CreativePro Forum

Return to Member Forum

• Author
  Posts
• • April 24, 2017 at 11:14 am #93867
    Jennifer Black

    Member

    When I place a particular Word doc in InDesign, it includes a bunch of code. For instance, the Word doc says this:

    “Step 3. When the Lineweight dialog box opens, scroll through and select the desired line thickness in which you want the layer to be printed and click OK (see Figure 4.41).”

    When it’s placed into Indesign, it says this:

    “<listitem><inst>Step 3. </inst><para>When the <emphasis role=”strong”>Lineweight</emphasis> dialog box opens, scroll through and select the desired line thickness in which you want the layer to be printed and click <emphasis role=”strong”>OK</emphasis> (see <link preference=”1″ linkend=”ch04fig37″>Figure <xref linkend=”ch04fig37″ label=”4-37″><inst>4.41)</inst></xref></link>.”

    Also, the Word doc is a mess – several different text boxes, styles, images, etc. – therefore resulting in a mess when placed into InDesign. The text formatting is surprisingly “ok” but everything else is just littered on the page. Does anyone know of any good practices to get a better result? Is there something I could do in Word perhaps?

    I’m using Microsoft Word 2013, InDesign CC and a PC with Windows 10.

    Thank you!

  • April 25, 2017 at 4:24 pm #93899
    Bonnie Britt

    Member

    Jennifer,

    The more cleanly styled the Word doc is, the easier it is to place in InDesign.

    Open a new Word doc. Copy and paste all of what’s in the old doc into the new Word doc. Delete the very last paragraph mark from the new Word doc. This is an old trick editors use to fix misbehaving or corrupt Word files.

    In Word Options, turn off all autocorrect functions except ‘Flag repeated words’ and Replace straight quotes with smart quotes.’

    Examine the styles in the new Word doc. Ensure that every element is styled in the way you want it. If you don’t know what that means, study this: https://shaunakelly.com/word/styles/stylesms.html

    One drastic way to apply styles from scratch in Word is to remove all formatting first. To do that, open the Styles palette. Select everything. Click “clear all” at the top of the palette. Again, you’re better off styling each element individually than letting Word automatically style or format anything.

    If messing with Word is too daunting, remove all formatting from the Word doc, place it in InDesign and style each element there.

• Author
  Posts