72 set justification to center align

--Apply a color to the fill of the text. set fill color to myColorA set stroke color to myColorB

end tell tell paragraph 2 of myStory

set stroke weight to 3 set point size to 144 set justification to center align set fill color to myColorB set stroke color to myColorA set stroke weight to 3

end tell

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 97

Creating and applying styles

While you can use scripting to apply local formatting—as in some of the examples earlier in this chapter—you probably will want to use character and paragraph styles to format your text. Using styles creates a link between the formatted text and the style, which makes it easier to redefine the style, collect the text formatted with a given style, or find and/or change the text. Paragraph and character styles are the keys to text formatting productivity and should be a central part of any script that applies text formatting.

The following example script fragment shows how to create and apply paragraph and character styles (for the complete script, see CreateStyles):

--Given a document "myDocument" containing a story and the color "Red"... tell myDocument

set myColor to color "Red" set myStory to story 1 of myDocument set contents of myStory to "Normal text. Text with a character style applied to it. More normal text."

--Create a character style named "myCharacterStyle" if

--no style by that name already exists. try

set myCharacterStyle to character style "myCharacterStyle" on error

--The style did not exist, so create it.

set myCharacterStyle to make character style with properties

{name:"myCharacterStyle"} end try

--At this point, the variable myCharacterStyle contains a reference to a character

--style object, which you can now use to specify formatting. set fill color of myCharacterStyle to myColor

--Create a paragraph style named "myParagraphStyle" if

--no style by that name already exists. try

set myParagraphStyle to paragraph style "myParagraphStyle" on error

--The paragraph style did not exist, so create it.

set myParagraphStyle to make paragraph style with properties

{name:"myParagraphStyle"} end try

--At this point, the variable myParagraphStyle contains a reference to a paragraph

--style object, which you can now use to specify formatting.

--(Note that the story object does not have the apply paragraph style method.) tell text 1 of myStory

apply paragraph style using myParagraphStyle

tell text from character 13 to character 54

apply character style using myCharacterStyle

end tell end tell

end tell

Why use the applyParagraphStyle method instead of setting the appliedParagraphStyle property of the text object? The

applyParagraphStyle method gives the ability to override existing formatting;

setting the property to a style retains local formatting.

Why check for the existence of a style when creating a new document? It always is possible that the style exists as an application default style. If it does, trying to create a new style with the same name results in an error.

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Formatting Text 98

Nested styles apply character-style formatting to a paragraph according to a pattern. The following script fragment shows how to create a paragraph style containing nested styles (for the complete script, see NestedStyles):

--Given a document "myDocument"...

--Get the last paragraph style. set myParagraphStyle to paragraph style -1 of myDocument

--Get the last character style set myCharacterStyle to character style -1 of myDocument

--At this point, the variable myParagraphStyle contains a reference to a paragraph

--style object. Next, add a nested style to the paragraph style. tell myParagraphStyle

set myNestedStyle to make nested style with properties {applied character

style:myCharacterStyle, delimiter:".", inclusive:true, repetition:1} end tell set myPage to page 1 of myDocument set myTextFrame to text frame 1 of myPage

--Apply the paragraph style to the story so that we can see the

--effect of the nested style we created.

--(Note that the story object does not have the apply paragraph style method.) set myStory to parent story of myTextFrame tell text 1 of myStory

apply paragraph style using myParagraphStyle

end tell

Deleting a style

When you delete a style using the user interface, you can choose the way you want to format any text tagged with that style. InDesign scripting works the same way, as shown in the following script fragment (from the RemoveStyle tutorial script):

--Given a document "myDocment" with paragraph styles named

--"myParagraphStyleA" and "myParagraphStyleB", remove the

--paragraph style "myParagraphStyleA" and replace with

--"myParagraphStyleB." tell myDocument

delete paragraph style "myParagraphStyleA" replacing with paragraph style

"myParagraphStyleB" end tell

Importing paragraph and character styles

You can import character and paragraph styles from other InDesign documents, as shown in the following script fragment (from the ImportTextStyles tutorial script):

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Finding and Changing Text 99

--You'll have to fill in a valid file path for your system. set myFilePath to "Macintosh HD:scripting:styles.indd"

--Create a new document. set myDocument to make document tell myDocument

--Import the styles from the saved document.

