Endnotes as Pop-Up Footnotes

This script is part of the Notes collection. See the full collection here. For more information about using the scripts in this collection, see  Adding and Deleting Notes: Managing Cross-References.

This script is part of the Book and Long Document Composition/Production collection. See the full collection here. 

When you export to PDF or Epub a document that contains endnotes, InDesign creates links so that when you click an endnote reference, the page is shown that contains the endnote. To go back to the note reference you click the endnote number.

However, it’s often useful to read a note in its context, that is, not to leave the document page. This is possible with pop-up notes: move the mouse cursor over a note reference to pop up the note in a separate frame on the page; move away the mouse cursor and the note is hidden again.

The script shown here creates pop-up footnotes from InDesign’s endnotes. It’s very easy to use; no preparation is needed: the script creates everything it needs on the fly, as shown below. To use it, open any document that has endnotes and run the script from the Scripts panel. That’s all there’s to it.

(Various solutions exist for InDesign to produce pop-up items in PDFs and Epubs – see e.g. Justin Putney’s article in CreativePro – but none deal with endnotes, let alone processing them en masse.)

After the script has run, export the InDesign document to (interactive) PDF and/or (fixed-layout) Epub and move the mouse cursor over an endnote reference to see the result:

The script is non-destructive: it doesn’t change the endnotes at all. To delete the pop-ups, simply delete the layer on which they were placed by the script. The only footprint left by the script are the layer on which the notes are placed, a swatch, and an object style. The next section provides all the details.

Details

Take the following document, opened on page 1. The three panels are shown because that’s where the script adds what it needs:

After running the script the page looks as as in the next screenshot. A button is created for each note and placed at the foot of the page. An object style is created and applied to the note. The object style uses a swatch (Pop-up note), and it, too, is created on the fly. A button is placed on the endnote references (not visible in the screenshot, but see below) and linked to the pop-up button. All these buttons are placed on the Pop-up notes layer, which is created by the script.

All notes on the page are stacked on top of each other. They’re buttons set to hide until triggered in the PDF, so you’ll see this cabal of frames only in InDesign.

Here is another view of the page, now with the Buttons and Forms panel shown and with the Pop-up notes layer expanded. The first note reference is selected and highlighted in both panels.

Version history

10 July 2024: Posted.

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