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• • March 7, 2019 at 7:10 am #114780
    B Holland

    Member

    Hi,

    I’ve got a fairly complex word document, which I’d like to convert to InDesign. When I say “complex”, I mean: some pages have a one-column headline, followed by 2-column and sometimes 3-column copy text with endnotes: the left-side column contains some sort of “summary” or “intro” text without endnotes. The right-side column contains the actual copy/content with endnotes. On top of that, there’s tables (which also contain copy with endnotes), pictures, etc…
    Basically, it’s some sort of “magazine design layout” done in Word. Full of column breaks, section breaks, page breaks, etc.

    I tried to import the document into InDesign, but that doesn’t really work, as it doesn’t import all the content from the Word document. (Probably because of the complexity and all the section breaks/page breaks/tables etc).

    Is there a way to do this via a manual “copy & paste”, whilst keeping the endnotes?
    I mean: When I copy/paste from one Word document to another, all the endnotes get carried over. But when I copy/paste from Word to InDesign, only the main text gets carried over and all the endnotes disappear.

    Is there any solution to this? Maybe a plugin, or script? Or 3rd party conversion software?

    Many thanks for your help!

  • March 7, 2019 at 7:17 am #114782
    Dieter Stockert

    Member

    When you say, you I tried to import the document into InDesign, do you mean copy/paste or place?

  • March 7, 2019 at 7:31 am #114786
    B Holland

    Member

    By import I mean place, yes.

  • March 9, 2019 at 5:42 am #114850
    Peter Kahrel

    Participant

    I read somewhere that there are considerable differences in how InDesign treats footnotes and endnotes depending on whether you’re placing a .doc file or a .docx one. So if you try .docx and the result is bad, open the file in Word and save it as .doc (or the other way round: if .doc doesn’t work right, try .docx)

  • March 12, 2019 at 3:14 am #114896
    B Holland

    Member

    Thanks for your reply! Conversions from .doc are indeed a little different to .doc (though not much). I’m pretty sure it’s the source document’s structure (columns/section breaks etc) that makes a straight conversion unfeasible.

    But I’ve found a way now for a straight “copy & paste” rather than “placing” a document:
    All I had to do was to go to Preferences > Clipboard Handling and enable “all information” instead of “text only”. This gives me the needed flexibility for conversions.

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