--importStyles parameters:

--Format options for text styles are:

-- paragraph styles format

-- character styles format

-- text styles format

--From as file or string

--Global Strategy options are:

-- do not load the style

-- load all with overwrite

-- load all with rename import styles format text styles format from myFilePath global strategy load all

with overwrite end tell

Finding and Changing Text

The find/change feature is one of the most powerful InDesign tools for working with text. It is fully supported by scripting, and scripts can use find/change to go far beyond what can be done using the InDesign user interface. InDesign has three ways of searching for text:

 You can find text and/or text formatting and change it to other text and/or text formatting. This type

of find/change operation uses the specify parameters for the

 You can find text using regular expressions, or “grep.” This type of find/change operation uses the

findGrepPreferences and changeGrepPreferences objects to specify parameters for the findGrep

changeGrep methods.

and

 You can find specific glyphs (and their formatting) and replace them with other glyphs and formatting.

findText and changeText methods.

findTextPreferences and changeTextPreferences objects to

This type of find/change operation uses the objects to specify parameters for the

All the find/change methods take one optional parameter, which the results of the search are returned. If you are processing the results of a find or change operation in a way that adds or removes text from a story, you might face the problem of invalid text references, as discussed earlier in this chapter. In this case, you can either construct your loops to iterate backward through the collection of returned text objects, or you can have the search operation return the results in reverse order and then iterate through the collection normally.

About find/change preferences

Before you search for text, you probably will want to clear find and change preferences, to make sure the settings from previous searches have no effect on your search. You also need to set some find/change preferences to specify the text, formatting, regular expression, or glyph you want to find and/or change. A typical find/change operation involves the following steps:

findGlyphPreferences and changeGlyphPreferences

findGlyph and changeGlyph methods.

ReverseOrder, which specifies the order in

1. Clear the find/change preferences. Depending on the type of find/change operation, this can take one of the following three forms:

CHAPTER 5: Text and Type Finding and Changing Text 100

 --find/change text preferences

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set find text preferences to nothing set change text preferences to nothing end tell

 --find/change grep preferences

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set find grep preferences to nothing set change grep preferences to nothing end tell

 --find/change glyph preferences

tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6" set find glyph preferences to nothing set change glpyh preferences to nothing end tell

2. Set up search parameters.

3. Execute the find/change operation.

4. Clear find/change preferences again.

Finding and changing text

The following script fragment shows how to find a specified string of text. While the following script fragment searches the entire document, you also can search stories, text frames, paragraphs, text columns, or any other text object. The the complete script, see FindText.)

--Clear the find/change preferences.

set find text preferences to nothing set change text preferences to nothing

--Search the document for the string "Text".

set find what of find text preferences to "text"

--Set the find options.

set case sensitive of find change text options to false set include footnotes of find change text options to false set include hidden layers of find change text options to false set include locked layers for find of find change text options to false set include locked stories for find of find change text options to false set include master pages of find change text options to false set whole word of find change text options to false tell active document

set myFoundItems to find text display dialog ("Found " & (count myFoundItems) & " instances of the search

string.") end tell

findText method and its parameters are the same for all text objects. (For

The following script fragment shows how to find a specified string of text and replace it with a different string (for the complete script, see ChangeText):

Macromedia InDesign - CS6 User Guide

Specifications and Main Features

Frequently Asked Questions

User Manual

Introduction

How to Use the Scripts in this Document

About the Structure of the Scripts

For More Information

Scripting Features

Script Preferences

Getting the Current Script

Script Versioning

Targ eting

Compilation

Interpretation

Using the do script Method

Sending parameters to do script

Returning values from do script

Controlling Undo with do Script

Working with Script Labels

Running Scripts at Startup

Documents

Basic Document Operations

Creating a new document

Opening a document

Saving a document

Closing a document

Basic Page Layout

Defining page size and document length

Defining bleed and slug areas

Setting page margins and columns

Changing the appearance of the pasteboard

Guides and grids

Changing measurement units and ruler

Defining and applying document presets

Setting up master spreads

Adding XMP metadata

Creating a document template

Creating watermarks

Adjusting Page Sizes and Layout

Selecting pages

Resizing and reframing pages

Transforming pages

Master page overlay

Making an Adaptive Layout

Making a flexible layout

Adding guides for a guide-based layout

Setting constraints for an object-based layout

Creating alternative layouts

Collecting and Dropping Content

Printing a Document

Printing using page ranges

Setting print preferences

Printing with printer presets

Exporting a Document as PDF

Exporting to PDF

Setting PDF export options

Exporting to grayscale PDF

Exporting a range of pages to PDF

Exporting individual pages to PDF

Exporting PDF with interactive features

Exporting as a PDF form

Exporting Pages as EPS

Exporting all pages to EPS

Exporting a range of pages to EPS

Exporting as EPS with file naming

Exporting to EPub

Exporting the current document

Setting EPub export options

Working with Layers

Understanding the Layer Object Model

Scripting Layers

Creating layers

Referring to layers

Deleting layers

Moving layers

Duplicating layers

Merging layers

Assigning page items to layers

Setting layer properties