Resources for Scripting and Publishing Automation

The list here contains some publications and sites that are useful resources for GREP and scripting. (Content updated and links last checked 16 Dec. 2025.)

Books/Ebooks

Scripting

There are surprisingly few books on scripting InDesign with JavaScript, and those that are available are pretty much dated, making reference in their titles to InDesign versions CS3, CS4, and CS5. Nevertheless, their content is basically still valid since the principles of scripting InDesign haven’t changed. Fellenz’s book is up to date.

• InDesign automatisieren: Keine Angst vor Skripting, GREP & Co (Gregor Fellenz; in German). Available in print and as an EPub (now in a 2nd edition) (see the title’s dedicated site). The book is in German, but the site has an English section on useful JavaScript tools. This original book introduces JavaScript and GREP, showing how the combination of the two makes for a powerful tool for typesetters and graphic artists alike.
• Grant Gamble wrote InDesign CS5 Automation Using XML & JavaScript, which is a good guide to JavaScript and especially to scripting XML. It also has a good primer on XSLT. It has CS5 in the title but most of the text and examples are still relevant for the latest InDesign versions.
• InDesign CS5 JavaScript. This is the same as above but without the XML chapters.
• Automating Adobe InDesign CS4 with ExtendScript (Shirley Hopkins). Though it has CS4 in the title it is still useful for recent CC versions of InDesign.
• JavaScript in InDesign. By Peter Kahrel. For absolute beginners.
• Peter Kahrel’s guide to ScriptUI, the module included in the ExtendScript Toolkit to write dialogs for all Creative Cloud applications.

GREP

There are many books on GREP (regular expressions) in general. The best title on GREP in general is Friedl’s book. To my knowledge there are just three titles dealing with GREP specifically in InDesign: Gregor Fellenz’s book (see above) and the two mentioned below.

• Mastering Regular Expressions (3rd ed.) (Jeffrey Friedl). The best general book on GREP. Not always easy, but excellent.
• Grep et InDesign CS3/CS4: Rechercher, remplacer et formater en un clic(Laurent Tournier). An excellent book (in French) containing a wealth of examples and tricks.
• Optimiser InDesign pour les documents longs. Avec les scripts et le GREP(Laurent Tournier). Another excellent book, this one with special attention to long documents (in French).
• GREP in InDesign. By Peter Kahrel. An in-depth guide to using GREP in InDesign.

Websites

• Adobe’s scripting forum is one of the best places to get help on scripting matters. This is also a good place to turn to when you need help on GREP matters, though for GREP queries you could also go to Adobe’s InDesign forum.
• CreativePro‘s forums are a good place to go with questions.
• Keith Gilbert‘s site offers many interesting scripts. Apart from making available free scripts, Keith also develops custom scripts.
• Silicon Publishing offer several scripts written by Olav Kvern for free download.
• HilfDirSelbst.ch is a general InDesign forum, but there are many queries and solutions involving GREP. This is the forum to head for with your German GREP queries – though speakers of English too are most welcome there.
• HilfDirSelbst.ch also has a special section for scripting (Skriptwerkstatt, ‘script workshop’). Like the general forum, this one is conducted in German but most people there are happy to answer English questions.
• Stefano Bernardi produced a useful list of scripts at https://redokun.com/blog/indesign-scripts.
• Ronald Dreger offers scripts on his web site.
• Harbs has a number of free scripts, in addition to his well-known plugins and suites.
• Gregor Fellenz created an alternative to the ESTK’s object-model browser for those who don’t like the latter.
• Marc Autret’s blog discusses intricate InDesign topics at a high level.
• Kasyan Servetsky’s site provides lots of his useful scripts. Kasyan also has a list which presents various scripts (not just his own) by category.
• Colin Flashman offers a number of free and paid solutions centered around his expertise in prepress and Data Merge solutions.
• William Campbell at Mars Premedia Prepress and Internet Prep Solutions offers a comprehensive suite of production-centered scripts for InDesign, Photoshop, and Illustrator, many of them free.
• ID-Extras features production and book composition scripts by Ariel Walden of Bookraft LLC.
• scriptopedia.org is a bilingual (French and English) repository for most aspects of automation of InDesign, PhotoShop, Illustrator, and Acrobat, using any of the three programming languages and Actions where they apply. The site appears to lean towards JavaScript and Indesign, but that’s bound to change.
• Loïc Aigon’s  blog covers InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, and Acrobat; his InDesign archive is here.
• Marijan Tompa (aka Tomaxxi) maintained a blog with many interesting and useful scripts and snippets. The site is no longer maintained but still accessible.
• Rorohiko has a nice on-line GREP tutor (English). They also do the APID developer kit, a powerful tool for developing scripted plugins.
• InDesignScript is an excellent site with scripting examples, tutorials, and its own forum dedicated to JavaScript. The site has a good collection of links. (German)
• Dave Saunders’ blog has good information. It hasn’t been updated for a while but there’s still some useful material there.

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